Hot and Steamy Read Online Free PDF Page A

“You aren’t getting away with this, Corrigan. You can cheat that witch. I don’t care. But you can’t cheat me.”
    Chance sank his hands into his pants pockets. “Seems I already have.”
    â€œGive me the Queen of Hearts.” The man hesitated. “And £50,000, same as you gave her.”
    The one-eyed man laughed. “Take a lot of convincing before I do that.”
    Trent balled metal-clad fists. “I shall enjoy this.”
    â€œDoubt it.” Chance shrugged and drew a flat, silver metal disk from his pocket. The diameter of a silver dollar, but three times as thick, the disk traveled effortlessly back and forth over Chance’s knuckles. “Go away. I don’t want to hurt you.”
    Trent set himself. “I’ll beat you to within an inch of your life.”
    Chance flipped the disk at Trent.
    The nobleman contemptuously backhanded it out of air. “That was supposed to hurt me?”
    â€œStockton, he says you’re good with wrinkles.” Chance smiled. “How good are you with scorch-marks?”
    Trent’s mouth fell open, incomprehension softening his expression. He looked at his right hand. The disk, instead of flying off, had attached itself to the back of his hand. Trent shook it, trying to flick it away. He then brought his left hand over to pry it loose, but the steel wristband clicked tight to the disk.
    Chance nodded. “Magnets. My specialty. Oh, and electricity, too.”
    Jagged blue-white electric tendrils raced along the convincers . Trent bounced up and down, and then capered around. His jacket smoked. He slammed into one bulkhead, then rebounded into another and slumped to the deck. A couple more sparks engendered twitches. His head lolled to the side.
    Chance looked through the thin vapor. “Your master will be fine in a few minutes. A stiff brandy or two, and he’ll be calculating how to explain all this.”
    The manservant nodded mutely.
    Chance hesitated, then fished into his jacket pocket. He tossed the jeweler’s box onto Trent’s chest. “It’s worthless now. Just like him. Call it a souvenir. Something for his pains.” Chance laughed at his own joke, eclipsing Trent’s groans, and made his way unmolested to the ground and his bed.
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    She came to him through the balcony’s French doors. “You need to be more careful with valuable treasure in your room.”
    Chance shook his head. “Why lock doors you’d have been through in an eyeblink?”
    Virginia smiled and crossed to the sideboard, where a magnum of champagne cooled in an ice bucket. “Shall we celebrate our success?”
    â€œI’m going to disappoint you.” Chance sat in the wingback chair in the room’s opposite corner. “I gave the Queen of Hearts back to Trent.”
    â€œYou what?” She glanced back at him over her left shoulder. “You had £750,000 and gave it back?”
    Chance pointed at the velvet sack in the middle of the bed. “I was playing a bigger game, Ginnie. Trent is a link. I want his bosses terrified. The Queen of Hearts you wore, the one LaPointe authenticated, it was paste. I paid LaPointe to create it and claim it was real. Caine and the Rothschilds had chosen LaPointe to value the real Queen of Hearts, so his word wouldn’t be challenged.”
    She turned slowly, still somehow incredibly feminine despite wearing a black woolen sweater, dark knickers, socks, and slippers. “If Trent hadn’t thought to bring LaPointe, you would have demanded, as a point of honor, his coming to verify things?”
    â€œTrent would have thought it was his idea.”
    â€œAnd LaPointe worked with you because?”
    â€œMoney. And an incident in the Sudan, when I was with Somerset.”
    Virginia brought him a glass of champagne. “You give back the necklace, proving it’s worthless. Trent’s bosses believe in your manufacturing