On another day, she’d asked him, “Is physical attraction the primary force that compels a man to seek out a woman?”
“It doesn’t hurt,” he said absently, smirking while perusing the manual of Gentleman’s Etiquette.
Thinking about a letter she’d received from Prue and how the gentleman, which her friend referred to as Lord F—, had pursued her to the point of compromising her in the gardens at Sutherfield Terrace, Jane had required more from his response. “What if the gentleman knows he cannot have her?”
To that, Raven had looked up sharply. He closed the book with a snap and dropped it onto her desk, seeming cross. “Sometimes a man desires what he cannot have, and not even he can explain the reason.”
He’d left shortly thereafter and stayed away for the two days that followed.
* * *
When he’d returned, he had regained his usual rakish humor, flirting with her shamelessly as she’d tried to teach him table manners and the intricacies of flatware.
“Show me again how the napkin is supposed to lay across my lap,” he’d said blandly. But there had been enough heat in his smoky gaze that suggested he had an ulterior motive.
Still irritated by his unexplained absence, and wondering if the siren call of cyprians had kept him away, she’d tossed the wadded linen at him. “Perhaps you would be better served if you had interests other than sexual congress.”
Capturing her wrist, he’d kissed her fingertips and waggled his brows. “You would not say such a thing if you knew how all-consuming pleasure can be.”
She’d jerked free, wanting to stomp her foot and be angry at him. And yet, she had to think about the book. Understanding the driving force of a scoundrel’s nature would be valuable information.
“Very well, then,” she’d said, taking up her ledger. “If you would, describe the sensation wrought by coupling.”
Raven had looked at her thoughtfully for some time and softly tucked a tendril behind her ear.
“Pleasure isn’t always a matter of physiology, professor. Sometimes,” he’d added rather cryptically, “a man can walk away from a rousing conversation, feeling more sated than if he’d spent himself between a pair of comely thighs.”
She, of course, had blushed but averted her face to write down every word verbatim.
* * *
The remainder of the week had progressed similarly. For every lesson she’d given, he’d provided a new insight for the primer.
Jane should be pleased, lack of kisses notwithstanding.
However, the more pages she filled in the ledger, the more she knew that this time with Raven would come to an end. The thought made her listless and anxious at the same time. It made no logical sense. After all, she’d known this from the beginning.
Still, she sighed as she folded and sealed the letter for Prue, leaving it on a salver in the hall.
She came back to the conservatory just as Raven strode through the door. Her chronic arrhythmia erupted again in a flurry of heart palpitations that drew all the blood from her brain, leaving her with that peculiar giddy, spinning sensation.
She pinched the bridge of her nose and wondered if a simple remedy might be to start wearing a corset and being fitted for spectacles.
Raven tossed his hat and gloves to the top of her desk with familiarity. But a frown furrowed the flesh above the bridge of his nose as he stared at her quizzically. “Something amiss, little professor?”
He took a step toward her and reached for her hand. Her fingertips tingled, craving his warm touch.
In the last instant, she shied away and pretended an urgent need to replace the stopper on her inkwell. “Nothing of the sort, I assure you.”
His gaze wandered over her in a slow, speculative perusal, pausing at the pulse at her throat and the crests of her cheeks. Then his mouth quirked as if he were privy to her inner thoughts and believed them all to be scandalous. That one hot look had the peculiar effect of expelling all the air from her lungs, sending her stomach into fits of flutters.
It was decided then. She would begin wearing a corset on the morrow.
He took a step toward her, then two, until only an inch separated them. The crisp scent of the outdoors clung to his clothes. She drew in a breath, catching the pleasing spice of fresh shaving soap, the aroma of leather boot polish and his own tantalizingly earthy essence.
“What’s my lesson today, hmm? Physiology, I hope. Or, better yet, female anatomy. Just lay yourself out on the trestle table for in-depth scholarly research,” he said, his voice as deep and rich as blackberry jam on rum-soaked cake.
“Paying calls,” she whispered hoarsely as if she’d spent the past hour breathing in noxious fumes from an experiment.
She cleared her throat and tried again. “It is a gentleman’s obligation to return calls that are paid to him. Morning calls to a person of the female sex, however, should always be of a short duration, otherwise it suggests certain intimacies. Therefore, it is essential to keep your hat and gloves with you.”
He chuckled and distractedly skimmed the backs of his knuckles along the exposed inner curve of her forearm, eliciting tingles of gooseflesh. “Does society believe it’s impossible for a man and woman to swiv”—he stopped at her narrow-eyed glance—“to share intimacies while a man carries his hat?”
“Certainly. If his hands are otherwise occupied then he is ready to leave at a moment’s notice and cannot engage in any activity to sully his hostess’s reputation.”
Raven turned back toward the desk and proceeded to don his gloves and then his hat. “Come closer, Jane. I’m going to demonstrate the first four things that popped into my mind—no, make that seven—in order to better inform you of what a man is capable of while still keeping his hat and gloves.”
“Seven?” she asked without the slightest blush. She was genuinely curious now. “I should need to take notes.”
Picking up her ledger and the stub of a pencil, she numbered the page and waited for him to begin.
He grinned and quickly surveyed the conservatory. “This isn’t the ideal room to have you up against a wall, since these are all glass. Nonetheless, that wouldn’t disturb my hat. Neither would taking you against the door.”
She considered this for a moment, her mind blank. Then her sketch artist flashed a pair of scandalous drawings and the surface of her skin heated by at least eight degrees. “I don’t mean to question your authority on the subject. However, wouldn’t those two be the same . . . um . . . position?”
“Not if, for the second one, I’m behind you and you’re facing the door, hands braced, feet apart,” he whispered, his breath drifting across her cheek as he tapped the tip of his index finger to the paper. “You’re not writing.”
She blinked, several times. Her throat went dry. And her body seemed to have developed a series of new pulse points that quickened deep inside and caused her inner organs to tilt and clench. “Oh, yes. And the third?”
“This desk would do nicely. Or on this stool with you on my lap and your hands on my shoulders,” he said and shifted closer. His boot slid in between her slippers, compressing the layers of her petticoat and skirts until they were molded against her thighs.
Her fingers slipped down the length of the pencil, her nails butting up against the page. “Goodness, I think I put too many pieces of wood in that stove. If you’re too warm, we could open the door to the garden.”