Free The Corrupt Comte by Edie Harris Page A

the secret paneled door from which he’d entered. He chose his next words carefully. “After all, think of the gossip if society knew your future bride was already ensconced here, in your home.”
    Évoque affected an affronted expression. “There’s nothing untoward occurring between me and the mademoiselle. I placed her in the wing opposite my own.”
    Which was what Gaspard had wanted to know. And it meant the windows on the second floor he’d seen were likely hers, their light like a beacon in the darkness. “Of course. My apologies.”
    The duke stood, watching Gaspard intently. “So…you’ll be going to the opera this week?”
    “I wouldn’t miss it.”
    Évoque smiled. “Excellent.”
    Just as Gaspard stepped through the panel door and into the stairwell encircling the turret’s chambers, Évoque called out, “Oh, and, Gaspard? Don’t be seen.”
    Whether that was in reference to tonight or to his upcoming mission at the opera, Gaspard couldn’t tell, and he didn’t bother with an answer as his jaw clenched shut. He merely inclined his head and embraced the dark of the stairwell, the door closing behind him.
    Two options faced him. He could go down and retrieve his hat and coat, then hurry home to his shabby bachelor apartments several long blocks away from the palaces dotting the riverbank. Or he could go up. Up to the guest quarters. Up to the lighted windows. Up to Claudia.
    He went up.
    When the war had ended and their lives as official spies for Crown and country first began, Évoque had encouraged Gaspard, Sabien, Max and Faron to make arrangements…the inference being that France might someday no longer be a safe place for them to call home. Sabien, as the third son of a marquis and a decorated officer—one who had survived the White Terror following Napoleon’s Hundred Days because he’d already been spying for the exiled king—had family living in Scotland he could turn to. Max was a baron, beloved by society and absolutely the last man anyone would suspect of being a spy, which meant he was likely safe where he was—and if he wasn’t, he had plenty of money to fund his escape. As for Faron…well, Faron could take care of himself.
    But Gaspard was spiraling. His lies would be the death of him if he didn’t play this right, and he wanted to believe his instincts—instincts that told him Claudia Pascale was his game-winning piece.
    Évoque couldn’t possess her. Sabien couldn’t appreciate her.
    His walking stick struck the door leading to the second level of suites, and he opened it slowly, silently. A pair of sconces cast faint light in the hallway, revealing one heavy-paneled door after another. He closed his eyes briefly, visualizing in his mind the layout of the mansion he’d memorized long ago, trying to focus on where he’d seen those windows.
    Holding his breath, he strode down the hallway, hearing the snick of the secret door as it latched behind him. Twenty feet, thirty, and—
    He paused. A sound, coming from behind a tall door not five feet ahead of him on his right… He knew that sound. It was the same sound he’d heard two nights ago in a linen closet, coming from between the bite-stung lips of a woman he’d tied up and blindfolded.
    It was the sound she’d made, right before she came all over his fingers.
    Gaspard didn’t knock, didn’t bother with a fortifying breath. He simply turned the knob and entered the bedchamber.
    There, in the middle of a massive bed piled high with cream-colored linens atop a red satin throw, lay a moaning Claudia Pascale, head thrown back, throat exposed, back arched.
    And with a frantic hand between her legs.
    He couldn’t remember the last time he’d gotten a cockstand so hard, so fast.
    His eyes narrowed on her as she sprawled across that blatantly sensual piece of furniture—and he cursed that bastard Évoque to hell for giving Claudia such a bed—a lecherous grin curling his lips. This was too perfect an opportunity to