The Scandal in Kissing an Heir Read Online Free PDF Page B

said once they’d bowed and curtsied to each other.
    From the corner of her eye, Rebecca could see Lord Brekenbridge trying to make his way toward them through the crowd. She ought to pull away from Mr. Neville and go to him, yet when Mr. Neville urged her along, she found herself moving forward alongside him until cool air greeted them and they stepped out onto the terrace. “I shouldn’t be here with you,” she said, not because they were alone, for they were not the only ones looking to escape the heat of the ballroom, and not because she was afraid he might try to compromise her in some way, but because she didn’t trust herself to be alone with him. Brekenbridge offered security, while Mr. Neville offered scandal. She would have to be a fool . . . hell she was already a fool, for if Brekenbridge saw them together, her efforts with him would be for naught.
    “I merely want a moment of your time,” Mr. Neville said as he steered her toward the terrace steps. “You see, I find it curious that you’re so eager to marry that you’d throw yourself away without the slightest hesitation on a man like Brekenbridge.”
    “Who’s a perfect gentleman, if I may remind you,” Rebecca said.
    “True, but he’s also a veritable bore—you’ll get very little excitement from him.”
    “Perhaps I don’t care for excitement. Perhaps I’d like a quiet life at home, caring for my husband and children, having friends over for tea, doing charity work and such.”
    “Sounds positively thrilling,” Mr. Neville muttered.
    “What? Many ladies take great pleasure in such things. Who are you to diminish it?”
    “I think the better question, my lady,” he said as he stopped in his tracks and turned to face her, “is not so much who I am, but rather who you are.”
    Rebecca sucked in a breath as her whole body went rigid.
    “Ah, I see I struck a nerve.”
    “You don’t know the first thing about me.” She had the uncanny feeling that Mr. Neville had just pulled the string that would unravel all of her secrets.
    “I believe I know you better than you know Brekenbridge. For one thing, you do want excitement in your life, Lady Nuit—the desperate need for marriage that has you plotting, along with the ambiguity about you, your desire for anonymity, they attest to it. This is an adventure for you, isn’t it? I wonder how many of those you’ve had in the past, and more importantly, will you be willing to give them up in the future?”
    They resumed walking. He had a point, to be sure, but he was making it without knowing all the facts. Yes, her life with Brekenbridge might be a bit more placid than what she would have wished for, but it would surely be better than marrying an aging cripple. She winced at the very idea of it.
    They started down the stairs leading to the lawn below. “Let’s take a stroll in the garden,” he said. “The fewer people who see us together, the better—for your sake.”
    She eyed him dubiously. “Have you any idea of how that sounds?”
    “What do you mean?” he asked, turning his head and meeting her gaze with a frown.
    “It sounds as though you’d rather keep to dark corners and the cover of trees and bushes, all the while hoping to have me believe that it’s for my own benefit.” She gave him a look that she hoped would underline her innuendo.
    If she wasn’t mistaken, his eyes widened a little behind his mask. “Point taken,” he said with a wry smile, “though I can assure you that doing so would benefit both of us equally.”
    The way her stomach twisted itself into a tight knot told her that he was no longer speaking of protecting her from ruin but quite possibly the opposite. She sucked in a breath and tried to ignore the sturdy feel of his arm beneath her gloved hand and how elegantly he guided her down toward the path below.
    “Tell me, Nuit, what’s the most outrageous thing you’ve ever done?”
    As much as she would have liked to blame her gown for causing her to