Heiress Without a Cause Read Online Free PDF

good, Lady Madeleine,” Madame said, sounding almost affronted. “I won’t keep you forever, and I know it is a risk for you. But a sold-out month would be enough for me to lease a bigger venue next season.”
    Madeleine couldn’t breathe. It might have been the bindings around her breasts that still kept her compressed. More likely, it was the thought of Ferguson cutting her in front of the entire ton that made her pulse flutter and her vision swim.
    “I could buy you a new theatre. Salford will write you a cheque if it saves me from ruin.” She didn’t want to tell Alex about her acting, but he would surely help her to end it.
    Madame Legrand shook her head. “It is not just the funds. You saw the audiences this past week. The theatre’s reputation rises daily. What good would a new building do if I can’t keep the audience after you leave? Staging your play for another month lets me improve the next offering. If you quit now, we are not ready to replace you and the audience will trickle away.”
    Her words struck home, right in the center of the place that secretly wanted to continue. Madeleine looked at Josephine, but the maid looked away. Josephine loved her, but she was still a servant. Only Madeleine could decide. She rubbed her temples, thought through her choices — and realized she had already made her choice.
    “Very well,” she said. “But if Ferguson recognized me, your blackmail won’t bring me back. I will be ruined before the night is out.”
    Madame smiled. “He will not recognize you. When you take off those breeches and become your prim society miss, he will never guess you could be such a delight onstage. And if he does recognize you, use your skills to convince him that he is mistaken.”
    Madeleine said nothing, stepping past Madame Legrand and making her way to the stage exit. She would think about her predicament later. At present, it was more important to sneak back to Salford House before anyone noticed her absence.
    If she was lucky, she wouldn’t see Ferguson again for several days — long enough for him to forget Madame Guerrier.
    But if luck was on her side, it had a diabolical sense of humor. She stepped out of the theatre, sought out the waiting cab — and stumbled straight into Ferguson’s arms.

CHAPTER FOUR
    He had looked notorious the night before, striding through the ballroom with his devil-may-care smile.
    Tonight, dressed in stark black and holding her against him, he looked powerful and notorious. His icy blue eyes saw straight through her makeup and his sculpted jaw clenched as he looked her over.
    But where a gentleman would have apologized profusely to a lady of her birth and set her on her feet, he kept his grip on her arms. “Madame Guerrier, it was an honor to see you perform.”
    His silky voice stole her breath away. He hadn’t recognized her — unless he was toying with her. “ Merci , your grace,” she said, keeping her voice low and heightening the French accent she used at the theatre.
    He arched a single brow. “I did not know we were acquainted. Surely I would remember being introduced to one such as you.”
    It was a fatal slip. If she was the actress she claimed to be, she would never have seen him before. “Of course not, your grace. Madame Legrand said a red-haired duke was in attendance. I merely guessed you to be the duke.”
    He still looked at her with those disturbingly perceptive eyes. “I do hope I haven’t inconvenienced you, but I must ask you a question of a rather... delicate nature. Shall I accompany you to your carriage?”
    This was the second time in twenty-four hours that he wanted to ask her a question, but she had no illusions this time. He knew who she was. She was certain he knew — the way he looked at her, as though assessing a target; how his hands gripped her, as though she might run. She would be ruined, and by a man whose own reputation was hardly spotless. The only question was whether he would ruin her with a