Read Online A Difficult Disguise by Kasey Michaels - Free Book Online

than one expressive eyebrow throughout the entire dissertation, his gray eyes continuing to search her green ones as if to gauge the veracity of the story. “George is a very lucky man. Very fortunate, indeed. I’m proud of you, Master Smith, for your unselfish love and devotion. You even send him money?”
    “Yes, sir,” Billy answered carefully, knowing she was blushing and hoping her pink cheeks would strike Fletcher as being the result of her modesty and his praise rather than the flush of guilt. She took another bite of crust, deliberately filling her mouth so that she wouldn’t give herself away by saying too much. She may have already gone too far with the bit about sending the fictitious George money.
    “Tell me, what’s her name?” Fletcher questioned silkily, the daisy chain now rotating around his lazily swinging finger, so that Billy inhaled sharply, nearly choking on the bread.
    “Her—her name?” she gulped out between betraying coughs. “Whose name?”
    “George’s fiancée, of course, Master Smith,” Fletcher pursued, causing Billy to wish there was another crust of bread so that she could stuff it down his grinning throat. He knew, curse him! He had done it again—found her out—and with the same elementary tactic.
    It wouldn’t be any great feat for her to come up with a name; heaven knew she had been accused more than once of having the devil’s own affinity for manufactured truths, but she was also no fool. The story—a spur-of-the-moment affair—had been offered and summarily rejected. She would fall back and advance on another front.
    The tears brought on by her fit of coughing standing her in good stead, she squeezed her eyes shut tightly and willed herself to produce a few more. “I—I’m so sorry, Mr. Belden. There is no woman,” she admitted quietly, adding a short sob for good measure as she sniffed and swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand.
    “How you amaze me, Master Smith. Tell me—is there a George, or is the so lucky brother also nonexistent?”
    Throwing herself face front on the blanket just as she hoped any thwarted young boy would, Billy shook her head in answer to the question while she cudgeled her brains for inspiration; then she sat back on her haunches, pulled a large red handkerchief from her breeches pocket, and noisily blew her nose.
    “There’s no George, or at least not for me,” she said brokenly. “He ran away to sea when our father died, saying he wanted to kill Boney. He really wanted to get away from our father’s creditors, who came and took everything—even my favorite top, which could be of no good to anyone but me, could it? It was red and green and I truly loved it. I was supposed to go to some dead-old distant aunt—in Tunbridge Wells of all places! I—I couldn’t do it, so I ran away. You won’t send me back, Mr. Belden, sir, will you? She’ll make me eat gruel and—and read sermons!”
    “She sounds like an ugly customer, although most dead-old distant aunts are not known for their joie de vivre . And I agree. Sermons can be murderously off-putting,” Fletcher said, his tone commiserating, “as can evening prayers, come to think of it. But, Smith, your aunt must be worried to death, wondering what has become of you. You’re much too young, halfling, to be out on your own.”
    Now Billy became belligerent, for she believed it was time she showed some hint of spunk. Sticking out her small chin, she retorted, “I’m ten-and-three, sir—no sniveling infant. There’s many a fellow my age who has already been out on his own for years.”
    Fletcher pushed himself up to a sitting position, a move Billy countered by standing up, for she had found she liked it better when she was looking down on him rather than straight into his eyes. “I suggest we leave further discussion of the right and wrong of the road you have chosen for later this evening when we are settled at an inn, although I must tell you I applaud your candor