Free The Art of Sinning by Sabrina Jeffries

your scurrilous brother Samuel.”
    â€œTrue, but I also said I know all his tricks. And yours.” She crossed her arms over her chest defensively. “If we’re in a room in the manor and you misbehave, I can always call for a servant.”
    â€œIf you’re naïve enough to think that threatening to call a servant would save you from seduction, then you don’t know any man’s tricks,” he said dryly.
    That seemed to give her pause. As well it should. “But if you try anything with me, you won’t get yourpainting. And surely that’s more important to you than attempting to bed one more woman in a long string of them.”
    â€œOf course,” he said with a smooth smile.
    She was right—it should be. Unfortunately, she didn’t realize what a potent enchantress she was. The prospect of painting her while she was dressed in a flimsy costume had him fairly salivating.
    Being alone with her at night for hours on end would be tempting fate. So of course, he must do it. He’d never been one to back down from a challenge.
    â€œVery well,” he said, “we’ll work while everyone else sleeps. But this room won’t do. It’s fine for the portrait, but the thing that makes it perfect for painting in the daytime will make it disastrous for our evening trysts.”
    He gestured to the windows with their flimsy net curtains. “I’ll need plenty of candles, lamps, and firelight to see by, and that will give away our presence to anyone who passes by below—servants, grooms, local populace. Not to mention your brother. Someone might come to investigate.”
    â€œThat’s true.” Her brow furrowed. “We need something more secluded and private, but indoors. Perhaps down the hall?”
    â€œIt’ll need to be far away from your brother’s bedchamber or he’ll hear us.”
    â€œTrue.” Wandering out of the room, she looked around. “Edwin’s suite is on this floor, as is yours. We can’t use the library, because Edwin likes to go in there when he can’t sleep. On the floor above, where my bedchamber and the others are, there might be a spare sitting room we could use.”
    â€œToo small.” He peered up the open well of the staircase. “What’s on the floor above that?”
    She tensed. “Nothing, really. Just the old nursery and schoolroom.”
    â€œThe schoolroom might do.” Without waiting for her, he strode up the stairs.
    â€œIt isn’t ever used,” she protested as she hurried after him. “I can’t even remember the last time a fire was laid in the hearth.”
    â€œAs long as the fireplace still draws, it should be fine.”
    When they reached the top floor, he paused to look around, seeing only a series of closed doors. “Which room is it?”
    Looking oddly reluctant, she meandered to the end of the carpeted hall and flung a door open. “Honestly, I don’t think—”
    But he was already stalking past her and into the room. A drugget covered the floor and Holland cloths draped the furniture, supporting her assertion that the room wasn’t used. A globe sat bare and forgotten in a corner, a blackboard hung on the wall, and a few spindly chairs were scattered about.
    Best of all, in the center of the room stood a massive oak table that had obviously been deemed too marred by scratches and stains to warrant protecting. It could serve as an altar if he covered it with white fabric.
    He ran his hand over the dusty surface. A pity he couldn’t use it as it was. The wood had stories to tell; he could practically hear it calling to him. But the altar’s surface must be pale enough to show theblood that he would paint coursing down from his sacrifice.
    His beautiful, provocative sacrifice, who remained frozen in the doorway, clearly uncertain of his choice. “Surely you don’t think this will