Every Scandalous Secret Read Online Free PDF Page A

“Strangely, your sister and your cousin claim the same thing. How touching that you all support each other so completely that you’d risk scandal and the ruin of your very pristine reputations.”
    Was she the model? That was the central question, of course. Julian, Peter, and he had been drunk enough to make a wager out of it. They’d each chosen the woman they most believed it of, then wagered that they could find proof, all within a month. And if the month passed, and none of them could produce actual evidence, the women won the right to the painting. The men were supposed to buy it for them and hand it over.
    But it wouldn’t come to that, Leo knew. Someone would prove one of the women was wild enough to risk—everything.
    At first he’d chosen Susanna as a lark—she’d been prissy and uptight from the moment he’d seen her that night, questioning his intelligence at every turn. Deflating her high opinion of herself had appealed to him. She was not the sort of woman he spent much time with—bluestockings bored him.
    But Susanna was different on so many counts. She’d intrigued him and amused him from the first. He’d stared at that painting on the club wall over her head, examining it for anything he could use against her. And he’d seen it, a small mole high on the model’s thigh. If she were the model, as she claimed, he would need to see her thighs—and there was only one way to do that, he thought with rare eagerness.
    They heard the lighter sound of feminine voices leaving the drawing room behind them.
    He glanced at all the easels. “Plan to sketch a half dozen different scenes all at once?”
    Susanna opened her mouth, then glanced back toward the house. The first ladies were arriving with their sketchbooks. Miss Randolph and Miss Norton paused noticeably to blush in Leo’s presence, while Caroline strolled forward with her usual confidence.
    “Mr. Wade,” Caroline said, a smile in her voice, “joining us today, are you?”
    “Perhaps I shall if you tell me what I’ll be joining.”
    Susanna only arched a brow as the ladies began to prepare their easels.
    “A painting session,” Leo said at last. “Miss Leland, I should have known by your practical gown.”
    He watched her blink down in confusion at the green gown she wore. How could she not see that she dressed so plainly compared to the other women, with their ribbons and lace? Though he allowed for the fact that painting could be quite messy, he didn’t understand why her clothing was of so little importance to her.
    Perhaps that’s why she’d taken them all off.
    He stepped away from the lesson but did not leave the terrace immediately. He wanted to watch her in her element, having heard something about her artistic skills. Every young lady was urged to such a path, of course. And the result was usually watercolors where he wasn’t certain if the rendition included people or animals.
    He leaned back against the cold stone of the house and studied Susanna. She was all business now, discussing the importance of shadows and shading, and how they’d only be using pencils at first. Her voice was brisk with knowledge, but in no way did she come off sounding superior. He simply heard her love of the subject, her enthusiasm to bring the other ladies along with her on an artistic journey these next few days.
    They seemed captured, too, some of them watching her with a new interest. Lady Caroline stole glances at her other guests, looking pleased that her suggestion to have Susanna teach was having a successful start. As they began to work, Susanna removed her spectacles from her pocket and donned them to look closely at her students’ work.
    Leo felt . . . strangely uneasy. He tended to avoid this side of the young ladies he flirted with, and for the first time, he wondered why he felt so. He encouraged their chattering about hobbies or fashion or gossip—but hearing about a lifelong pursuit, something intellectual and beyond a mere