“I thought you were residing with Mrs. Newcomb in a fashionable neighborhood.”
Miss Stratham shot him another look. “How do you know so much about my circumstances? Oh, yes, my sister must have told you.”
He’d made it his business to find out about Venetia long before that.
They had been dallying in the corridor, and when he ushered her inside, her wariness momentarily turned to curiosity. “I have wondered what goes on in a den of iniquity.”
“You don’t know?”
“No, of course not.”
A single lamp burned softly, casting a golden-rose glow around the room. He watched as she took in her surroundings…the enormous satin-covered bed swathed in gauzy scarlet curtains, a chaise longue strewn with tasseled pillows, a table covered with an elaborate assortment of carnal equipment.
Quinn was glad for her wide-eyed reception, for it suggested she was still a novice at the erotic arts.
“One would think you have never been to a pleasure club before.”
“I have not— Well, I have, but only once, in Paris, and not upstairs.”
Her blush was rather endearing. Then she shook herself as if recalling her circumstances and turned the conversation back to him. “It is common knowledge that you frequent places like this regularly.”
“I would not say ‘regularly.’?”
“According to the gossip rags, you do. The society pages follow your movements and report on your whereabouts. That is how I knew where to find you tonight.”
“I’ve made no secret of my patronage of Tavistock’s.”
“The Morning Chronicle speculated that you were meeting Lady X here tonight.”
Quinn felt his mouth tighten. His former mistress, Julia, Lady Dalton, was a baronet’s widow and went by the soubriquet Lady X. “You cannot believe everything you read.”
Venetia did not seem chastened. “The newspapers were not my only source. You know servants are experts at ferreting out information, and Mrs. Newcomb’s staff are particularly well informed.”
“How resourceful of you,” Quinn drawled. He was half admiring of her boldness in tracking him down at a brothel, even if he didn’t approve of her being here. It was the kind of action the women in his family would take. Like the Wildes, Venetia Stratham refused to conform or do the expected.
He admired her spirit as well. There was a fire inside her that her elegant, ladylike exterior couldn’t hide.
When he closed the door behind him, she glanced back over her shoulder and saw what he had done. “Must you shut the door?”
“Yes, so that we won’t be interrupted. The rules are simple. A closed door means the room is occupied.”
She digested that without replying but bit her lip in consternation.
“You can safely remove your mask,” Quinn said. “Here, let me help you.”
When he reached up to untie the strings behind her turban, however, Venetia flinched and drew away from him. “I prefer to leave it on.”
He felt a measure of disappointment that he wouldn’t get a better glimpse of her beautiful eyes.
She moved farther into the room, gazing around her nervously. He had caught her off guard with their smoldering kiss earlier, and she had quickly recovered her aplomb, but now she seemed flustered again. Perhaps her fidgets were due to being alone with him in a room designed for sexual pleasure.
With the door shut, Quinn also was more cognizant of the primitive sensations still streaking through him: possessiveness, hunger, desire. Sexual awareness was suddenly rife between them.
She felt it also, he knew. The tension in her body had returned with a new, sharp-edged tautness he could actually sense.
Obviously trying to pretend nonchalance, she cleared her throat. “I confess I am out of my element here.”
In an effort to put her at ease, he replied lightly, “You are the one armed with a knife, Miss Stratham. Perhaps I should fear for my virtue.”