Read Online Lions and Lace by Meagan McKinney - Free Book Online Page A

beg of you—listen to reasoning. You've wrongly taken my fortune, and I must have it back. I must!"
    He looked down at her small hands grasping his lapels. That one glance made her want to tear her hands away in fear. She saw something then that she'd never seen in the men in her set. There was an earthiness about this man, perhaps because he'd been spawned from the gutter, but that earthiness didn't translate into the image of gentle, pastoral nature. When Sheridan looked at her as he was looking at her now, she thought of a lion raging bloody fights for territory or subduing lionesses in the primeval need to procreate. This Irishman personified nature in all its dark, magnificent fury, and she knew she'd never come up against such a force before. When he covered her trembling hands with his large ones and stared down at her, a taunting quirk to his lips, it was all she could do not to turn and run.
    "You feel like ice."
    "Let me go," she whispered, unable to meet his eyes.
    He refused. Instead he looked down at her wet gown, appearing to take great interest in the way the satin draped across her shoulders. It sent a fiery tingle down her spine. She'd never been perused like this before, as if the man were trying to see her without her clothes, trying to see deep inside her—no doubt all the way to where he thought her barren little heart lay.
    Her reaction, though she tried to hide it, obviously pleased him. A small dark smile touched his lips, and he said, "Your dress is quite beautiful, Miss Van Alen . I must compliment you on the color. It's the exact color of your skin. You hardly look clothed at all. . . ."
    She blushed all the way to the tips of her toes. If her mission with this man hadn't been so serious, she might have slapped his face for such a familiarity. "My dress is not the subject of this discussion."
    "Of course. We were discussing your fortune . . . or lack thereof." He forced her gaze to meet his. "But first tell me—do all you hoity-toity hyphenated New-Yorkers behave in such a ludicrous manner? Demand reparation in drenched Worth gowns? Leave your relatives on strangers' doorsteps? Interesting behavior for society folk."
    Embarrassment rose again to color her cheeks. She gave him a censorious look. "My uncle is a vile man, Mr. Sheridan, and you lower yourself when you taunt me with his wretched behavior." She stared at him, and her mouth went dry. His hands were like fire around hers, and she wondered if that was because she was so cold or he so scorchingly hot.
    "Tell me why he did what he did."
    His touch affected her so much, she could barely whisper. "He was drunk. Your ruining us made him go crazy. He thought if I were humiliated, he might gain some kind of revenge."
    "And was this revenge also?" He released her, and one warm finger trailed down the soft inside of her arm.
    She looked down and saw the bruises Didier had left there. She covered them with one hand, unwittingly showing him the bruises on her other arm. "Please, Mr. Sheridan," she began quietly, her insides dying with shame.
    He ignored her and touched her cheek, the one Didier had bruised the night of the Sheridan ball. The powder she had used to cover it must have washed off in the rain, and she cringed at what a sight she must present to this man. While his touch was gentle, she couldn't bear to feel it. He was only pointing out another facet of her degradation.
    She pulled away his hand and said, "I must ask you to return my money. I'll leave your home and never bother you again. It's not an enormous sum."
    "I know it isn't, Alana."
    She wondered how he knew they called her Alana, but he already knew so much about her, she didn't bother asking him. With defeat settling around her shoulders like black laurels, she made one last humiliating confession. "My uncle is my curse, Mr. Sheridan. So you see , your revenge lacks the sting it might have had. What was done to me tonight is punishment enough. You needn't add to it. Return my