Lady Amelia's Secret Lover Read Online Free PDF

stepped to the cabinet where his liquor and cigars were kept. “I suspect I have been remiss in a great many matters when it comes to you.” He glanced at her over his shoulder. “I should do something about that.”
    She stared at him for a moment, then smiled slowly, the sort of provocative smile that promised any number of things she had no intention of providing. The sort of smile she hadn’t directed at him for a very long time. “Yes, you should.”
    He turned back to her and offered a glass of brandy.
    “What?” She arched a brow. “No cigar?”
    “Did you want a cigar?”
    Of course she didn’t want a cigar. She found them foul and disgusting. She accepted the brandy. “Not tonight, I think.”
    “Imagine my surprise,” he murmured, and sipped his drink.
    She stared at him. “Are you surprised?”
    “No, not at all.” He chuckled. “You’ve never hidden the fact that you don’t like the smell of them.”
    “Nor do I like the taste of them.”
    “And yet you’ve never smoked a cigar.”
    She laughed. “Are you sure?”
    “I think I would have noticed,” he said wryly.
    “I believe, Robert, we have already agreed that you are not as observant as you should be.”
    He studied her for a moment. “And yet I am observant enough to know that you are not the type of woman to smoke a cigar.”
    “Nonsense.” She took a deep swallow of the brandy. “What type of woman smokes a cigar?”
    “The type of woman a man does not marry,” he said firmly.
    Now was probably not the time to let him know she and her sisters had once tried one of her father’s cigars in an effort to understand what men saw in them. “Why not?”
    “A woman who smokes cigars might well be prone to any number of other disreputable activities as well.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “Yes.”
    “No doubt whatsoever?”
    “None.”
    She swirled the brandy in her glass. “Then what does a man do with a woman like that?”
    “A woman like what?” he said cautiously.
    “A woman who smokes cigars and is therefore likely to engage in other disreputable activities.”
    “Nothing,” he said without hesitation. “Absolutely nothing. Not a thing. One has nothing to do with such women.”
    “Really? I would think such a woman would be eminently suitable to, oh, I don’t know, the position of mistress perhaps.”
    A muscle in his jaw clenched, but his voice was noncommittal. “I do not have a mistress.”
    “Of course not,” she murmured.
    “I will not say it again,” he warned.
    She shrugged. “As you wish.”
    “But you don’t believe me.”
    “Why shouldn’t I believe you, Robert? You’ve never lied to me before.” She tilted her head slightly. “Have you?”
    “No, never,” he said quickly but not quite quickly enough. There was something to be said for marrying a man who had a difficult time with blatant dishonesty. From the moment they’d first met, she could tell when he wasn’t being completely truthful.
    “Regardless, the discussion at hand is not your mistress but my lover.” She smiled in a pleasant manner and held out her now-empty glass. Where did the brandy go? “Isn’t that what you wished to talk about this evening?”
    He cast her glass a disapproving look but took it nonetheless. “That is indeed what I wished to talk about.”
    She seated herself in one of his comfortable wing chairs and watched him refill her glass. The man was remarkably collected given the topic they were about to embark upon. But then, oddly enough, so was she. This must be how a warrior felt before going into battle. Cool, calm, and determined.
    “Have you made any further decisions?” He passed her her glass.
    “Further decisions?” She adopted a light tone. “Beyond the decision to take a lover, you mean?” She shook her head. “I daresay, Robert, that was rathersignificant in and of itself. I’m not sure I wish to make more than one decision of such magnitude in a single day.”
    “Then you’ve not yet