What an Earl Wants Read Online Free PDF

send you, my good fellow?”
    The boy flushed to the roots of his red hair. “To protect the
lady, sir. In case of any rum coves making a fuss over losing their blunt or
getting frisky or drunk or such like. His lordship will pay my wages, and that
he’s already done, ma’am. All you need do, his lordship says, is feed me and
give me somewheres to sleep. His lordship says that you got the bad end of it,
ma’am,” he said, hanging his head once more. “I suppose I do eats a bit.”
    “Entire small villages just for breakfast, I should think,”
Richard said, smiling at Jessica as he walked over to her. “Now here’s a turn-up
for the books, isn’t it? The earl has sent you...protection. Puzzling.”
    Jessica was livid. “Maddening, not puzzling. He’s insulting me.
Telling me I can’t protect myself.”
    “And how would he know that, Jess? No, answer me this instead.
How do you know that’s why he sent the boy?” Richard
asked, looking at her closely. “What did happen up there last night?”
    The jingle of harness followed by the sound of the knocker
saved Jessica from answering. “That has to be the coach. Richard, if you’ll get
Seth settled?”
    “We could bed him down in the stables. If we had stables. So
we’re keeping him?”
    Jessica shot a quick look at Seth, who reminded her of a
woodcut she’d once had, that of a gentle-eyed dragon spreading its wings to
protect a group of children lost in the woods. “I don’t suppose we really have a
choice, do we? And it will add to my arguments to have Adam here, if we’ve got
a...protector. It’s a wonder his lordship didn’t think of that.”
    “I doubt there’s much his lordship doesn’t think of,” Richard
said, escorting her out to the street. “It’s not too late to reconsider, Jess.
Don’t do this. I know he’s your brother, but you haven’t lived in his world for
a long time. He could break your heart.”
    “I’ve told you, my heart broke long ago. It can’t break again.
But having Adam with me might help mend it.” She patted Richard’s plump cheek as
a liveried footman opened the coach door and put down the steps. “Think good
thoughts while I’m gone, and don’t let Seth loose in the kitchens unless it’s to
help Doreen pare vegetables.”
    “We’re really going to keep him? I thought you were just being
nice until you can think up an excuse to send him on his way.”
    Jessica had one foot on the coach step when she turned to her
business partner. “I’m being amenable. I will continue to be amenable until Adam
is residing under my roof. Besides, it might be a good idea to have a bit of
enormous muscle to point to if anyone becomes a problem.”
    “Pointing would be probably be enough,” Richard agreed as he
stepped forward and shut the coach door behind her. “I know it would be enough
for me. But until we see if he’s anything more than big, I’ll keep my wooden
club beneath the table, if you don’t mind. It has served me well so far.”
    Jessica smiled until the coach moved off, but then allowed her
true feelings come to the surface.
    Gideon Redgrave had sent her protection, had he? From everyone but him, considering Seth was in
his employ. Perhaps the youth’s true purpose was to spy, which would make
perfect sense to her...and if it made perfect sense to her, his lordship
undoubtedly had already thought of it.
    But, mostly, Seth was an insult, a reminder that she might have
James’s pistol, she might consider herself quite a good shot, but she had not
been able to bring herself to do more than threaten with it.
    Well, of course she hadn’t shot him!
    She would have been hanged in any event, as blowing a hole in
an earl was frowned upon by the courts. She wouldn’t have been able to rescue
Adam from the man, because she’d be locked up and then executed. Too many people
had seen him climb the stairs with her; it wasn’t as if she and Richard could
have hidden the body somewhere and then hauled it to some