Rules of Attraction Read Online Free PDF

him to denounce her.
    Instead, he said, "Lord Ruskin did warn me you had become a no-nonsense woman filled with resolution. It would appear he was right."
    "Lord Ruskin!" Hannah blurted. "How… why… when did you speak to Lord Ruskin?"
    "Which of your questions would you like me to answer first?"
    Dougald had spoken to Lord Ruskin. Dougald had confessed… heaven only knew what, and now he sat like a great, vengeful lump, smiling at her with a disturbing twist in his smile. She leaned forward and glared. "You make me want to box your ears."
    He opened his arms and waited for her to try. But she was not so foolish, and at last he allowed his arms to sink to his side. "I believe you went to your friend Lady Ruskin, told her that you had a payment you wished to make to a certain Dougald Pippard of Liverpool, and without explaining why, asked if she could do so to protect your identity."
    He knew it all. Despite her best efforts, he had traced her through her friends— and, if she knew Dougald, he had made matters most unpleasant for Charlotte. But Charlotte was a woman of resolution. "Lady Ruskin is one of my dearest friends, and I do not believe for a second that you succeeded in intimidating her."
    "Not at all. Charlotte… or rather, Lady Ruskin, is a most agreeable female."
    His intimate use of her first name gave Hannah pause.
    "In fact, she completely complied with your need for secrecy, and even funneled the monies through her mother-in-law, a certain Lady Bucknell."
    "Lady Bucknell?" Hannah thought of the beauteous, gracious Adorna who had so readily agreed to buy the Distinguished Academy of Governesses. Had she been motivated by more than self-interest? "Lady Bucknell told you where I was?"
    "No, no." He scoffed as if the conversation should be crystal-clear rather than a maze through which he deliberately led her. "I received the moneys. I traced your payment to Lord and Lady Bucknell's London account. I went to Lord Bucknell at once, thinking really rather vile things about the two of you."
    Hannah winced.
    "He was incredibly insulted."
    Hannah thought of Adorna's proper, stiff-necked husband. "I have no doubt of that."
    "But as soon as I explained that I was your husband—"
    "My husband." Hannah clutched the material over her racing heart. "You told Lord Bucknell that you were my husband?"
    "Of course." As he observed her distress, that smile again twisted Dougald's lips. "He traced the payment to Lady Ruskin, and so the two of us went to Lord Ruskin."
    "Lord Ruskin knows we're married?" Hannah came to her feet. This was what she feared. "Charlotte knows." Charlotte Darumple and Miss Pamela Lockhart had started the Governess school with her.
    "Yes. Charlotte knows." He observed her as if he'd been anticipating the pleasure of telling her how well and truly he had her surrounded. "But she trusts you implicitly. She insisted there must be a reason for you to run away and not return. She defended you quite hotly."
    "Of course she would. She's… how long have they known?"
    "Several months."
    "They knew when I went down to the baby's christening. They never said anything." She searched her mind for any hint of censure. Perhaps from Lord Ruskin, but he didn't approve of her independence. The man sincerely believed each woman should be wed, and of her friends he had been the one most determined to find her a suitable mate. It had taken Charlotte to rein him in. Charlotte, who allowed her husband to rule as king of his home and his business. Charlotte, who controlled him with the strong hand in a velvet glove. But Charlotte… when Hannah had seen her, she would have sworn Charlotte was her usual dear self. And she knew. All the time she knew. Heaven only knows what she had been thinking.
    Hannah paced away from the fire. "They still told you where I was."
    "Lord Ruskin told me where you were. He was quite appalled by our situation."
    "Of course he was. He thinks men are God's gift to the feminine gender, that women