The Passionate One Read Online Free PDF

young— “Are you Lord
Carr?”
    Once more the
gorgeous smile lit his dark visage. “No. Lord Carr is my father. And you’re
perfectly correct if you’re thinking him a negligent sort of guardian. He is.”
    She was unable to
read the flavor of that amused estimation. His manner, his address, were
nothing like those of Fair Badden’s young men. “I don’t understand.”
    “Neither do I, and
I thought I had,” he murmured, one brow climbing. And then, “I think Carr would
like you to believe that he has simply misplaced you these past years.”
    “Did he?”
    Ash Merrick’s enigmatic smile spread. “I doubt my father has ever misplaced so much as a
toothpick.”
    Each of his answers
only provoked more questions, and each statement this Ash Merrick made only
increased her discomfort. She once more felt she was standing at the door
leading into that forbidden, enticing house. She was afraid to step over the
threshold. It would cost her a price she could not name and was uncertain she
could afford. And yet it beckoned.
    “What is it you
want, sir?”
    “I? Nothing. I’m
merely here to escort you to Wanton’s Blush because
he
wants you,
Rhiannon Russell.”
    “Why?” The sleek
cat had tired of watching, he was playing with the mouse now.
    “Your aunt was
cousin to his wife,” he said.
    “
We’re
cousins?” she asked. Impossible to believe that this black glossy
creature and she were related.
    “Oh, no. No. My
mother had the distinction of being the
first
Lady Carr. Your mother
was related to his second wife... or was it the third? Carr has an unhappy
habit of losing wives to early graves.”
    “I see.” But she
didn’t. With his explanation the exhaustion had returned to his dark, mobile
face, touching her tender heart. “You’ve traveled a great distance, sir. Would
you like something to drink? To eat?”
    He looked up
abruptly at the offer, his brows knit with surprise. “No,” he said. “Thank you.
We’ve business to conduct, you and I. Perhaps later.”
    “I don’t
understand,” Rhiannon said. “Why now, after all these years has your father
sent you to find me?”
    “Unreasonable
chit,” Ash Merrick chided comfortably. “You are not supposed to ask questions.
You are to fall into paroxysms of joy that Carr has deigned to offer you his
protection... such as it is.”
    She studied him in
consternation but forbore comment.
    “What?” he queried
when she did not reply. “No paroxysms? He’ll be disappointed. But to answer
your question, Miss Russell, Carr sends you the message that now that he has
found you, he is willing—
nota bene,
my dear, he did not go so far as
to declare his
eagerness,
merely his
willingness
—to accept
his responsibility for you.”
    Her frown was
severe, her concentration fierce. He spoke obliquely and his manner was mocking
but impersonal, as though the jest he saw was more at his expense than hers.
    “And what do you
say, Mr. Merrick?” she asked carefully.
    “Miss Russell, a
lady never puts a gentleman in the onerous position of making a judgment,” he
said. There was kindness—or perhaps pity—underscoring the ironical tone.
“Particularly about his sire’s motives. I never make judgments, Miss Russell,
ergo I never misjudge. If I were following my own inclination, I would never
have come here. I am only my father’s agent. I do not question his edicts. I
follow them.”
    His voice had grown
terse. It was as if he’d decided to dislike her before they’d ever met. She
could think of no reason he should do so—unless he resented his father’s
interest in her. Perhaps he was profligate and his purse light, she thought,
eyeing his shabby raiment, and feared his father would be overly generous with
his newly discovered ward.
    The idea explained
Ash Merrick’s subtle antagonism and melted her earlier resentment. She could
put him at ease. She didn’t want his father’s protection or his guardianship or
his generosity. Nor did she need