At Marietta’s gentle touch, Cole felt a quick rush of sexual excitement. He brushed her hand away and turned his back on her.
“Sing some more, Marietta,” he said, knowing that her singing would quickly dampen his desire. “I do so like to hear you sing.”
“Really?” she asked, eyes shining.
“You have no idea,” he said as he picked up his chambray shirt.
Marietta was thrilled. Her singing had had the desired effect. She would use it as her chief tool to tempt him. And once she had seduced him, had given herself to him, he would surely fall in love with her. So much in love he would not force her to go to Galveston to her grandfather. He would take her wherever she wanted to go. And she wanted to go back to Central City and the opera!
Marietta inwardly shuddered at the prospect of allowing Cole to actually make love to her. She didn’t really know what to expect. Wasn’t sure she would know what she was supposed to do when the time came.
She was worried. But she had no other choice. If she was ever to be free of him, then she would have to let Cole make love to her. It would, she knew, be quite a sacrifice on her part.
But it would be worth it.
Also by Nan Ryan
THE SCANDALOUS MISS HOWARD
THE SEDUCTION OF ELLEN
THE COUNTESS MISBEHAVES
WANTING YOU
CHIEFTAIN
Naughty Marietta
Nan Ryan
For seven of my favorite writers
who are also valued friends
Marsha Canham
Lori Copeland
Heather Graham
Virginia Henley
Kat Martin
Meryl Sawyer
Christina Skye
Contents
One
June 1872
Midnight in Galveston, Texas, a Southern coastal city still under the occupation of federal reconstruction troops seven long years after the end of the War Between the States.
A man who had given the ultimate for the Confederacy’s cause—his only son’s life—sat alone in the paneled library of his spacious seaside mansion. He was grimacing in agony, his teeth were clenched, his eyes closed.
Seventy-eight-year-old, wheelchair-bound, Maxwell Lacey—crippled in a fall from a horse years ago—was suffering. The increased dosage of laudanum failed to kill the pain. The disease that was slowly ravaging his frail body was incurable; he would not recover. Nor, he realized, would his passing be an easy, peaceful one.
The