My Surrender Read Online Free PDF Page A

claimed to be Vicar Tawster,” she continued. “Only Helena can identify him. All I know is that you remain intent on not revealing yourself to your former companions. Or my sister. Perhaps there is a reason.”
    He didn’t bother to reply. His collarless shirt lay opened, pulled askew so that she could see his shoulder, tanned and smoothly capped with muscle. A few inches over would be the infamous rose brand. Though she had never seen it, both of her sisters had told her of the souvenir the torturer at the LeMons dungeon had branded into their husbands’ and Dand Ross’s hides.
    She bent down, bringing her lips to within inches of his ear. He smelled clean, of soap and camphor. He didn’t even bother looking around. He took entirely too much for granted. No man of the ton had ever taken her for granted. And yet Dand Ross did. A wicked impulse arose within her.
    “Added to which,” she whispered in his ear, “you didn’t appear in London for many months after the episode with Helena and the sword. Perhaps you retired to France to recover from your wound? Perhaps,” she leaned over his shoulder, “you carry the mark…here!”
    Her hand darted down, pressing low on his side. Before she realized what he was doing he seized her wrist, holding her hand hostage against his ribs a second before jerking her over his shoulder and toppling into his lap. She looked up, startled, into a face dark and suddenly alien, her offending hand held in a steel grip well away from his body.
    A glimmer of fear shivered through her. She hadn’t realized he was so strong or could move so fast. Or that he could look at her with such a hard expression.
    Abruptly, she began to struggle. He controlled her with humiliating ease, the heat from his body seeping into her in every inappropriate place, setting her skin afire and bringing to life her long-forgotten ability to blush. He didn’t even notice.
    “Do you really think I am a murderer?” His low voice had lost all trace of amusement. “And if so, do you really want to play this game with me ?”

2
    C HARLOTTE SHRANK IN D AND’S EMBRACE, for the first time feeling truly frightened of him. No one had ever manhandled her before. Ever. She kept her face averted, so that he would not see how he’d shaken her. “Dand…?”
    At once, his hold loosened. “And that, my girl, will teach you to lay violent hands on another.”
    She had laid violent hands on him ? She told herself that fear alone accounted for the trembling in her chest, the sudden difficulty she had drawing a breath, and that he would not respect her if he suspected that something as simple as a snarl and an intimate touch could affect her so. “It was hardly violent.”
    “I suspect that depends on one’s perspective. Violence is anything that threatens, you know.”
    She didn’t understand. She shifted, aware of how hard his body was, of how hard the arms that still held her were and of his heart beating against her. It felt as though a thousand little needles were lightly pricking every part of her skin that came in contact with him. Yet, now that her fear had subsided, she felt…safe? Yes. Protected.
    It had been a long time since she had felt that someone actively stood between her and whatever threatened her. It was nice, however illusory. Though she didn’t doubt Dand would dutifully intervene if he thought she was in danger, he was seldom in London and thus seldom in a position to protect her. She would, as she had for years, have to protect herself.
    But she could relish a few moments of illusion. There was nothing wrong in that, was there?
    She let her head fall back against his shoulder, looking up into his brown eyes, oblique and fathomless. Despite his scurrilous clothing, his body was clean, his hair healthy and shiny. His upper lip was bowed, his lower lip firm but curved. A sensualist would have lips like his. “I don’t really think you are a murderer.”
    “Your faith comforts me no end. Now, off