Never Seduce A Scoundrel Read Online Free PDF

humid and smoky kitchens through the open double doors in the back of the annex, Cecily crossed to the nearby chapel. She glanced up at the sky, remembering for an instant the last time she’d had intentions of visiting this place of prayer and had instead wound up at the Foxe Ring. No starry blanket crowded the sky now, only low clouds, appearing disgruntled and as if they were contemplating a shower out of spite. Or perhaps boredom. Cecily loosened the scarf from around her waist and tied it over her hair before pushing one side of the heavy doors open just far enough to slip through as thunder stirred from far away.
    The chapel was empty, save for the fleeting and nearly invisible appearance of the old, stooped maid who tended the church and Father Perry’s quarters. The servant bobbed her head and raised a gnarled old hand within the gloomy shadows at Cecily’s arrival, and then disappeared through a black doorway with a hitching shuffle, her small brush broom riding her back like an emaciated child.
    Cecily took a deep breath, feeling a slight release in the tension between her shoulder blades. The smell of old incense permeated every surface inside the chapel, and the subtle, leftover perfume of it was truly a comfort. She stood just inside the doors for several moments, her eyes fixed on the altar ahead, and felt a foreign bloom of hesitation. The chapel was her home, the place she felt the most comfortable, even more so than Fallstowe. And yet she knew the sins she had committed—they shouted inside her head to make their presence known: lust, acedia, wrath, envy, pride. She dared not reveal these particular failings to her most trusted counsel. He would know it was she, certainly—what other unmarried young lady at Fallstowe was contemplating the religious life, and had also rescued Oliver Bellecote after his accident?
    And then slept with him?
    She knew that she could be forgiven outside confession by being in a state of perfect contrition; the problem was, Cecily was unsure whether she was contrite at all, let alone perfectly.
    She took a deep breath of the perfumed air and let it out before clasping her hands at her chest and walking down the aisle.
    She knelt at the altar railing and made the sign of the cross.
    She raised her face to gaze upon the crucifix above the altar.
    Her mind went completely blank.
    Cecily’s brows knitted downward into a frown. All right, she told herself. I shall just start simply.
    She recited six different prayers from memory, hoping they would purge her mind of the block that was preventing the easing of her conscience, her knees already singing from the hardness of the stone beneath them. But even after the last amen, she could not force an original phrase from her mouth.
    “Do you not want my confession?” she whispered crossly. “What is it, then? I am sorry that I’m not sorry about the proper things. I don’t know what else to do—this has always worked before!” She laid her forehead atop her folded hands with a sigh.
    Her head rose abruptly at the familiar scraping of the chapel door behind her, and then Father Perry’s mellow voice in midsentence.
    “—you see that we are outfitted quite splendidly despite our isolated location, and—” He broke off abruptly, and Cecily surmised that he was not expecting the chapel to be occupied at that particular time of day.
    Cecily made the sign of the cross once more and rose, prepared to greet Father Perry and his guest. She turned and watched the two men walking toward her, one short and slight and clothed in the familiar uniform of Fallstowe’s priest, the other of slightly taller height and clothed in the garb of a wealthy nobleman. The stranger had dark blond hair that fell in one length to just above his shoulders where the hood of his fine cloak lay in soft folds. The front-most lock of his hair was caught behind his ear thoughtlessly, as if in a habit to keep it from hindering his vision. His face was lean and