The Secret to Seduction Read Online Free PDF Page B

Indulgent. “I am writing a poem.” He looked at her a moment longer, almost appraisingly. “I was trying to think of a rhyme for skin.”
    Whoosh. Heat scorched Sabrina’s face from her collar to her hairline.
    The earl returned his gaze to the page. But not before she saw the flash of a tiny smile.
    The devil.
    “No, you weren’t, Lord Rawden,” she said firmly.
    He looked up, surprised. “Wasn’t I?”
    “No. If you’d said, perhaps, that you were trying to think of a rhyme for ‘lemon,’ I might have believed you. Shin, din, grin, sin,” she added pointedly. “I believe you were trying to be . . .”
    She trailed off when she realized, to her horror, she was actually scolding the earl.
    He was smiling a little. “Incorrigible?” he completed helpfully. “Very well. Lemon, did you say? I shall take that under consideration the next time I decide to be incorrigible.”
    And then he lowered his head to his work again, and it was clear she was once again forgotten.
    A bit belatedly Sabrina recalled that she perhaps ought to ingratiate herself with the earl, in order to help support Geoffrey’s petition for funding of the mission she hoped to share with him.
    She took a deep breath, and gingerly, as if holding her hand out for a bear to sniff, she ventured a conciliatory question. “Do you find writing poetry pleasurable, Lord Rawden?”
    He jerked his head up again, his eyebrows drawn ever so slightly together. As if he wondered that she dared interrupt. “God, no,” he said dismissively. “It eases pain.”
    He dropped his head.
    Sabrina stared at that handsome head bent over his page of foolscap and knew an unfamiliar ire. She knew he wasn’t precisely obligated to be polite, as he was an earl and a notorious one at that. Still, she wasn’t accustomed to being completely ignored or dismissed—quite the opposite in fact, at least in Tinbury—and she was a little surprised to discover how much she minded.
    “?‘It eases pain,’?” she mimicked under her breath. “How very dramatic.” She lowered her head to her book again.
    The earl’s head came up very slowly this time.
    “What did you say, Miss Fairleigh?”
    Oh, no.
    She stared at him in what she hoped was an artless way. “I . . .” She stopped.
    “It rather sounded like: ‘How very dramatic,’?” he encouraged on a drawl.
    Sabrina was unwilling to corroborate this. She was certain her scarlet cheeks were all the answer he needed, anyway.
    “Have you read any of my poetry, Miss Fairleigh?” A mild question.
    “No!” she said rather vehemently, before she realized her vehemence might be construed as impolite. Then again, it was best she make it clear precisely what sort of female she happened to be.
    “Good. I daresay you wouldn’t understand it, and it would only confuse you.” The earl dropped his head again to his page. His pen scratched a few more words across the page.
    She should leave it at that. She really should.
    “I read English well enough,” she said coolly.
    “Passion is another language altogether.” He tossed this out without bothering to lift his head from his foolscap.
    She’d been in the presence of this notorious man scarcely a day, and already one of the seven deadly sins had her firmly in its grip. Later, she would blame pride for what she said next.
    “I’m tempted to roll my eyes, Lord Rawden, but then I would be unable to read my book.”
    The earl lifted his head slowly, slowly up then. He studied her at length. And finally, a faint smile began to hover about his mouth, and his face registered a peculiar sort of approval.
    “Unable to read your book? You haven’t turned more than two pages since you’ve sat down, Miss Fairleigh. Do you read so very slowly? Or does my presence disconcert you? If it’s the latter, I do apologize.”
    She’d thought poets possessed clouds for brains. This one possessed a rapier.
    “You’re not sorry, Lord Rawden,” she said evenly.
    Oh, and at that, he