Shayla Black Read Online Free PDF Page B

abandoned her, not the other way around. And she’d rather slit her throat than admit that his rejection had crushed her. Worse, any discussion of their past could too easily lead them to the subject of Aimee.
    Cautiously, Maddie rose. “I don’t wish to be courted. Allow me to give you my thirty pounds.”
    His faintly sexual smile fell, replaced by false regret. “I’ve already given you my terms, Maddie. It’s hardly in my best interest to extend this loan, and you have nothing with which to bargain.”
    She scowled, hating these games. Hating him. “You know I cannot pay you.”
    “ Courting it is.” He sounded terribly pleased by that fact. “I shall pick you up tomorrow evening for the theater. I have a box at the Adelphi.”
    He rose and approached on silent steps. Maddie resisted the urge to back away. Then Brock clasped her hand, his grip rife with warmth and strength as he lifted her fingers to his mouth.
    Before she could brace herself, he pressed those firm, full lips to her fingertips, his green gaze gleaming with mischief. Awareness shot up her arm in a warm tingle, all the way to her belly, where it spread through the rest of her body with alarming speed, settling right between her thighs to create a shocking ache. Maddie tore her hand away.
    Brock merely smiled. “I shall anticipate tomorrow night.”
    “ Goodbye, Mr. Taylor.” She stepped back, hoping her voice didn’t sound as breathy as it felt.
    “ Until tomorrow, sweet girl.” Brock crossed the room and opened the door.
    As he did, a tiny blond tornado hit him with the gale force of a gallop. With one hand, she held a stick with yarn attached steady between her chubby legs. She carried a paper sword with the other. Sporting two swinging braids and gray eyes just like Maddie’s, he knew this must be her daughter.
    “ Aimee!” Maddie’s gaze darted between himself and the girl. “You should be upstairs sleeping.”
    “ Only babies nap. I’m a knightess,” the child proudly proclaimed.
    Intrigued, Brock bent to the child. “A knightess? That does sound important.”
    “ I am Aimee. Who are you?”
    The girl had already mastered haughty. He laughed.
    “ Brock Taylor.” He extended his hand for the girl to shake.
    Instead, she grimaced, nose scrunched. “I will rid this house of you, evil knight.”
    “ Evil, am I?”
    She nodded her little blond head with conviction. “You made Mama mad.”
    Brock heard Maddie’s embarrassed gasp, and he chuckled again.
    “ Aimee,” Maddie said. “We do not insult strangers. Apologize, please.”
    “ So it’s no faux pas for you to call me evil because you know me?” Brock teased and was rewarded with a pink splash of color upon Maddie’s cheeks.
    “ I challenge you to a joust,” the girl declared to Brock.
    “ And should I win, do you promises to stop calling me evil?”
    “ Aye,” answered Aimee, chin raised.
    “ If I should lose?”
    “ To the dungeon!”
    Brock suppressed a smile. He’d wanted to dislike Viscount Wolcott’s offspring, but the girl was too cute.
    “ Aimee,” Maddie cut in, tone warning. “Leave Mr. Taylor alone.”
    “ But I can defeat this bl-blackc... What did you call him, Mama?”
    “ Blackguard?” Brock supplied helpfully.
    “ That’s it,” Aimee pronounced, prancing on her makeshift stick pony.
    Brock glanced Maddie’s way, only to find her shielding herself from embarrassment with a palm over her face. He laughed again.
    “ Well, we can’t have anyone thinking me a blackguard,” he told Aimee. “How shall we joust? Surely not outside with swords?”
    “ No. That is cold and unsafe.” She shook her head like a chastising parent, as if he ought to know better.
    “ You do have a point.”
    “ I hide and you find me,” she explained with a little fist on a little hip.
    “ Aimee, now is not an appropriate time for this game.” She shot Brock a glare as she stepped between them. “Mr. Taylor was just leaving.”
    Brock watched Maddie.