In all his life, there had never been anything Cross had wanted to do more than throw this strange woman down on his desk and give her precisely that for which she was asking.

Desire was irrelevant. Or perhaps it was the only thing that was relevant. Either way, he could not assist Lady Philippa Marbury.

She was the most dangerous female he’d ever met.

He shook his head and said the only words he trusted himself to say. Short. To the point. “I am afraid I am unable to accommodate your request, Lady Philippa. I suggest you query another. Perhaps your fiancé.” He hated the suggestion even as he made it. Bit back the urge to rescind it.

She was quiet for a long moment, blinking up at him from behind her thick spectacles, reminding him that she was untouchable.

He waited for her to redouble her efforts. To come at him again with her straight looks and her forthright words.

Of course, there was nothing predictable about this woman.

“I do wish you’d call me Pippa,” she said, and with that, she turned and left.

Chapter Two

When Pippa was no more than six or seven, the five daughters Marbury had been paraded about for a musical interlude (as hosts’ children often were) like little blond ducks before a gathering of peers at a country house party, the details of which she could no longer remember.

As they exited the room, an older gentleman with laughing eyes had stopped her and asked which instrument she preferred to play. Now, had the gentleman inquired such a thing of Penelope, she would have answered with complete assurance that the pianoforte was her favorite. Had he asked Victoria or Valerie, the twins would have replied in unison that they enjoyed the cello. And Olivia would have won him with her five-year-old smile—coy even then—and told him that she liked horns.

But he’d mistakenly asked Pippa, who had proudly announced that she had little time for music, as she was too busy learning general anatomy. Mistaking the gentleman’s quiet shock for interest, she’d then proceeded to lift the skirts of her pinafore and proudly name the bones of her foot and leg.

She got as far as the fibula before her mother had arrived, shrieking her name against the quiet musical backdrop of society’s laughter.

That was the first time Pippa realized that she was odd.

It was also the first time she’d ever been embarrassed. It was a strange emotion—entirely different from all the others, which seemed to fade with time. Once one had eaten, for example, it was difficult to recall the precise characteristics of hunger. Certainly, one remembered wishing one had food, but the keen desire for sustenance was not easily recalled.

Similarly, Pippa was no stranger to irritation—she had four sisters, after all—but she could not exactly remember the way it felt to be utterly, infuriatingly irritated with any one of them. Lord knew there had been days when she could have cheerfully pushed Olivia from a moving carriage, but she couldn’t resurrect the emotion now.

She could remember, however, the hot embarrassment that came with the laughter at that country gathering as though it had happened yesterday. As though it had happened moments ago.

But what had actually happened moments ago seemed somehow worse than showing half of the Beau Monde one’s seven-year-old ankles. Being labeled the strangest Marbury from such a young age allowed for one to develop something of a thick skin. It took much more than snickers from behind fans to rouse Pippa’s embarrassment.

Apparently, it took a man refusing her request for ruination.

A very tall, clearly intelligent, obviously fascinating man.

She had done her best—laid out her proposal in detail, appealed to him as a man of science—and still, he’d refused.

She hadn’t considered that possibility.

She should have, of course. She should have recognized it the moment she stepped inside that glorious office—filled with all manner of interesting things—should have known that her offer would not intrigue him. Mr. Cross was obviously a man of knowledge and experience, and she was the fourth daughter of a double marquess, who could name all the bones in the human body and was therefore somewhat abnormal.

It mattered not a bit that she required a research associate and that she had a mere fourteen days—just 336 dwindling hours—to resolve all her questions regarding her future marriage.

He’d obviously completed plenty of his own experimentation and did not require a research associate.

Not even one who was willing to pay him.

Looking around the large, empty main room of the casino, she supposed she should not have been surprised by that either. After all, a man who owned a casino that dealt in the kind of finances accounted in the large, leather-bound ledger she’d discovered when she’d entered his office was not the kind of man who could be tempted by twenty-five pounds. Or fifty.

That, she should have considered.

It was a pity, really. He’d seemed altogether promising. The most promising option when she’d conceived of the plan, several nights earlier after reading the text of the ceremony to which she would be a party in two weeks’ time.

Carnal lust.

Procreation.

It was wrong, was it not, that a woman was made party to such things without any experience? Without even a sound explanation of the items in question? And that was before the priest even came to the bits relating to obedience and servitude.

It was all entirely unsettling.

Even more unsettling when she considered how disappointed she’d been that Mr. Cross had refused her.

She would have liked to have spent more time with his abacus.

Not just the abacus.

Pippa did not believe in lying, either to herself or to others. It was perfectly fine if those around her wanted to hide the truth, but she had found long ago that dishonesty only made for more work in the long run.