One Scandalous Kiss Read Online Free PDF Page B

wasn’t true, but he wished it was.
    He’d spent the last two years attempting to put Hartwell’s finances in order and secure the future of the estate. Preferring the rational, logical rows of figures and facts in his ledger books to London society didn’t mean he was immune from scandal. Though he could easily ignore what the gossips might say, he couldn’t deny that any kind of ignominy would reflect on the earldom, and his own future heirs. He did not yet hold the title of Earl of Dunthorpe, but protecting the family name had now fallen to him.
    She didn’t look like she believed his lie anyway. He’d never mastered the art of falsehood.
    “What of you? What will your family have to say about your behavior this evening?”
    She swallowed hard, dipping her head, and then blinked up at him. She seemed confused, as if she didn’t take his meaning. Or perhaps it was too difficult to contemplate. Shouldn’t she have considered her family before behaving in such a shocking manner?
    “Come now. Your family. Your father. Perhaps an older brother. Tell me I won’t be receiving a call from them demanding I marry you to save your reputation?”
    “No, of course not!”
    Her exclamation bounced off the carriage walls, and it was Lucius’s turn to blink. He’d meant the comment as a jest, infusing his tone with as much mirth and irony as he could muster. But he joked and teased rarely. Apparently he was as ghastly at it as he was at acknowledging beady-eyed women in a crowd.
    “My father and mother are dead. I have no brothers or sisters.”
    The words were plain, simple. Perfectly understandable. Yet there was more behind them, a well of loneliness and need that resonated in Lucius, as familiar to him as his own name.
    “You’re an orphan.” Lucius rarely spoke words with the sort of care he took in stating the truth of Miss Wright’s circumstances. A foolish impulse made him wish to confess that he was an orphan too. Not in the same way, of course. His father was alive. But if your mother was dead and you’d been estranged from your father most of your life, did that not qualify you as an orphan?
    Miss Wright seemed to take his words as gently as he’d intended. She glanced down at her hands before reaching out to run a long, slender finger over the beveled glass of a pocket watch she’d pulled from her skirt. When she finally met his gaze, she seemed as resolved as she’d been the moment she’d walked up to him in the gallery.
    “Yes, I suppose I am, though I’m not a child. And my father only died a few years ago.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “Don’t pity me.”
    The fury in her gaze was familiar. He’d stared back at it in his own looking glass for years.
    “I require no one’s pity, my lord.”
    No. When you’d lost everything, pity was the last thing you desired. He’d learned that truth at nine when his mother ventured out on a trip, leaving him behind because he was ill, and a carriage accident took her life. His world became bleak, colorless, and in his child’s mind he believed fate had dealt him its worst. But being banished to Scotland two months later because his father could not bear the sight of him—that had been worse. And the pity he’d seen in the faces of his mother’s family, worse still.
    The carriage slowed to a stop too soon for Lucius’s taste. He’d asked the coachman to take the longest route to the address Miss Wright had offered before returning him to his sister’s house in Belgrave Square.
    As soon as the carriage stopped moving, Miss Wright looked about her like a wary bird, just landed on a foreign branch. She leaned forward to get a glimpse out the carriage window.
    “This is the address you gave, Miss Wright. But there is still the matter of providing the explanation I require.”
    Indignation wasn’t there when Lucius searched his heart and mind. He didn’t pity Miss Jessamin Wright. He’d abide her command on that count. But her honesty and unfortunate