Romancing Lady Stone (A School of Gallantry Novella) Read Online Free PDF Page B

been dead. You should have been dead if Strelna was where you were drugged. Because that means you have slept for over ten hours.”
    She swallowed knowing he was right. She would have been dead without having ever gotten around to seeing her daughters or her son properly marry. She would have been dead before she could hold her grandchildren or travel to Paris and breathe in the sort of wild adventure she had always yearned for. She had once read in the gossip papers that Parisian women waltzed naked with their lovers in the privacy of their flats and smoked cheroots in public. Secretly, she had always wanted to try both.
    Mr. Levin leaned back against the seat. “Fortunately for you, Lady Stone, your son is associating with a well-known actress, which will make it easy to find him. All we have to do is inquire at the theatre she performs in when we get into Saint Petersburg. Depending on how well that goes, you should be with your son in two days. Three at most.”
    She almost slumped back against the seat. She had never been more thankful. “Your kindness has no bounds.”
    “Let us not exaggerate. It has its bounds.”
    She bit back a smile. She liked him. He didn’t pretend to be anything more than what he was. She envied people who didn’t have to lead their lives according to a title. Unlike her, they could waltz naked with a cigar. “I cannot thank you enough. Is there anything I can offer you in return for the assistance you are providing?”
    He extended his long, trouser-clad leg and let his worn, leather boot hit the upholstered seat across from them. Flakes of dried mud spattered the seat. “A beautiful woman should never ask a man what he really wants.” His green eyes studied her and his mouth quirked. “He may tell you.”
    Her pulse fluttered knowing he was flirting with her. She tightened her hold on her shawl. “You certainly are anything but coy, Mr. Levin,” she countered.
    He dropped his leg from the seat and took back his arm from the seat. His eyes brightened as he shifted toward her. “Being coy never got me anywhere.”
    She locked her knees together. “My son will pay you when we find him,” she offered, trying to change the course of their conversation. “I will ensure it is generous.”
    “I would never take anything for assisting a woman.” He leaned in across the seat, that charred, smoky scent of wood drifting in from the heat of his body. “Even if there was something I wanted.”
    Unspoken words of ‘ Which there is ’ hung between them.
    She felt her entire body ripple in awareness. She leaned back, her shoulder bumping into the wall of the carriage behind her.
    He smirked. “You are not as bold as you paint yourself, Lady Stone, are you?” Drawing in closer, he brushed a hand over her shoulder, lowering his gaze to his fingers that traced an area of her cashmere shawl. “Sadly, there appears to be some damage to your shawl. A part of it is unraveling.”
    She swallowed, feeling faint from the tips of her ungloved fingers down to the tips of her toes buried in her stockings and half boots. Her shawl wasn’t the only thing unraveling. For some reason, she now envisioned him shredding apart her clothing at the stitch with bare hands and whispering words in Russian to her until she herself spoke Russian. Her heart lurched, her breath coming in uneven takes. It was amazing how being away from her three girls had suddenly turned her into a woman. Not a mother. A woman. She had honestly forgotten what that was.
    Almost dying apparently did something to a woman’s mind.
    He took back his hand. “Forgive me. I should not have touched you.” Rising from the seat, he turned and fell back into the seat across from hers. His sharp features dimmed. He dragged out his watch and flipping it to the backside of the silver casing he slid a finger across what appeared to be etched words. He tucked it back into his waistcoat pocket and shifted his unshaven jaw, watching her.
    Despite