Shifting in the chair, she slowly lifted the veil from her face. “Well, I do not expect my purpose to require more than one.” Meeting his eyes without the black netting filtering her view proved more unsettling than she’d expected. The man had a poignant gaze. “I shall assume you are an intelligent man and that you know why I’m here.”
He lowered his chin and the look he gave her then would have made her pulse flutter if she had been a weaker woman. “I would never presume to know a woman’s mind.”
“Intelligent, indeed.”
He flashed his teeth in a brief smile. “Tell me what you need of me and I shall endeavor to please you.”
She ignored the tightness his words and voice and eyes created low in her body. A sharp edge entered her voice as she replied with a practiced smile. “What would please me, Mr. Maxwell, is your exodus from London.”
Her declaration did not appear to surprise him. Leaning back in his chair, he linked his fingers over his abdomen and returned her steady stare. The curve of his mouth was undeniable, as was the lowered, more intimate tone of his voice as he replied. “It appears you are everything you’ve been reported to be, Madam Pendragon. This pleasures me immensely.”
“It is not my intention to pleasure you, Mr. Maxwell,” she noted coolly. Though he remained silent and unmoving, his gaze intensified as light sparked in their depths, making her wonder if his eyes were not as dark as they’d first appeared. “Nor is it my intention to suggest a threat in my words. The simple truth is that you cannot compete with Pendragon’s Pleasure House. Your club will fail.” She smiled, silky smooth. “I hope only for you to avoid the inevitable embarrassment and loss. You would be better off re-establishing your club elsewhere. Might I suggest Bath or Edinburgh?”
He lowered his chin with a long, slow exhale as he removed his spectacles and laid them atop his desk. When he looked at her again, he kept his chin lowered and lifted only his gaze. “Madam Pendragon. It seems clear that you would not have come here if you did not fear the exact thing you deny. But I would like to assure you that my business is not a threat to yours in any form.”
Annoyance filled her at his unshakeable poise and subtle condescension. But before she could respond, he leaned forward to prop his elbows on his desk as he looked intently into her eyes. “You see, our businesses could not be more dissimilar.”
Her temper flared. Did he believe himself so damned superior, then?
Callista shifted in her chair and leaned forward to mimic his posture, folding her hands on the gleaming surface of his desk. Though the position pushed her breasts against the edge of her bodice, exaggerating her cleavage and lengthening her neck, she was surprised to see that his gaze flickered not to her bosom but to her leather-encased fingers. The flame that had sparked in her core at the first sight of this man flared.
Steeling herself against it once again, she tilted her head to reply in a cool tone. “No matter how covert your services or how boring the décor of your establishment, the truth cannot be changed. Your business, Mr. Maxwell, is fucking. And so is mine.”
She didn’t exactly think she would shock him with her crude choice of words, but she certainly didn’t expect the reaction she got.
It started with a slow, almost gentle widening of his lips—as though he’d just been offered a favored sweet and was imagining how he’d savor it—followed by a glitter of unnamed intention in his eyes. “You are quite right, madam. And also very wrong.”