Kasey Michaels Read Online Free PDF Page B

pointed out to him five minutes earlier. “Dear God, I hadn’t thought about this. Mayfair must be shin-deep in your mother’s discarded lovers.” He absently lifted his booted legs onto the footstool Sophie hastened to place closer in front of him. “This isn’t going to work. I don’t care what my solicitor said. There must be some other way. This isn’t going to work at all.”
    Sophie sat down on the small bit of footstool left to her and patted His Grace’s knee, wishing she could “pat” it with an anvil. “There, there. It’s not to worry. Only think about it, Your Grace. So many important men, and all of them so collectively eager to see me happily wed and out of London, yes? Out of London and stuck in Hampshire, or Sussex, raising babies and watching my husband go off to the city to bed his mistress. Just as they wed their wives and went off, in their turn, to bed my mother. Why, I imagine they will all prove most eager to assist you in settling me as quickly as possible—once they realize how very discreet I can be, of course.”
    The duke looked at her fully, his blue eyes so like dearest Uncle Cesse’s. Intelligent, all-seeing—yet without a trace of humor in them. How had any son of Uncle Cesse’s come to be such a prig? “I see. You’ve figured this all out madam, haven’t you? And you rather delight in the notion of strong men quavering in their boots as you walk into any gathering, fearing that their liaisons with the notorious Widow Winstead are about to be served up at the supper table.”
    The notorious Widow Winstead, indeed! Sophie longed to slap his face for such an insult. It was enough that her mother had been who she had been; it was too much to hear His Grace say the words, hear the tone of his voice when he said them. But she tamped down her temper yet again, and doggedly, determinedly, assumed a hurt expression, her full bottom lip pushing forward in a pout. “Oh, no, Your Grace! It’s nothing of the kind. I just thought you should know that, grateful as I am for your kindness in sponsoring me for the Season, I am not without resources of my own. I shouldn’t wish to be a burden on you, you see. And I’m quite confident my uncles will be of great assistance to both of us.”
    “If one of them doesn’t decide to strangle you in order to protect himself from scandal,” His Grace muttered, then drained his glass and looked up as Edith Farraday tippy-toed into the room and took up a chair in the furthermost corner. “Who’s that?”
    Sophie, grateful for the interruption, turned and waved to her make-believe guardian, waggling two fingers at her, and then explained the woman’s presence. “I would introduce you, but I’m quite convinced Mrs. Farraday will be snoring again within the minute. Travel is anathema to her—a delicate stomach, you understand—so that Desiree prudently dosed her with laudanum before we set out. Frankly, I’m surprised she has been able to toddle up the stairs without assistance.”
    The duke looked at the tall, rail-thin woman for another moment, until Edith Farraday’s chin once more made contact with her bony breast. Then he turned to Sophie. “Shouldn’t she be in her bed?” he asked, then quickly swept his legs off the footstool and glared at her as if only belatedly realizing that his left boot had been resting most intimately against her hip, her hand on his knee. “Miss Winstead, please get up. This is highly unsuitable.”
    Don’t rush your fences, Sophie , she warned herself as she obediently rose, holding her breath so that her cheeks blushed a becoming peach. “I’m prodigiously sorry, Your Grace,” she apologized, smoothing down her skirts. “Uncle Cesse so liked it when I sat at his feet. He called me his little girl, and told me the most marvelous stories. He was always making me laugh, and teasing me back into a good humor whenever I complained to him about my studies. I particularly disliked sums.” She frowned,