Read Online Her Mystery Duke by Natasha Blackthorne - Free Book Online Page B

chewing.
He turned to where she sat across from him at the cheap little table. Sunlight
illuminated her hair into shining gold.
    She pinned him with her gaze from the largest, bluest eyes
David had ever seen. “She’s your mistress?”
    “In another lifetime, yes, she was.”
    Transfixed, he jerked his gaze from hers and looked around
again at several tall stacks of books and papers scattered over the floor
nearby. “You live here alone?”
    “Yes, I live alone.” Her voice was soft and so girlish; it
drew his attention back to her. “How old are you, sweeting?”
    “I am twenty-one.”
    She was a woman, not a girl after all. Thank God for that.
Apparently he had not taken that much
leave of his senses.
    But he had missed the vote in committee on the bill he’d
introduced to improve the treatment of the insane. The single most important
event he’d worked toward in years. He’d spent the entire hunting season
finessing various members of both the opposition and his own side to see things
his way. He’d promised favors that would take him years to repay. But first the
bill had to get out of committee and into a general vote.
    What if the vote in committee had gone the other way today,
just by his own absent voice?
    “What is today?”
    “Tomorrow is the Lord’s day.”
    “How did we come to be together? Truly.”
    “You walked into the coffee shop I frequent on Aldgate High
Street and you called me Thérèse. You were out of your head—I am certain they
would have taken you to Bedlam otherwise.”
    Despite himself, the image of the Duke of Hartley being
carted off to Bedlam made him chuckle. “And you were afraid for my safety?”
    “My father died in one of those places.” She closed her
eyes. “There came a time when I could no longer control him alone and I could
afford no servants.”
    Softness and sympathy welled in his chest. He felt his face
contort with it. “My darling girl, I am so sorry.”
    She opened her eyes. “It is just what happened.”
    Her attempt to smile failed miserably.
    A peculiar pressure developed in the center of his chest
that had nothing to do with his improving illness. Tenderness consumed him. She
had taken it upon herself to protect him and brought him here to care for. She
had also denied him the advantages of a physician. But she had cared for him, a
virtual stranger.
    “You are a very sweet girl.” He reached across the table and
touched her mouth, running the pad of his thumb over her velvet-soft lower lip.
“And you have a very sweet mouth.”
    He allowed himself a slight smile at the memory of those
rose-colored lips wrapped around his erection. She continued staring at him
with those large eyes. She was trying to appear strong. Trying to conceal the
pain he’d seen darken her gaze.
    He wanted to give her pleasure. Lavish pleasure. He wanted
to comfort her. He wanted to soften those hard, prickly edges she put between
herself and the world. She was like a brave, spiting kitten lost in the large
city.
    The last thought left him shaken. It was the exact truth.
    So what did that make him?
    A wolf?
    “Good God, you’re so very young.” He’d not been with anyone
so young in years.
    She raised a brow. “Well, just how old are you?”
    “I am thirty-eight.”
    “That doesn’t seem so very old.”
    “Doesn’t it?”
    “No,” she replied with a bland expression.
    So, she was used to bedding much older men. He didn’t know
how he felt about that.
    “Dare I ask, what street are we on here?” He wanted to take
his mind off the subject of this girl and her other, older men.
    “Wentworth Street, Whitechapel.”
    He blinked at her. How the devil had he come so far east?
“I’ll see that you are compensated for the trouble you have taken.”
    What good would it do to tell the girl who he was? Moreover,
he didn’t want to see that open, sincere gaze harden into greed.
    “I don’t need much. But I had to buy the shaving items, the
food, extra firewood—oh,