Always a Scoundrel Read Online Free PDF Page A

your father the money.”
    “You haven’t received a proposal yet, Maggie. You’ve only begun using his familiar name within the last day or two.”
    “You think he won’t ask m—”
    “All I’m saying is that Cosgrove expects my father to make good on James’s debt. At the most, Father will be able to delay a public announcement of our betrothal until the end of the month. Twenty-six days. I prefer to deal in facts rather than fairy tales. And yes, I think Ascott will offer for you.”
    Her cousin’s frown smoothed away. “Very well. I’m appeased. The facts, though, can’t be very pleasing to you.”
    The facts deeply troubled her. She’d lain awake all night, trying to figure a way for the family to raise ten thousand pounds. Nothing had come to mind other than selling James to pirates; amusing as that thought had been, at the moment she simply felt…overwhelmed.
    “Come along, Rose. Let’s purchase some hair ribbons. That should cure your doldrums.”
    A sack of money falling from the sky would cure her doldrums better. Rose nodded, pasting a smile on her face. “Yes, that’s just the th—”
    The book jolted loose from her arm and fell to the ground. Opening her mouth to apologize to the man she’d bumped into, Rose turned around. And stopped.
    “A History of the New World ,” he read, straightening with the book in his hands.
    Eyes black as pitch regarded her. She’d never seeneyes like that before. The effect of their direct, level gaze was…unsettling. Beside her, Maggie gave a small gasp. “Thank you for retrieving my book, sir,” she said, finding that her voice wanted to quaver and fighting against it. “May I have it back?”
    His head tilted a little to one side, a strand of coal black hair falling forward across his forehead. He was all in black, she realized, from his beaver hat to his gloves to the soles of his boots. Only a white shirt collar and simply tied white cravat leavened his stark appearance. No, not stark, she amended as he glanced down at the book again. Predatory. All six lean feet of him.
    “Do the Americas interest you?” he asked, his voice a low, cultured drawl that seemed to resonate down her spine.
    “Learning things interests me,” she replied, and held out her hand.
    The corner of his mouth quirked, and he slowly placed the book into her fingers. “Well, then. I could teach you such things, Lady Rosamund,” he murmured. With a last look from those midnight eyes, he turned away and vanished into the crowd as if he’d never been there at all. As if she’d imagined him.
    “Oh, my word,” Maggie whispered, and clutched her arm.
    Rose jumped. “What? Do you know him?”
    Blonde hair shook vigorously. “Never. I know of him, though. So do you.”
    “Who is he, then? For heaven’s sake. He knew my name.” And the way he’d said it, and what he’d said…It had made her want to blush, but on the inside.
    “Heaven has nothing to do with him. My father pointed him out to me once and told me to stay well away from him.”
    “Maggie.”
    “That was Lord Bramwell Lowry Johns.”
     
    Bram flipped open his pocket watch. If Abernathy was to meet Cosgrove at noon, then he was running very late. “Up, Titan,” he ordered, nudging the black in the ribs. They moved into a canter, the fastest pace possible in the environs of Pall Mall at this hour.
    If the chit hadn’t spent so long in the bloody lending library—or if he’d been able to tolerate the idea of crossing the threshold to see her up close inside, he might have saved a bit of time. There were some things, though, not even he would stoop to. And entering a lending library was one of them.
    The book he’d pushed out of her hands had surprised him, when he hadn’t expected anything about her to be of much interest. He’d summed her up in advance. She would be mousy, with a weak character, close-set eyes, a dress up to her chin, a simpering laugh, no conversation, and the book would be one of those