How to Murder the Man of Your Dreams Read Online Free PDF Page B

sort of semi-coherent response into the receiver, and, immediately after hanging up, burrowed back into sleep. For me to goup now and risk jolting him awake just wouldn’t be fair. Far better to finish up the last of the digestive biscuits, while seeing poor Hester safely out of the churchyard. Things were looking dark indeed for her when I reopened the book.
    “You shiver, my dear Miss Rosewood.” He reached out a hand to peel open the button at my throat. “Let me warm you with my caress. Your skin has the soft glow of moonlight and your breath is as sweetly intoxicating as the night air.” A muscle tensed in Sir Gavin’s jaw as he surveyed me from his great height with dark and slumberous eyes. His voice grew dangerously deep when he said: “Did you think I would let you go, my dear delight?” His eyes never leaving my face, he removed his clothing a slow button at a time, to reveal a body so magnificent in the glory of its manhood that I had to bite down on my lip in order to hold back a scream of ecstasy that verged on reverence
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    “Please desist, sir.” I stepped back from his embrace and strove valiantly to remember I was a bishop’s niece. “I want to look at you, to revel in your broad chest, to glory in your firm flanks, rippling muscles, and splendid calves. Let me feast my eyes on the vigorous thrust of your man … ly jaw.”
    Somewhere on the outskirts of my mind a bell was pealing with an urgency that brought me off the sofa with sufficient speed that I dropped my book smack down on the floor. Still in the throes of Sir Gavin’s embrace, I was convinced for a horrific ten seconds that his invalid wife was pulling on the bell rope in a frenzy of jealousy that bade ill for virginal Hester Rosewood’s continued employment at Darkmoor House.
    Who could be ringing the doorbell at one-thirty in the morning?
    If I’d been thinking straight, I would have armed myself with the poker before going out into the hall, or have waited for Ben to come stumbling bleary-eyed down thestairs. As it was, I exercised merely enough sense to feel uneasy as I approached the front door. My hair had come straggling out of its French twist, and my face was flushed from the exertion of turning the pages.
    “Who’s there?”
    “Let me in!” Fists pounded on the door. The voice was hysterical.
    “I’m afraid I did not catch your name.” In the act of reaching to draw back the bolt, my hand froze. Whoever it was could be a full-fledged maniac in the manner of Sir Gavin’s wife. Or at the very least, an Avon lady grimly bent on making her daily quota of lipstick sales.
    “God in heaven!” A scream ricocheted through the door, already bulging from the force of increased pounding. “Another moment and it will be too late! I will be torn to shreds by the beast with the head of a grizzly bear!”
    “Hold on!” It wasn’t the midnight visitor’s sobbing pronouncement that the creature had devoured one of her legs and was proceeding to polish off her real leather handbag that persuaded me to open up. What did the trick was the unmistakable sound of a deep-throated growl, followed by an evil belch.
    My fumbling hands fought with the bolt. A woman hurtled into the hall, almost knocking me out in the process and rocking the twin suits of armour back against the staircase.
    “Quick! Quick! Do not let him in!” The woman crouched down on the flagstone floor and swiftly made the sign of the cross. Her hand trembled so badly, it missed her forehead by a mile. Too late! As I debated whether to climb over her or dodge sideways in order to slam the door shut, a form—blacker than the angel of death—glided into the hall, leapt up the staircase, then doubled back to sit still and silent as the grave a few inches from my feet.
    “It’s a dog!” I informed the stranger who had slithered up against the door and bumped it shut with her rump, effectively closing us in with our four-legged adversary. “Not an especially