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following me around all week.”
    “I promise that if you or Mr. Goodale write, I will respond through return post.”
    “Return post? That will hardly do. It would be better if you just stayed in London while we are on it. Then you can respond immediately.”
    The demand caught her by surprise. He looked at her, the picture of a reasonable man assuming she would accommodate him, now that he had accommodated her.
    “That is not possible. I have duties too. At The Rarest Blooms.”
    “Surely Miss Johnson could tend those flowers and plants while you are gone a short while. It is very much in your interests to take residence in town. This would get settled much more quickly that way. You would be here to influence my decision too. I am surprised you do not see the benefits for your position.”
    She searched his expression for some sign of humor in how he was cornering her. She only saw the face of a duke concluding she was stupid not to realize that he was making her victory easier.
    “How long do you think this would be?”
    “A week. Perhaps ten days. I can’t imagine it being longer than that.”
    She could not help but be suspicious. Still, if it would settle this more quickly, and if she could influence his decision—“I suppose that I could ask Celia—Mrs. Albrighton—for a chamber in her home.”
    He returned to his chair and made himself very comfortable. “I doubt her new husband will appreciate the intrusion. Also, she lives near Bedford Square, does she not? That is too far away and inconvenient. Better if you stay here, as my guest.”
    His innocent expression did not fool her. She had guessed the game he might be playing, and with that last sentence he showed all his cards.
    “If I care a shred for my reputation, best if I do not stay here, Your Grace.”
    He smiled devilishly and looked more like he had at her house than he had all afternoon. “I forgot that Mrs. Joyes is fairly strict about proprieties.”
    “Yes, she is boring and inconvenient that way.”
    Still smiling, he gazed over in that familiar, incisive way that subtly crossed inappropriate lines. “And if I insist?”
    So, there it was. This call was not only about that property and his decision. Perhaps it was not about either at all. She felt as if, rather suddenly, she had come under a predator’s examination. It would help enormously if the caution he raised in her was not heavily tinged with alarming, warm stimulations.
    “If you insist, I will question your motives, which are already suspicious, sir. I will also remind you that you said I could refuse you anything, and you would not hold it against me. I assume that as a gentleman you meant it.”
    “I don’t remember saying that. I am sure you are mistaken. It doesn’t sound like me at all.”
    “You remember well enough when you choose. It was the last thing you said at the end of our dinner.”
    “How careless of me. I am never so rashly generous.”
    The air was getting thick with words unspoken and implications layering high. She prayed that she would not blush again, but his long, knowing gaze provoked scandalous little thrills that dismayed her.
    “I will write to Celia this evening and arrange to visit with her. New husband notwithstanding, she will be agreeable.”
    He dismissed her intention with an irritated flip of his hand. “I have a better solution, one to which you can not object. Summerhays has offered the use of his family house on Park Lane. Since he and his wife have gone to the coast and his mother has gone down to the country, you will have both comfort and privacy there, with all necessary proprieties in place.”
    He had planned this thoroughly, she realized. Perhaps plotted it for days. He had been leading her to this exact spot with the entire conversation. “I doubt that Lord Sebastian made this offer on impulse. What did you do to encourage him?”
    “I may have written and mentioned I had met you and that I thought that you would be coming