Leslie Lafoy Read Online Free PDF Page A

wanton … “I haven’t even begun to show you knots, dearest Simone.”

Chapter 2
    A rope made of knotted damask didn’t lend itself well to a display of his true rig-climbing abilities, but Tristan did the best he could with the opportunity and descended hand over hand with far more finesse than any of the others had displayed. Letting go a couple of meters up, he dropped the last of the distance to land squarely on his feet. Both Emmaline and Noland looked at him in wide-eyed and appropriate wonder—the very the kind of wonder and appreciation he’d designed his descent to illicit from Lady Simone Turnbridge. Unfortunately …
    Tristan looked around the immediate vicinity and then farther. A flash of white moving toward the end of the flaming mansion caught his eye. “Where’s Simone going?” he asked, his eyes narrowed against the smoke and drifting cinders as he considered her.
    “To find Haywood,” his sister supplied.
    “Who?”
    “Haywood,” she repeated. “I don’t know who he is. She didn’t say.”
    “She just thanked us for the adventure,” Noland chimed in, “wished us luck in finding our carriage, and headed off on her own.”
    “Independent thing,” Tristan muttered through a smile. As the first of the fire brigade wagons came racing up the shelled drive, he turned back to the others. Abandoning both his smile and his original plan, he improvised a new plan and set it into motion. “Noland, would you see Emmaline home?” he asked. “Lady Simone shouldn’t be left unescorted.”
    Noland blinked. “Your sister and I alone together in the coach? Are you sure?”
    You wouldn’t take a liberty if it were offered on a silver plate. “The circumstances being what they are tonight, I don’t think anyone is going to notice. Or care if they do.”
    It took the man a minute to think about it, but eventually Noland nodded. “I suppose that makes sense.”
    It made perfect sense, but a lukewarm acceptance was good enough. Especially with Simone putting more distance between them with every heartbeat. Tristan leaned down, planted a quick, perfunctory kiss on his sister’s cheek, and promised, “I’ll call on you in the morning.”
    She smiled and looked up at him adoringly. “Thank you for saving us, Tristan.”
    “I did nothing more than follow Lady Simone’s lead,” he countered as he eased away. “She’s a remarkably levelheaded and resourceful woman.”
    Em brightened. “I take it that you would approve of a continuing friendship?”
    “Absolutely.” In fact, I’m counting on it.
    “Thank you, Tristan!” she cried. “Please keep yourself safe and I’ll see you in the morning!”
    He smiled, waved jauntily, and strode off. He grinned as he saw that Simone had stopped and hiked up her pure white petticoats and was in the process of stripping off her stockings. God and females only knew why it was necessary to do so, but he was most appreciative of the show. Long and gorgeously shaped legs had always been a weakness of his. As well as pert breasts. And hourglass curves. And elegant shoulder sweeps. And silken napes. And mischievous, sparkling bright eyes. Add in accepting an advance with a laugh and a dare.… From what he could tell so far, Lady Simone Turnbridge was very close to being his idea of the perfect woman.
    He timed his pace so that he arrived at her side just after she’d dropped her petticoat hems and resumed her trek toward the end of the house. “Hello, again.”
    “Hello.” She glanced over her shoulder and then up at him. “Where are Emmy and Noland?”
    Oh, he liked the way she tilted her head when she met his gaze. She had the most amazing cheekbones. High and finely carved. When the light traced over them, they practically begged for fingertips to follow. And her neck … Long but hardly spindly, it was the ideal length for effective seduction. By the time a man kissed his way from the lobe of her ear to the hollow at the base of her throat, she’d