Read Online Improper Gentlemen by Mia Marlowe, Diane Whiteside, Maggie Robinson - Free Book Online

me, I’d build you an empire, not castles in the air.” He raised his glass to an engraving of a Confederate veteran’s shattered farmstead. Then he poured the golden liquor down his throat, his eyes shut in ecstasy.
    Justin drummed his fingers for a moment, then shoved the decanter away. Neither memories of his childhood home’s burned-out remains, nor alcohol, spurred him as much as today’s problems. And honor.
    “When will you hand the woman over?” Johnson caught the decanter easily and refilled his glass.
    “I won’t.” Justin put down his glass, careful not to break the fragile crystal. Now they were getting down to this conversation’s true meat. Just a little longer and he could ask what had happened when Charlotte met Simmons.
    “I thought we just agreed that neither of us like big fights.” Johnson’s Georgia drawl grew thicker.
    “We did. But she’s a woman and I won’t let Simmons have her.” Shit, Simmons had hit her, and she hadn’t even been with him five minutes.
    “I don’t understand you. It’s not as if your morals are sunshine bright when it comes to bed partners.”
    Justin gritted his teeth and reminded himself to stay calm. He and Johnson never had the same tastes, which was why they didn’t share the same whores. “All of my lovers were willing. Miss Moreland is a lady and wishes nothing to do with Simmons.”
    “It’s only for a few days.”
    “She’d be lucky to stay alive. No.”
    He watched his friend rapidly swirl his drink in his glass until it resembled an abyss, rather than a lamp-lit cloud.
    “Why are you doing this, Johnson?” Justin dropped his voice to a lower pitch, as if his old friend was a skittish horse to be coaxed through a winter pass. “Why are you pushing so hard to get Simmons’s attention?”
    “I told you—he can make Wolf Laurel the county seat.”
    “Yeah, half the council is parading for his attention. If it happens, hordes of miners will come here to register their claims and spend their money.”
    “They’ll use my hotel—and visit your Hair Trigger Palace. We’ll be rich. Even after mining dies out, loggers and ranchers will spend fortunes here.”
    “But Sweetwater is a better bet to become county seat. It’s on the other side of the pass and it has better roads. The railroads already love it so its citizens have more money for bribes and chicanery in the legislature. How can you stand against it?”
    “By giving Simmons the only bribe he can’t find anywhere else.” The veteran fighter’s jaw set hard. “A beautiful white woman he can seduce—”
    “Flog!” Justin pictured Charlotte’s fragile white skin shattered and bleeding under the whip, while she screamed and screamed . . .
    The other Southerner shrugged indifferently. “Doesn’t matter. She’s an adulteress who sleeps with married men.”
    “One man.” Justin surged onto his feet. “Nobody knew he was married until his harridan of a wife arrived to drag him back to Cincinnati.”
    “So what?” Johnson matched him and glared at him from only a few feet away. “Moreland crossed the line and she’s now a fallen woman. She doesn’t deserve protection.”
    Justin’s hands twitched over his guns and he fought to control his temper.
    “If your sister,” he said as coolly as possible, “was in the same predicament—”
    The former infantry officer knocked him down with a hard right hook to the jaw.
    Justin fell over the straight-backed chair, which slammed into the side table. Glasses and decanters rattled, and alcohol sloshed out.
    Where the hell had that blow come from? Damn it, Johnson always got in the first strike.
    He sprang back up onto his feet, more than willing to fight.
    “My sister was never a Northern whore, lifting her skirts for married men!” his saddle partner roared.
    Oh hell, he couldn’t duel over a long-dead female’s honor. He managed a curt bow. “My apologies.”
    “Accepted.” Johnson’s nod was even briefer. “You’d