All I Ever Needed Read Online Free PDF Page A

a point beyond his shoulder. A swallow alighted on the stone bench behind him and paced the length of it looking for crumbs. Since Sophie had permitted the children to take tea there only yesterday, the swallow was fortunate in his choice of picnic spots. "Perhaps I am about town more often than you suspect and it is only that I am outside your notice."
    Eastlyn started to deny it but caught himself abruptly when she held up a hand. Her smile was slight, but genuine.
    "You must not be gallant, my lord, and deny such a thing is the most reasonable explanation. I am fully aware that I am an unlikely female to command your attention. It will ease your mind to know that our initial introduction aside, you are not the sort of someone I would go to the park to see."
    It did not ease the marquess's mind. In point of fact he was not insulted; but she had tweaked him rather sharply, and while he thought he should avoid hearing her explanation, he simply could not. When he had left the Battenburn estate this morning, he had been in expectation of a wholly different meeting with Lady Sophia. Though he had cringed at the possibility, he had forced himself to consider the prospect of tears and how they might be dealt with swiftly but with some compassion. The exercise had been a waste of gray matter, he realized now. Far from being near tears, the eyes that met him were frank and reasonable. Except for one brief lapse, Lady Sophia remained composed. Perfectly so.
    "You would not go to the park upon hearing I would be there?" he asked. "Even if I were driving my new barouche?"
    "Do not feign disappointment, my lord. It is badly done of you. You can be naught but relieved that I bear you no affection."
    He was. Or at least he thought he was until she placed it so baldly before him. He wondered if she was entirely correct in assuming his disappointment was feigned. "There you have me," he said slowly, regarding her with new interest. "But you must allow that I am curious. What makes me so beneath your notice?"
    "Oh, no." She shook her head, and the brilliant halo of hair waved softly about her face until she was still again. "You misunderstand. It is not at all that you are beneath my notice, only outside of it."
    "There is a difference, I collect," he said dryly.
    "Certainly. The former suggests you are not worthy of my attention. I meant to say that you simply do not fix my attention."
    "You are not making it more palatable, you know. I cannot recall when last I was so deftly cut to the quick." He could, but it had been at Hambrick Hall, and he had planted the boy who had done it a facer. It was scarcely the tack to take with Lady Sophia. If she dealt blows with her fists as well as she did with words, he would be the worse for it in the end.
    Sophie searched Eastlyn's face for some sign that she had indeed done him an injury. His finely cut features remained impassive during her scrutiny, giving nothing of his thoughts away, no hint of amusement or distress. Still, it was Sophie's conclusion that he was teasing her. Any other outcome would have been difficult to imagine, no matter what emotion he affected. Her words could not have truly pricked him. The Marquess of Eastlyn must know he was recklessly handsome.
    How could he not be aware of heads turning when he came upon a room? Though she was not often out in society, Sophie still had had occasion to witness the phenomenon. For the marquess's part, he seemed supremely unconcerned by the attention he received, which only reinforced Sophie's opinion that he held himself as deserving of it. At the Stallworths' ball to open the Season past, she had observed him in conversation with his friend Viscount Southerton in front of an indecently large mirror in the grand hallway. Only a man as confident in his appearance as the marquess could have avoided a sideways glance at his person. Even Southerton, who was very well turned out himself, was not above darting a look in the mirror to check the