Rules of Surrender Read Online Free PDF

perfect.“
    ”She’s very young and very pretty.“ Wynter’s years in the desert had apparently stripped him of artifice.
    Charlotte’s fingers tightened around the handle of her bag and she put a crisp edge to her voice. ”Youth and prettiness are not a barrier to efficiency.“
    ”No? We shall see.“
    A rush of blood flooded her cheeks. And for no reason, she assured herself. In every new employment, she had been initially disdained by someone. But to have this man, this brute, so openly doubt her… ah, that set her teeth on edge.
    Adorna hastily provided introductions. ”Miss Dalrumple, may I present my son, Wynter, Viscount Ruskin. Wynter, this is Lady Charlotte Dalrumple, the governess for… or rather, an expert in manners.“
    Lord Bucknell coughed, and Charlotte correctly interpreted that as censure. But she paid him no heed. It was Wynter, Lord Ruskin, who commanded her attention. Determined to behave as if the personal comments, the cross-conversation, the insolent inspection were quite normal, Charlotte curtsied. ”I am delighted to make your acquaintance, my lord.“
    Lord Wynter just gazed at her rather stupidly. ”What should I do?“ he asked, apparently to the thin air.
    Acting on reflex, she placed the bag on the floor beside her. ”You bow and repeat, ’I am delighted to make your acquaintance, Miss Dalrumple.‘ “
    ”But you have a title.“
    ”Only because my father was an earl, and besides, using one’s title to excess is considered uncouth. Even Her Majesty Queen Victoria is frequently called ’Ma’am‘ by her attendants.“
    ”I see.“ He bowed, a sweep of courtesy. ”I should bow like this?“
    ”Exactly like that.“
    ”And I should say“—he took her hand and bent over it, then looked into her eyes—”I am delighted to make your acquaintance, Miss Dalrumple.“
    At that moment, she realized he made a game of her. He knew exactly what he should do.
    She didn’t like the man. She didn’t like him at all, but if he was similar to the other fathers she’d had truck with, she would never see him past this initial meeting.
    Only he looked at her as if she were a person who now merited his full attention. The gaze that before had been analytical now searched her as if he wished to know her in some intimate manner. And when he brought her hand to his cheek and smoothed it across the skin, she thought she knew exactly why.
    The slight growth of his beard caught at the cotton of her glove. She knew her eyes had grown wide. She glanced at Adorna and Lord Bucknell, but they were engrossed in a conversation of their own. So she tugged at her hand, and when Wynter released her, she said, ”If you would allow me, my lord, to offer a critique of your conduct?“
    He straightened, still watching her. ”Of course.“
    ”I believe I may have pinpointed the reason for Lady Howard’s flirtatious manner. That gesture of hand to cheek is quite unusual in English society. She may have read into it interest on your part. Perhaps it would be best if you dispensed with such gestures until you once again regain your sense of propriety.“
    He tucked his hands behind his back and straightened his shoulders. ”Actually, I believe my sense of propriety is alive and well.“
    Now she looked at him, seeing him as others would; a swaggering, powerful, experienced man of the world. ”But it is not British.“
    ”You think the British have defined propriety?“
    ”Certainly. In your situation, where you have been gone for many years, to be a paragon of British propriety would prove a social advantage.“
    Wynter laughed, a wholehearted bellow of amusement. ”You are lovely, oh moon of my delight. Without you, my life has been as barren and cold as the night desert when the harmattan blows with its endless, sorrowful breath.“
    Charlotte wanted to respond, to somehow point out that such an unrestrained babble of words was indelicate and most improper.
    Yet with his head lifted, his hair swung