What an Earl Wants Read Online Free PDF Page B

alleyway and left it
there.
    She’d thought of all those things in the few seconds she’d had
to reach into her pocket and close her hand around the pistol before the earl
had swooped down and taken the weapon from her. A pity she hadn’t thought of
them before she’d so blatantly offered herself to
him. It simply had seemed prudent to have it in her pocket, that’s all. The
weapon had given her courage, she supposed. Too bad it
hasn’t given me brains, she thought, pulling a face.
    It was seeing that damned golden rose in his cravat. She’d seen
it, and something had seemed to go snap in her
brain.
    She still didn’t know how she felt about his refusal. Relieved,
definitely. Not that she wasn’t willing to make any sacrifice in order to gain
custody of Adam; although the gesture had been rather melodramatic, hadn’t it? My body for my brother. She’d been offering the
man a bite of candy when he already had bought up half the stores of sweets
throughout London.
    And yet, ashamed as she was now, in the clear light of day, she
felt insulted, as well. He hadn’t even seemed interested. If anything, he’d seemed amused.
    She’d been too blatant. Even now, she felt hot color racing
into her cheeks as she thought of how she’d behaved. Misbehaved. Her body for
her brother? How stupid! The man could have any woman he wanted just by cricking
a finger in her direction.
    And, according to Richard, he already did.
    Two mistresses? And a pair of ton ladies to boot? That seemed excessive. The man was
more his father’s son than he might wish people to think. And again—he wore the
golden rose.
    “I have to get Adam out of there,
no matter what I must do to best the man!” she exclaimed aloud, punching her
gloved fist into her palm, refusing to consider she might be sounding very much
like some overwrought and probably hare-witted heroine in a melodrama.
    Still, her determination lasted throughout the quarter-hour
journey to Portman Square through the heavy midmorning traffic. But when the
coach halted, and she was helped down to the flagway in front of the imposing
facade of the Redgrave mansion, a tiny voice in the back of her head whispered
less confidently, “How do you propose to do that, exactly?”
    Shaking off the question, she reminded herself her brother was
behind that large black door with the lion’s head knocker. She put out her chin
as a mental battering ram and headed inside as if she was accustomed to being
welcomed in the finest London houses.
    “Mrs. Linden, to see his lordship,” she said imperiously as she
stripped off her gloves and untied her bonnet, even as she belatedly realized
Doreen should be standing just behind her to take possession of the things.
Stupid! How could she have forgotten she was to be chaperoned at all times? This
was what living her catch-as-catch-can life for the past five years had done to
her; she kept forgetting she wasn’t supposed to be able to fend for herself. She
should have brought Seth, that’s what she should have done. Protection, indeed!
She’d never needed more than Richard and his heavy club at the gaming house.
Here in Portman Square, an entire regiment of Seths probably wouldn’t come
amiss!
    She shoved both bonnet and gloves at the footman. “His
lordship, young man. See to it.”
    “If you was to wait here, ma’am,” the fairly astonished-looking
footman said, indicating the open door to what had to be the ground-floor room
reserved for tradesmen and those petitioners seeking interviews.
    Her fingers still at her throat, as she’d been about to untie
the closing of her pelisse, Jessica looked through a dull red haze of anger to
the curving staircase that led to the first floor, and then to the small room.
“Oh, I think not. I’ve reconsidered my visit. Kindly inform his lordship I have
been and gone.”
    So saying, she retrieved her bonnet and gloves from the clearly
relieved footman, and quit the house. She stood on the top step of the