Master of Love by Catherine LaRoche

elected fellow and tutor there next year. Danvers pays them all a small quarterly stipend; we provide lodgings at Rexton House when they come down to London and underwrite their costs for research travel, such as attending the Edinburgh conference.”
    â€œAll most admirable, but not quite to the point, I’m afraid,” she said, tapping one foot. “What I’m after is a better understanding of how you intend to use these books. It would help in my organization of the collection.”
    So much for deflection. “What exactly would you like to know?” he asked carefully.
    â€œHow often do you plan to consult the books, and are there certain tomes in particular you want easily accessible? Do you enjoy reading, my lord?” Her puckered brow took on the air of real puzzlement.
    â€œYou sound skeptical of that possibility, Miss Higginbotham.”
    â€œNot at all,” she said too brightly. “I would read all day if I had the leisure, but I’m an odd bird in that regard. Most noblemen maintain a library simply because it’s expected of their station. Few read much at all.”
    It was his great secret. He felt a sweat break out under his collar, the childhood anxiety start to churn his stomach, at the truth that he wanted only to spend his time in the library, reading and writing philosophy. He’d have given his right arm to have been allowed that path in life. Such had not been his fate. From earliest age, his father had viciously mocked Dom’s interest in study and dismissed him as his mother’s golden-boy Cupid. When he’d tried to be taken seriously as a scholar at the University of Cambridge, he’d soon learned it wasn’t only his father and the childhood tutors the man had hired who found the idea of him as a dedicated student absurd. The faculty at Cambridge had heard the gossip and ignored him on arrival, laughing that it’d be a waste of their time to educate a lordling whose talents so obviously lay in the bedroom. He’d thought to show them all, but his first philosophy essay on Plato only got him hauled before the dean on charges of plagiarism—they insisted he couldn’t have written anything so original and learned himself.
    An empty-headed pretty boy was all he’d ever been allowed to be.
    The way this slip of a woman Callista dared make public her love of learning filled him with envy and sorely provoked his old demons of shame. He’d buried his true self behind the Master of Love lie, in order to pursue his real interests in concealment. But now here she was, dangling her unusual intellectual proclivities for all to see.
    Walpole’s story at table about the young-buck lord who’d fancied himself Plato had almost made him lose his lunch, although at least that poor bastard’s father had helped him. If Dom’s secret ever got out, if such were ever to happen to him —laughed off the lectern, ridiculed by all—it would be his worst nightmare.
    The secret life he’d crafted must never come to light.
    He stalled. “Are you always such a bookish sort and always so serious—no laughter, no teasing?”
    She considered him patiently. He was still avoiding her question of course, redirecting it back on her, and in a less-than-flattering light. Her shoulders rolled back, as if accepting the burden. “Yes, I suppose I am. If you wish, my lord, I shall endeavor to lighten my demeanor.”
    He stared at her grave countenance before barking with laughter. “Are you teasing me now, my dear Miss Higginbotham? Is that the hint of a smile curling those enchanting lips of yours?” He reached out to trace their luscious curve, but she batted away his hand as a blush bloomed crimson across her cheeks. “You could give Graves a run for his money in a straight-face competition.”
    Flirtatious banter it was going to have to be. This Callista was too delightful to resist. He knew he