One Night with a Rake (Regency Rakes) by Connie Mason, Mia Marlowe

surrender.
    “All right. You win. I promise to behave.” He turned his attention back to the outspread map, but lifted his hand in a summoning gesture. “Come. I’ve discovered something that may interest you, actually.”
    She hesitated. Nathaniel’s kiss that morning wasn’t the sort of thing she could easily dismiss. She ought not to spend time with him.
    Of course, it wasn’t as if that had been her first kiss. Last Christmas, Lord Roger Fishwick had stolen a kiss from her under the mistletoe at her family’s house party. Even with copious amounts of rum punch thrown into the mix and the frivolous holiday atmosphere, the kiss wasn’t very remarkable. Roger’s lips were wet and slippery, like the underside of a lily pad. The memory of his kiss certainly didn’t make her toes curl inside her shoes.
    Not like her toes curled now just looking at Nathaniel Colton. She didn’t dare lower her guard with him, but his absorption with the map piqued her curiosity.
    “What is it you think will interest me?”
    “I believe I am the proud owner of the property across the lane from that brothel you and I exited in a hurry this morning. Take a look at this.”
    Against her better judgment, she drifted back toward the table and the outspread map. “How did you come by this property if you don’t know for certain where it is?”
    “I won it in a poque game at White’s.”
    She crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m not surprised in the slightest.”
    “Don’t be so gloomy, Georgette. It doesn’t suit you.”
    “I’m not gloomy.” She wished his hair didn’t curl behind his ears in a way that made her fingers itch to smooth it down. “I’m disapproving. There’s a difference.”
    “Is that another way of saying you care that I waste my time gambling?”
    “It matters not a bit to me how you waste your time.”
    “Then if you don’t care, stop frowning. Your face will grow like that and it’d be a shame.” He shot her a quick grin before looking back down at the map again. “It’s such a pretty face, you know.”
    Was he teasing her again or did he mean it? He’d seldom been serious as a boy. Now that he was a man, it was hard to tell when to take him at his word.
    “Well, your frown over my gambling aside, this was one game of chance that wasn’t wasted. Here’s the legal description of the property.” He dropped a yellowing piece of parchment on top of the map. “If I’ve interpreted this correctly, its location is here.” He pointed to a parcel on Lackaday Lane, that same narrow alley in Covent Garden where Mercy’s friend was trapped at Madam Bouchard’s House of Pleasures for Gentlemen of Quality.
    “You seem inordinately enthusiastic about a property that is likely in a sad state of repair,” Georgette said.
    He shrugged. “A property can always be improved. I’m a second son, remember, which means I must make my own way in the world.”
    He fisted his hands at his waist and for a moment, Georgette imagined him at the prow of a pirate ship, piloting his own future. He’d make a proper rogue with an eye patch , she decided with an inward sigh. Then she resolved to put her imagination in a drawer while she was with Nathaniel Colton. Could be dangerous .
    “Collecting rents strikes me as a fine way to support my gambling habits,” he said, obviously trying to get another rise out of her.
    “Congratulations,” she said dryly, refusing to take the bait. “You probably own a house of ill repute.”
    “You may be right.”
    “Which means the rents you receive will come at the cost of abject misery for those young women who are bound to that degrading life.”
    “As I recall, you are enthusiastic about women making their own choices. If this property is a brothel, the women who work there made theirs.”
    “No, not all of them. Many have no other way to survive,” she said.
    Nathaniel looked up from his map again. A frown marred his brow. “You seem to know a great deal about