After Innocence Read Online Free PDF Page A

forced her to stay and watch. Now he realized she’d been drawing, her reason for being there in the first place.
    Still, most young ladies would have run away instantly.
Not her.
She had stayed, right until the end. Just thinking about it, he could feel his damn cock stiffen. Edward realized that, despite his many hair-raising escapades—and near brushes with death—he had become far more jaded and dissolute than he had guessed. The incident was proof. How else could he explain his own behavior? How to explain hers? They hadn’t even met, and yet, he was intrigued.
    He assumed that she was a guest of the Ralstons’; he hoped so. He found himself anticipating their next, real meeting with a mixture of both amusement and excitement. Surely he would find her downstairs with the other guests.
    Edward stood, aware of the fluttering in his chest, amused with himself. Goddamn, his blasted heart was beating twice as fast as usual. He couldn’t remember when the last time was that he had felt his pulse accelerate in response to the mere thought of a woman.
    Edward moved back into his bedroom, paused briefly to check his necktie and slip on a white evening jacket, then he hurried down the stairs.
    On the ground floor he slowed and entered the formal salon. The guests were clustered in groups of twos and threes, chatting amiably as they sipped before-dinner drinks passed about by servants in uniform. At least two dozen people were present; apparently neighbors had been invited to supper that evening as well. His glance skiddedpast everyone—including Hilary Stewart—and slammed to a halt. The voyeur stood alone in front of the French doors on the other side of the room.
    His heart seemed to slam, too. But his first thought was, no, this is impossible!
    She made a thoroughly nondescript figure of a woman, one he would not normally ever look at twice. Except he was more than looking twice at her now—he was mesmerized. He could not look away.
    She had a god-awful style. Her hair was drawn into a severe chignon, she wore no jewelry, not even earbobs, and the gray gown she was wearing was absolutely the worst color she could choose. In his imagination. Edward stripped her naked, fantasized alluring curves, saw her with her hair down. He imagined her wearing nothing but an oversized necklace made with his glittering diamonds while he made love to her, repeatedly.
    Rigid with new tension, Edward stepped into the room to take advantage of the salon’s electric lighting, certain that her appearance was deceiving. He could see her better now—and it was deceiving. She had no style, that was true, but she wasn’t homely, far from it. True, she was not his type—he preferred women who were obviously lush and startlingly attractive, not ones who hid behind ugly gowns and uglier hairstyles. But he was fascinated nevertheless.
    And she was staring back at him, too. Edward wondered how she had felt earlier that day, watching him with Hilary. He wondered how she was feeling now. What she was thinking. She had turned crimson. His heart beat harder, faster. Their gazes held. An eternity seemed to unfold before he could look away.
    Christ! He reminded himself that she was young.
Very young.
Far too young for him. He doubted she was more than eighteen. Undoubtedly she had only just made her debut that year. Undoubtedly she was a very proper, very young, very innocent lady—except that he had just destroyed her innocence that day. Oh, God!
    Edward stood rooted near the doorway, flushing with sudden, real mortification as he finally comprehended thefull extent of what he had done—and what he was thinking of doing now. He had purposefully made love to his mistress in front of a young lady just out of the schoolroom. And he was aching to make love to that very same young lady right now—to show her the glory of carnal passion, to introduce her to the pleasure, the agony, the rapture. In fact, he was anticipating it, not just with his body, but