Page 33 of The Devil's Bargain
“Our agreement?” His mouth curved slightly. “You mean our marriage contract where you promised to help advance our joint business interests?”
“I promised nothing,” she snapped.
“Not in so many words but...” He leaned back, gesturing to the drawings. “But surely your curious mind can’t resist a proper engineering challenge? The pressure differential alone is causing a fifteen percent loss in efficiency.”
Despite herself, Caroline found her eyes drawn to the diagrams. “Twenty percent. Your calculations failed to account for pipe diameter variations.”
“Did I?” His voice held genuine interest rather than mockery. “Show me.”
“I will not.” But she took an unconscious step closer to the desk.
“No?” He shifted one of the drawings, revealing a series of complex mathematical calculations. “Then I suppose I’ll have to solve it myself. Though these quarterly production figures suggest we’re losing nearly eight thousand pounds annually to inefficiency...”
Caroline’s hands clenched. The numbers were wrong. The losses were closer to twelve thousand, and the solution was elegant in its simplicity. All it would take was—
“No,” she said firmly, more to herself than him. “I won’t be manipulated.”
“Manipulated?” A crease formed between his brows. “I’m merely sharing a technical problem with my wife, who happens to be the finest engineer in London.”
“Flattery won’t work either.”
“Not flattery. Fact.” He stood, moving to pour them both brandy. “Though if you’re not interested, I understand. It’s only that I’ve never seen someone grasp fluid dynamics quite the way you do. Your innovations with the pressure release valve alone are revolutionary.”
She accepted the brandy without thinking, her mind already racing through possible solutions. “The problem isn’t justthe pressure differential,” she found herself saying. “It’s the interaction between—” She stopped abruptly.
“Between?” His eyes sparked with excitement. “Please, continue. I’ve been puzzling over this for weeks.”
Caroline took a large swallow of brandy, cursing her weakness for interesting problems. “I hate you,” she said conversationally.
“I know.” He smiled, pulling out a chair for her. “But you love engineering more than you hate me. At least for the moment.”
She sat, already reaching for a pencil. “This changes nothing between us.”
“Of course not.” But his voice held warmth as he settled beside her. “Now, tell me more about this interaction you noticed.”
As they worked late into the night, Caroline tried to maintain her wall of resentment. But it crumbled slightly every time he asked an intelligent question or offered an insightful observation. How different their interaction was compared to her working relationship with her late husband. Elmstone listened, valued her opinion, and understood the technical complexities. By the time they had solved the efficiency problem, she had to admit—if only to herself—that working with him was surprisingly satisfying.
“Thank you,” he said softly as she gathered her things to leave. “Your mind truly is remarkable.”
“Good night, Mr Elmstone.” She moved toward the door, then paused. “The secondary valve would work better with a copper alloy. It’s more resistant to corrosion.”
His smile lit up his entire face. “I look forward to discussing that tomorrow.”
“I didn’t agree to—” But she was already mentally calculating the proper ratios. “Damn you,” she muttered, sweeping out of the room.
His warm chuckle followed her down the hall, along with the unwelcome realisation that she was actually anticipatingtomorrow’s discussion. It seemed the devil knew exactly how to tempt her after all—not with flowers or intimacy, but with the one thing she couldn’t resist: an engineering puzzle worthy of her talents.
Devlin stood at the window of his study, brandy forgotten in his hand as he replayed every moment of their interaction. The way her eyes had lit up when she spotted the flaw in his calculations. How her fingers had moved with passionate precision across the page, her entire body animated as she explained complex principles that had eluded his best engineers.
“Bloody brilliant,” he murmured, a smile tugging at his lips despite his guilt. He hadn’t entirely fabricated the filtration problem. The inefficiencies were real enough. But he’d deliberately left the obvious errors in the drawings, knowing her keen mind wouldn’t be able to resist correcting them.
He moved to examine her additions to his diagrams, tracing her elegant handwriting with one finger. Her technical mastery both awed and unsettled him. For all his business acumen, for all the power he’d clawed his way up from the gutters to achieve, he was painfully aware of the gaps in his formal education. Yet she’d treated his questions with surprising patience, explaining complex theories without a hint of condescension.
“Well played, you scheming bastard,” he told his reflection in the darkened window. He’d got what he wanted—her brilliant mind engaged in his business. But the victory felt hollow when he remembered the cold fury in her eyes, the rigid way she held herself away from him.
He’d forced this marriage on her, used her past against her. The fact that he’d fallen half in love with her by then didn’t excuse his methods. No matter how right they felt together, he’d robbed her of choice. The guilt of it gnawed at him.
But he wasn’t selfless enough to let her go. Not when he’d glimpsed how magnificent they could be together.
