Season for Scandal Read Online Free PDF Page A

Jane , so utterly wicked and laughing, that his foggy thoughts cleared. Every time she smiled and laughed, his relief grew. Something on this day had brought her pleasure. Now he had only to continue it, not create it.
    The guests lingered long over breakfast, and it was early afternoon before they began to disperse. As Edmund shook Xavier’s hand in thanks and farewell, he ignored a quick gnaw of pain in his abdomen.
    “I’ll be good to her,” Edmund assured his old friend.
    The earl smiled. “I’ve no worries on that matter. You’re good to everyone.”
    The compliment made Edmund suddenly impatient. You ought to trust me less and Jane more , he thought. But the words didn’t make their way anywhere near the tip of his tongue. Because Xavier was right: Edmund was good to everyone. He had developed the habit long ago. It was . . . atonement.
    The carriage ride to the house in Berkeley Square was brief, though not silent. Edmund filled Jane’s ears with glib observations about the weather, the house, the guests. Everything in the world came out of his mouth except for what was important: that they were married, and that they would soon get on with the business of becoming husband and wife in truth. Creating a child. An heir, he hoped. Quickly, before Turner pounced on him; before Edmund’s dependents were left destitute.
    The chain of thought was hardly conducive to passion. He wished Jane would look at him in that wicked way again, as though their wedding was all a game and they were playing by their own secret, shared rules.
    But her mind seemed elsewhere now. Edmund had no notion whether it was in the bedchamber, or a ballroom, or in Sheringbrook’s card room before the moment of her ruin. When the carriage rolled up before the Berkeley Square house, she bounded from it as soon as the steps were let down. Up the stairs to the front door, and inside. In the entry hall, Edmund caught up to her.
    She bounced on her toes before handing her cloak to a footman. “Kirkpatrick, it’s beautiful. I couldn’t even imagine how the work would look once complete.”
    This had to be an overstatement, because the only change to the entry hall was a coat of leaf-green paint that Jane had chosen to cover a glum lead-gray. Everything else was the same: a ceiling of delicate plasterwork and painted roundels. A dizzy-tiled floor with spiraling black and white diamonds. All had been cleaned and polished to a shine, though; the servants wanted the house to look its best for its new mistress.
    Perhaps this was a sign that Jane would be good for his domestic peace. Or perhaps he was grasping at straws.
    “The house looks well, does it not?” he said. “I’m glad your tastes are satisfied.”
    Satisfy . Would he be able to satisfy her? Would she know the difference?
    “I didn’t expect to enjoy it so much. Choosing colors for a house, I mean. I’ve never done such a thing before because my mother and I never had the money.”
    “Well, now you do,” Edmund said lightly.
    “Now I do,” she echoed. She looked up at him, her expression covetous.
    Holding his gaze with her deep hazel eyes, she began to remove her elbow-length gloves. Edmund watched as she took hold of the delicate kid leather between thumb and forefinger and pulled, releasing her fingers one by one from their sheath of propriety. Tugging the whole glove free, at last, revealing her pale arm in one slow sweep.
    And then she did the same for the other glove, her eyes never leaving his.
    Significance lay heavy in the air, as pungent as myrrh. Edmund watched, his throat dry, as Jane handed off her gloves to a servant. What would be undone next? The clasp of her necklace? Or she might remove the fragile high-heeled slippers on her feet, and he could carry her upstairs.
    The idea was alluring.
    Jane rubbed her hands up her just-bared arms, as if the feel of her own touch was an awakening.
    And winked at him.
    Just like that, it all made sense. She was acting a part