The Heiress Bride Read Online Free PDF Page A

could. Whatever else she was, she was an excellent rider.
    When they reached the park, he said as they turned into the north gate, “Let’s gallop for a bit. I know a lady shouldn’t so indulge herself, but it is early, as you said.”
    They raced to the end of the long outward trail and his stallion, strong as Douglas’s horse, beat Fanny soundly. She was laughing when she pulled her mare.
    â€œYou ride well,” Colin said.
    â€œAs do you.”
    Colin patted his stallion’s neck. “I asked Lord Brassley who you were. Unfortunately he didn’t see you speaking to me. I described you, but to be frank, ma’am, he couldn’t imagine any lady, particularly Lady Joan Sherbrooke, speaking to me as you did.”
    She rubbed the soft leather of her York riding gloves. “How did you describe me?”
    She’d gotten to him again, but he refused to let her see it. He shrugged and said, “Well, I said you were reasonably toothsome in a blond sort of way, that you were tall and had quite lovely blue eyes, and your teeth were white and very straight. I had to tell him that you were brazen to your toenails.”
    She was silent for a moment, looking over his left shoulder. “I suppose that’s fair enough. But he didn’t recognize me? How very odd. He’s a friend of my brother’s. He is also a rake but good-hearted, so Ryder says. I fear he still tends to see me as a ten-year-old who was always begging a present off him. He had to escort me once to Almack’s last Season, and Douglas told me in no uncertain terms that Brass wasn’t blessed with an adaptable intellect. I was to remain quiet and soft-spoken and on no account to speak of anything that lay between the covers of books to him. Douglas said it would make him bolt.”
    Colin chewed this over. He simply didn’t know what to think. She looked like a lady, and Brass had said that Lady Joan Sherbrooke was a cute little chit, adored by her brothers, perhaps a bit out of the ordinary from some stories he’d heard, but he’d never noticed anything pert about her himself. He’d then lowered his voice, whispering that she knew too much about things in books, at least he’dheard that from some matrons who were gossiping about her, their tones utterly disapproving, and she was indeed tall. But then again, she’d been waiting on the front steps of the town house for him to arrive, certainly not what the young lady of the house would do, would she? Wouldn’t an English young lady be waiting in the drawing room, a cup of tea in her hand? Brass had also insisted that Joan Sherbrooke’s hair was a plain regular brown, nothing out of the ordinary, but it wasn’t. In the early sunlight it was at least a dozen colors, from the palest blond to a dark ash.
    Oh, to hell with it. He didn’t understand, and he wasn’t at all certain he believed her. More likely, she was looking for a protector. Perhaps she was the lady’s maid to this Lady Joan Sherbrooke, or a cousin. He should just tell her that he had no money and all she could expect from him would be a fun roll in the hay, no more, no less.
    â€œI have taken you by surprise,” Sinjun said, watching the myriad expressions flit over his face. On the heels of her calmly reasoned understatement, she said in a rush, “You’re the most beautiful man I have ever seen in my life, but it’s not that, not really. I wanted you to know that it wasn’t only your face that drew me to you, it was . . . well, just . . . oh goodness, I don’t know.”
    â€œMe, beautiful?” Colin could only stare at her. “A man isn’t beautiful, that is nonsense. Please, just tell me what you want and I shall do my best to see that you get it. I can’t be your protector, I’m sorry. Even if I were the randiest goat in all of London, it would do me no good. I have no