Barbara Pierce Read Online Free PDF Page B

smile. Her friends knew that no amount of money would lure her upstairs with any man. She was still relatively innocent in matters of a carnal nature, and she was content to remain that way. Julian Phoenix might have taken her virginity, but her innocence would be given to the man of her choosing. The distinction was beyond her companions’ understanding. The three of them came from a world where they bartered anything and everything. Patience’s prim ways did not fit in their ruthless world. It was a quandary, since there was no place for her in the world where she was once Miss Farnaly.
    So where do I belong?
    She closed her eyes and rubbed her aching temples. Lord and Lady Powning’s gathering had stirred up feelings Patience had thought were buried. It was so easy to imagine herself in her former life. Miss
Farnaly would have certainly sought a conversation with Lady Powning in hopes of attaining an introduction to Lord Ramscar. Would the earl have treated Miss Farnaly differently? Patience groaned. There was no place in her life for regret. Right or wrong, she had chosen this path when she ran off with Julian Phoenix.
    For now, her place was with this small troupe of players. What they needed was a strong leader. Unfortunately, they would have to settle for her. “If anyone is evading a subject, it is you, Link,” Patience said tartly. “You as well, Perry. Do not think I have forgotten you both almost ruined the evening by disappearing.”
    “Me? What’d I do?” Perry defiantly protested.
    Anticipating a battle, Link shrugged off Deidra, who appeared to be dozing against his shoulder. “So I wandered off to share a bottle or two with the grooms.”
    “The number was closer to twelve,” Deidra sleepily murmured. “They were opening five more bottles when I stumbled across them as they sat around a large bonfire behind the stables.”
    Link gave Patience a patronizing look that always seemed to raise her hackles. “I do not understand all the fuss, my girl. Deidra located my whereabouts before an alarm was sounded, and the fancy folk were pleased with their evening. You should be
showing us some gratitude, rather than sniping at our faults.”
    Deidra gave Link’s knee a sympathetic pat. She had been listening to her companions’ complaints about one another for years and knew there was little she could do to stop them from arguing.
    “Gratitude? For what, I ask you?” Patience yelled back. “If it wasn’t for me, we wouldn’t be able to pay for our lodgings, you ninny! I was the one who negotiated the terms of the engagement with Lord Powning. If we had left it up to you, we would still be performing at that filthy, pathetic excuse for a fair near Bath, while you and Perry drank and gambled away our meager earnings.”
    “We all earned our share. The blunt belonged to all of us,” Perry argued. Sitting beside her, he turned his body so he could glare at her profile. “Who are you to tell us all how we spend our individual shares?”
    “Shares of what? The shillings we collect from our performances at flea-ridden booth theaters from Dublin to Cornwall? We wouldn’t have even them if I was not nagging you at each performance. Or perhaps you are referring to Deidra wandering off with every man willing to throw silver on her bed when he is finished with her—”
    Deidra’s eyes snapped open at the insulting remark. Her mouth thinned in anger. “Not every gent. I am not a whore!”

    “Or Link. What did Phoenix call you?” Patience said, feigning innocence. “Oh, right, a handy ol’ fool who will do anything for a bottle of blue ruin!”
    “Enough!” Perry grabbed her arm and gave her a hard shake. “Your tongue could cut tough hide when you are full of bile.”
    “Oh, and what about you?” Her eyes burned with frustration and hurt as she scowled at him. “Stealing from our patron. How could you?”
    “It’s what we do, woman!” Perry slammed his fist several times against the side of