Read Online London's Last True Scoundrel by Christina Brooke - Free Book Online

whether he was a married man or no.
    She didn’t regret that their betrothal had come to nothing. Indeed, the whole notion seemed to have been a figment of her mother’s imagination. That could well be the case. Marigold deVere had always harbored illusions of grandeur.
    Ethereally pretty but dowerless, Hilary’s mother had come from a minor branch of an aristocratic family. Her notions had never fallen into step with those of her brutish husband, however, and her spirits had slowly declined until there was nothing left.
    Marigold had given up, but her daughter wouldn’t. She would find a way to attain her dream if she had to brave all of Davenport’s attempts to ravish her.
    Ravish . The word held an illicit thrill, particularly in the context of Lord Davenport.
    She did not want to think about that.
    The threatened storm had not eventuated, leaving the air oddly sultry. Or perhaps it was the fire she’d ordered, so she could dry her hair at its heat before she went to bed.
    She threw off the covers, tossed and turned a bit, pounded her pillow with the flat of her hand.
    Double drat the man!
    His face kept swimming up in her mind’s eye. That smiling, disreputably bruised, extraordinarily compelling face. And she’d still not caught a glimpse of his remarkable buttocks.…
    A sound like the rumble of thunder made her start awake from her drowse. Disoriented, she glanced toward the window. A masculine shout made her realize that the thunder had come from inside the house.
    “Oh, no!”
    She leaped out of bed and flew into the corridor. The commotion had come from the guest bedchamber.
    She hurried toward it and wrenched open the door.
    There, stark naked with his back to her, in the midst of a pile of ceiling plaster and debris, stood Lord Davenport.
    Hilary’s jaw dropped.
    He was covered from head to toe in grayish-white plaster dust. He looked like a statue of a Greek god as he surveyed the wreckage, one hip negligently cocked. A David, a colossus still standing proud and tall through the sacking of Rome, with wide, muscled shoulders, a slim, tapered waist, and firm, taut buttocks.
    Buttocks.
    Hilary swallowed hard. Now she understood.
    Her mind filled with understanding, in fact. She couldn’t seem to move or speak for understanding. Her thought processes ground to a complete halt.
    He turned and saw her. “Oh, hello there.”
    Her eyes popped. She opened her mouth. Closed it. David was nothing like it.
    Gracious, but she’d never dreamed …
    How on earth did he manage to walk around all day with that dangling between his legs? Flushing, she tore her gaze from his groin, only to fix on that imposing chest.
    As easy in his nudity as he was in his clothes, Davenport gestured at the carnage behind him. “As you can see, there’s been a slight accident.”
    From somewhere, she dredged up the ability to speak. “Put … some … clothes … on!”
    He glanced about him, as if the notion had only just occurred. “Afraid I can’t. Your maid took my things away to see if she could get the mud out.”
    Sheets. She thought of sheets, but the bedclothes were buried under the rubble.
    “Ah.” He turned and reached up to yank down the bed curtain from a post that leaned drunkenly toward the bed.
    The ripple of musculature in his back and buttocks as he fully extended his arm to pull down the threadbare damask made Hilary feel a little faint.
    He took his time about arranging the curtain around his waist and securing it.
    Dark eyes glinted at her through the mask of plaster dust as he put up his hand to brush some flakes of ceiling from his hair. He ought to appear ridiculous, she thought.
    He was, in a word, magnificent.
    Oh, dear.
    Far too late, she averted her gaze. “You are not hurt?” she inquired, staring at the bedpost.
    “No, I was lucky. I hadn’t managed to fall asleep yet, so I leaped from the bed in time.”
    There was a taut silence while she wondered if the cause for his insomnia might mirror