“That’s not the worst of it,” she murmured, curling up with the cat in the reading chair. “The fellows at the bank respect me, the same way they respect the flu and lung fever—with a side helping of dread. Elsmore’s respect is personal.”

And he’d kissed her, which raised the real problem with Wrexham, Duke of Elsmore.

“I am attracted to him, not like a giddy girl is attracted to any flirt, but…” Ellie fell silent, because her attraction to Elsmore was irksomely complicated. She wasn’t a blushing virgin, hadn’t been for years. Poor girls grew up early, and their neighbors didn’t judge them for it.

Elsmore was different. In a society where few people admitted that a woman could handle extensive figures with authority, he’d trusted her as an equal.

“Heady business, trust.” Dangerous business. Grandpapa Naylor had trusted the Earl of Winston, and that had led to tragedy upon tragedy.

A sharp rap on the door had the cat bolting from the chair. Ellie admitted Elsmore, who set paper-wrapped parcels on the desk.

“Why haven’t you a table?” he asked. “To partake of sustenance in the same place where you toil away by the hour seems wrong.”

“The table is in the other room.” The bedroom. For grand ladies, bedrooms could be social spaces. They received early callers there, chatting away the morning during the pleasant business of hair dressing and wardrobe selection.

Ellie was not a grand lady.

“You are blushing,” Elsmore said. “Are the end times nigh?”

Oh, possibly. Ellie slid his coat from his shoulders. She’d done the same for Walden and Joshua Penrose, but she did not remark the breadth of the gentleman’s shoulders on those occasions, did not treasure the feel of his body heat on expensive wool.

“Have you considered that another auditor might be a more prudent choice, Your Grace?”

“Getting cold feet over a pair of harmless kisses, Mrs. Hatfield?”

“Yes.”

He took his coat from her and hung it on a peg, then he collected the parcels of food with one hand and took Eleanora by the wrist with the other.

“The soup is best consumed hot,” he said, leading her into the bedroom. “You might be surprised to know that I can come within sight of a bed and remain on good behavior. That wasn’t always the case. Once upon a time, I was a randy imbecile, but regretted folly, and the passing years have worked their sobering magic. You are entirely safe with me, madam.”

“I never doubted that, but you beg the question: Are you safe with me?”

She expected a jaunty retort—Elsmore was nothing if not self-possessed. Society expected men of his station to deal openly with the masculine appetites, and Elsmore was a good-looking devil. He’d have plenty of offers, and his overtures—if ever he had to make any—would rarely be rejected.