Sapphires Are an Earl's Best Friend Read Online Free PDF Page B

bed and skimmed over the Cytherian Intelligence column. Her liaison with Ravenscroft was not mentioned in this morning’s edition, but it would be before the end of the week. She had made progress at the ball. Not only had Ravenscroft danced with her three times—three miserable times—he’d attempted to seduce her and asked if she would accompany him to the theater tonight.
    Lily was glad it was one of the Shakespearean tragedies she had agreed to attend. She could never stay awake through the opera, and she would need all her powers of observation to study and learn what she could about the Duke of Ravenscroft. Thus far, he did not strike her as a man who wanted to kill the group of agents the Crown held responsible for the ultimate defeat of Napoleon. But then, traitors rarely wore signs proclaiming themselves as such. Still, nothing the duke had said or done had struck her as suspicious. Her instincts did not tell her she needed to fear him.
    Only one event from the evening stayed with her—and it took the employment of all of her willpower not to think about him.
    She’d dreamed about the kiss, of course. She was exceedingly weak-willed in her dreams. She’d dreamed of Darlington’s mouth on hers, his hands moving over her flesh, the delicious weight of his body hard and solid on top of hers…
    Lily drank more chocolate. How had Fallon known Darlington would be such an impediment? He’d never so much as looked at her before! And now he would not leave her alone. It pained her to treat him so coldly, but she had no other choice. Her mission was paramount. And perhaps she hadn’t needed to be quite so cold. But it galled that when she was finally over her infatuation with him, that was the moment he chose to kiss her.
    How she would have killed for that kiss months ago.
    She lay back on her pillows and searched for something in her room to distract her. She’d had her room done in white lace and robin’s egg blue. Compared to Juliette and Fallon’s bedchambers, hers was a little girl’s room, but she sometimes felt her childhood had ended too soon. Her innocence taken before she was ready. She wondered what the gallants of the ton would think if she actually admitted a few to her bedchamber. Would they be surprised it was not exotic and lush as Fallon’s was or full of silk and splendor as Juliette’s?
    Not that she suspected Fallon or Juliette had admitted many, if any, men to their bedchambers. Once all three girls had lived under the Earl of Sinclair’s roof. She’d missed that closeness when they had moved into separate town houses. She’d always been part of a large family, and it felt strange to live alone. Now she was the only one still living alone.
    Once she had dreamed of sharing, if not her life, at least her bed with Darlington. She remembered when she first met him. He’d taken her breath away—and not simply because he frequently wore extremely tight breeches. He had curly brown hair she had never seen tamed into any sort of proper style. It was the kind of hair that made a woman want to run her hands through it, watch the curls twine about her fingers. He had thick eyebrows that offset large, dark eyes. His eyes were heavy-lidded and almost always looked as though he’d just been wakened. He had a sleepy quality about him that made Lily think of tousled beds and twisted sheets. But his mouth was his best feature. It was full and pouty and boyish. He had lips made for kissing. She could have feasted on those lips.
    And if his good looks hadn’t been enough, he had the best taste in fashion save for Beau Brummell—better than Brummell to Lily’s mind. She felt that icon of fashion dressed too plainly. Darlington added a bit of flair to his choices. Darlington was too good-natured, too witty to wear sober garb. And yet he’d always dressed in a manner that befitted an earl who would one day be a powerful duke. Except, of course, for those sinfully snug breeches.
    Lily had loved