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

hers.
    “You cannot stay here,” she declared. Talk about the obvious!
    “No, I suspect you’re right about that.”
    She tried to think of where else to put him. She’d have to make up another bed. And somehow draw a bath for him so he could wash all that plaster dust off.
    “I apologize,” she said, though the words scraped in her throat. “It must have been a shock.”
    “I’m still trembling,” he said. He held out his arms. “Hold me?”
    That did not deserve a response. “I’ll order a bath, and while you’re…” She gestured with a flap of her hand, trying not to imagine that body of his, wet and naked in the tub.…
    She cleared her throat. “While you do that, I’ll see to another bedchamber for you.”
    She didn’t wait for his answer or look at him in the eye again. She hurried away, fighting the firework thrills of awareness his teasing request had set off inside her.
    An agony of confusion dogged her as she went to fetch Trixie. Traversing corridors, climbing stairs, she scolded herself for her prurience. How much she’d wanted to stay right where she was and simply gawk at him. What a wicked temptation it had been to obey him when he’d asked her to hold him, plaster dust and all.
    Ridiculous man. And she was worse, allowing herself to be caught up in his nonsense.
    Even more mortifying than his nakedness was the reason behind it. Shame washed through her. What must he think of a family who let their house fall down around their ears? Her brothers refused to spend money on repairs to the old redbrick building, lavishing their income on their stables instead. Their living quarters shrank with every passing year as more rooms were shut up, abandoned to rot and decay.
    Despite the need to distance herself from Lord Davenport, the desperation to get away from the Grange was greater.
    Hilary lifted her chin. She could handle Lord Davenport. Once he had his clothes on again.
    She scratched on the door of her maid’s attic room. She must treat Lord Davenport as a trial and a test of her good sense and self-restraint. If she could come through a journey to London with the greatest scoundrel in the country without allowing him the liberties he so clearly craved, it would be a triumph of virtue over sin.
    But the clear memory emblazoned on her brain of him standing amongst the rubble in all his naked glory made her doubly thankful that Trixie was going with them.
    As if in answer, the maid’s tremendous snore greeted Hilary as she opened the door.
    She smiled wryly at the notion of Trixie lending her either propriety or moral support. Ah, well, she was better than nothing, Hilary supposed.
    *   *   *
    Davenport was vaguely embarrassed at all the fuss. But he was covered with plaster and he couldn’t see himself retiring to bed again in this state.
    He said, “Please, do not trouble yourself further, Miss deVere. You ought to be in bed.”
    She dismissed his objections. Clearly, she was humiliated by what had happened and determined to set all to rights.
    So he let Honey and the saucy little maid bustle about. They roused one of the stable hands to boil water and carry it up.
    All the while, Davenport tried to catch Honey’s eye, to draw her aside, but she was having none of it.
    He even flexed his muscles a few times in an experimental manner, just to see if she was covertly watching him, but she had firmly averted her gaze. She didn’t speak to him the rest of the night.
    The bath seemed to take an inordinate amount of time to fill, with the sullen stable hand rubbing his eyes and slinking backward and forward with bucket after bucket of steaming water. They’d brought him to another bedchamber, this one more decrepit than the last.
    Honey made up the bed with her own fair hands, shooing away his attempts to help.
    He watched her, all wifely efficiency, and thought of the excellent meal she had conjured from nothing that evening. She would make some fellow a good helpmeet.
    That led him