An Ideal Husband? Read Online Free PDF Page B

ball dress in all the wrong places.’
    ‘Sophie Ravel—yes, I know her. I would have used the word ravishing rather than redoubtable.’Richard put his hands behind his head and conjured up Miss Ravel’s delicate features. Her generous mouth had held the promise of passion, if a man could find a way to unlock it. ‘Even Aunt Parthenope declared there was nothing scandalous in our behaviour.’
    His mother went white. ‘Parthenope was there?’
    ‘My aunt attended the ball last night. Apparently my grandmother is buried in Jesmond. She visits the grave every year.’ He glared at his mother. ‘You never said.’
    ‘She is sure to write to your father, giving a report. Even if he misses the papers, he will know you have been in Newcastle. Parthenope is like that—full of spite disguised as doing good. When she is at her most charming, she is also at her most deadly.’
    ‘You overreact, Mother.’
    ‘Richard, this is important. It is your sister’s future. Hannah has an excellent chance to have a glittering marriage. Could you use this Miss Ravel as an excuse to stay, rather than dashing off to London this afternoon?’
    Richard tapped his finger against the scandal sheet, the beginnings of an idea forming. Pursuing Miss Ravel without interference from either parent and seeing if there was passion underneaththe ice she presented to the world was tempting, but…
    Richard folded the paper in half again. ‘What puzzles me is how quickly the papers have acquired the story.’
    ‘Someone is always willing to sell a good story.’ His mother gave an exaggerated sigh. ‘Poor girl. It is the women I feel sorry for. The men can survive, but a woman, well, she always has the whiff of a scandal hanging about her skirts.’
    ‘I will sort it out before it becomes an inferno, Mother.’
    ‘I trust you to do the right thing, Richard.’
    ‘I am surprised you even need to say that, Mother. I know my duty. The necessity of doing it has been beaten into me since childhood.’
    ‘Did you have a pleasant time at the ball, Sophie? You said very little about it last night. You were back far earlier than I expected.’
    Sophie’s hand froze in the act of buttering her toast. It made no sense for her stepmother to be asking further questions about last night. She’d given an account when she came, an account in which Lord Bingfield did not feature as there was no point in alarming her. Her stepmother seemed well satisfied then, but now she regardedSophie with razor-sharp eyes. Her stepmother waved a newspaper in Sophie’s direction. ‘I do read the papers. Every item.’
    ‘The papers? Why should they say anything about me?’ Sophie asked, genuinely perplexed. Lady Parthenope had declared that the little incident was entirely innocent. She’d left it to Lord Bingfield to explain to his aunt that they would … alas … not be marrying.
    ‘It is what I want to know.’ Tears shimmered in her stepmother’s eyes. ‘I trusted you, Sophie, last evening and allowed you to go to the ball without a chaperon. When you were younger, you used to be involved in harum-scarum affairs and I despaired. After Corbridge, you changed. Perhaps you became a bit too stand-offish, but I retained hopes of you fulfilling your father’s dying wish and marrying into society.’
    Sophie attempted to ignore the nasty prickle at the back of her neck. ‘Do what? What have I done? I behaved perfectly properly all evening. You knew about Cynthia’s elopement and approved.’ Sophie carefully kept her mind away from how she’d nearly kissed Lord Bingfield in the dark. Wanting to kiss him and actually kissing him were two separate things. She had behaved properly and they would never encountereach other again. ‘Show me the papers. I need to know what I have been accused of.’
    Her stepmother held out one of the worst scandal sheets. Sophie’s eyes widened. ‘The redoubtable Miss R? Do I look redoubtable to you? I am the least formidable person I