Susan Carroll Read Online Free PDF

insignificance. She felt as if
she were alone with this enigmatic stranger, who made her pulse
race with but a touch.
    As the opening strains of the minuet sounded
through the ballroom, Phaedra gave herself a mental shake. The rest
of society, the fops, the silly chits like Muriel Porterfield,
might be content to stand in awe of this man. But Phaedra was
determined to find out exactly who this marquis was, what sort of
mischief he might be brewing with her grandfather. He was a far cry
from the elderly busybody she had expected. So why the devil had he
advised against her return to London?
    Gliding toward his lordship, her skirts
rustling against his legs, she tried to penetrate what lay behind
the mask. But his eyes were so hypnotic and piercing that she
averted her gaze in confusion. She regarded his shoe buckles, the
firm-muscled calves encased in white silk stockings, the
tight-fitting knee breeches that clung so well to his lean
hips.
    "Well, what think you, madame?" His soft
voice startled her.
    "Of what, my lord?"
    "Of the buttons on my waistcoat. I told the
tailor they would never do."
    "Buttons?" she repeated, wrenching her eyes
away from their admiring perusal of his masculine form. "I-no, my
lord, I see nothing wrong with your-your buttons."
    "But I affirm that there is. If they so hold
a lady's attention that she never looks up to afford me one glimpse
of her beautiful eyes, then I think my tailor has greatly
erred."
    Flushing, Phaedra looked up at once. Was he
mocking her? She could tell nothing from the dry tones in which he
spoke.
    "That is better."
    "I am sorry, my lord. I did not mean to seem
rude." Her apology was swept away as they were separated by the
movement of the dance.
    Why did he never smile? His lips were set,
immovable, but at least his eyes did not look so cold as she'd
first seen them. Or was it all a trick of the candlelight?
    When they came together again, she said, "I
was not staring at you, but merely watching my steps. It has been a
while since I danced the minuet."
    Even as she spoke, Phaedra winced in pained
remembrance. The crowded assembly room, Ewan's foot hooking around
her ankle, tripping her into the line of dancers. "Your pardon,"
Ewan had called out as he had hauled her up from the floor. "But I
fear my wife tries to gallop through every dance as if it were an
Irish jig." Then as always, the cruel, cutting laughter.
    Phaedra became aware of a strong hand at her
waist, another clasping her palm. With a start, she came back to
the present, realizing that she had almost blundered into the next
set, but Armande discreetly guided her back into position.
    "There, you see," she said, feeling her
cheeks burn. "I did try to warn you. As my husband was wont to say,
I am not plagued by an overabundance of grace."
    "If there was grace found wanting, my lady,
it would not be any fault of yours, but your partner's."
    His lips came startlingly close to her ear
until she felt the warmth of his breath. How could any voice so
deep, so undeniably masculine, be also soft and caressing? She
wondered if he could feel the tremor that passed through her and
hailed with relief the next pattern of the dance that separated
them.
    What was she doing? she wondered as she
circled the room. She had not informed him as she had planned, that
she could do without his interference in her life. She had not
asked him even one question. Now Armande had her by the hand again,
pulling her close, outwardly maintaining all the formality, the
ritual of the dance, while his fingers teased the sensitive hollow
of her palm.
    "My lord," she said, trying to bring her
disordered wits together, "I fear I have a complaint to lodge
against you."
    He spoke as if he had not heard her, his
voice pensive. "How sad you appeared a moment ago, my lady, so far
away. As if some unhappy memory had risen to haunt you."
    Phaedra nearly snatched her hand away. What
sort of man was this, that he could read her innermost thoughts?
She began to