Wicked Desires (Wicked Affairs, Book One) Read Online Free PDF Page A

down, you’ll see you haven’t lost so much. And if you want my opinion—”
    “Which I don’t, thank you.”
    “If you want my opinion, the man is in love with you. Nothing else would prevent a man from fucking my whores, not while they are naked and in the very act of intercourse. Nothing, madam.”
    “Love? That’s not what I call love.”
    “Perhaps you are denying him his rights?”
    Clarissa slammed her glass on the table and stood up. “Me? I throw myself at him. This very night, I had my mouth on his cock and he rejected me. Denying him? He’s the one who denies me.”
    “Hmm.”
    Alice leaned back in her chair, her glass settled on her stomach. Her lips puckered again. “How long has it been since he made love to you?”
    Clarissa melted at the humiliating admission. “Over a year.”
    Lord, what was her life coming to that she spilled the secrets of her marriage to the local bawdy-house madam? It was bad enough that Anne knew some and suspected more about her relationship with Michael.
    “You’re several years younger than the earl?”
    “No. Only six.”
    “How old is he?”
    “Forty-one.”
    The madam hummed again, nodding her head and smiling. She looked like Mother Goose, only she sold sex instead of spinning nursery rhymes.
    “We had a perfect marriage. He loved me. He loves me! I don’t understand and he won’t tell me what’s wrong. Really, I have to go home.” Clarissa stood, her legs weak and unresponsive.
    “Lady Dunnaway, calm yourself. Please stay seated. I’ll see that you are home in time.”
    Clarissa recognized that Alice DuPuis was a consummate manipulator and a skilled abbess, yet Clarissa complied, since she could see no other way of solving her problem. The woman seemed too matronly and kind and honest to be a threat, and perhaps she, more than anyone, understood men in the most base and meaningful way.
    Finally, Alice spoke. Clarissa sat up to listen, believing that her happiness—her life, her existence—was at stake.
    “Just so you understand, I’m offering these suggestions in a purely mercenary capacity. You will pay me if you accept, just as the earl will continue to pay me.”
    Clarissa nodded.
    “The earl seems devoted to you and you seem interested in pleasing him. Perhaps we could come to an arrangement whereby you are the woman in his room.”
    “I’m sorry?” Clarissa had heard her correctly, and even though she’d seen enough tonight to cause blindness, she still gaped at the madam’s suggestion.
    “Of course, you’d be alone with the earl. I believe I could work up a sufficiently erotic tale about my newest French whore to keep the earl unsuspecting for a few weeks while you, shall we say, entice him? You are French, are you not?”
    “ Oui , on my father’s side.”
    “Perfect.”
    “Why would I do such a thing? Michael obviously finds a satisfaction here that I cannot provide.”
    “Men change. He’s gotten older. Perhaps he is worried about keeping you, satisfying you. Perhaps his taste in entertainments has changed and he is worried he will hurt or offend you. The children are gone. He has a little less stamina. A little less hair.”
    “He does not! He has perfectly fine hair.”
    “I think you understand what I’m trying to say. Men put a lot of stock in their virility. It’s a blow when they discover they aren’t the stallions they thought they were.”
    “My husband is quite virile. Obviously it is his appetite for the unusual, as you suggest.” She bit at her fingernail. “And perhaps he is bored with me now that I’m old and done bearing his children.”
    Alice smiled. “Somehow that seems to me to be the least of your worries.” The madam allowed her appraising gaze to wander over Clarissa’s figure. “I think you look as good as some of my best whores.”
    Clarissa gasped. “Madame DuPuis, I take exception to your statement.”
    “Calm yourself, Lady Dunnaway. We have to look at all of your assets if you are to