Still, it had been no secret that one day he would have to provide an heir. It was his duty, after all. On reaching his thirty-fifth birthday, he’d decided the time was now and he’d gone about the business of selecting a bride just as he went about everything else—carefully and methodically, making lists and checking out financial situations. It was amazing how many of England’s great families were insolvent.

He’s almost given up hope when he’d met Charlotte. She was everything the Elliots were not—quiet, well-mannered, and gentle. Her parents had trained her well, and she would never embarrass him or cause him alarm.

Charlotte’s goals in life would be to see to his happiness and the happiness of their children and to the smooth running of Greyley House. He, in turn, would give her the benefit of his maturity and wisdom, and a handsome amount of pocket money. In return, she would provide him with an heir and make no ridiculous demands of his time.

Unlike Anna Thraxton, who would, he was certain, meddle in the affairs of any man she became entangled with.

The word “entangled” fired his imagination once more, and he was assailed with the image of his new governess, naked and impertinent, her firm round bottom just out of reach, that saucy smile aimed not at him, but at some other man who looked disgustingly besotted.

Anthony slammed a hand onto the surface of the desk, the loud noise dispelling the pictures in his mind. Good God, what was he doing? A liaison with Thraxton would be a mistake of the first order. It was unthinkable.

Or was it? She was staying under his roof, which made her convenient if nothing else. And it was certainly no sin in society’s jaded eyes to have a mistress. Some men felt compelled to do so, as a measure of their standing.

Anthony rubbed his chin and stared with unseeing eyes at the mural over his head. Anna’s exposure to the harshness of life had removed any sort of troublesome innocence she might have once had, not that he thought her experienced in sexual matters. He was fairly certain that for all her bravado, she was untouched in that one area.

The thought tantalized him further, even as he acknowledged it put an end to the possibility of having her as a mistress. She was a handful, was Thraxton, he decided with a deep sense of regret. She met him glare for glare and never so much as flinched. And she was no self-appointed martyr who would cry at the slightest imagined insult. She was also far more attractive than any governess had a right to be. So much so that he’d been in imminent danger of yanking her to him and tasting her impudent mouth no fewer than three times just today.

Perhaps it was her passionate nature that intrigued him so. Whatever Thraxton did, she did with all her heart. It was, he suspected, yet another quality that made her such a good governess, as well as such a damnable nuisance. There would be no light flirtation with a woman like her, and he knew it. As soon as he took her to bed, she’d order new curtains for the entire house. Then she’d set about organizing the furniture, perhaps even ordering that damned mural for the entryway.