Read Online Not Proper Enough (A Reforming the Scoundrels Romance) by Carolyn Jewel - Free Book Online

walked arm in arm to the library, which she knew was famous both for its beauty and the number of titles it held, reputed to be in excess of twenty thousand volumes.
    “Oh,” she said when Fenris led her inside. The interior was two stories high with nearly every wall lined with shelves and shelves of books. The upper floor had a railed walkway all the way around, with three separate staircases leading to the second level. At each landing, top and bottom, was a chair or sofa as well as a table for reading. There was a grand fireplace with a marble mantel and floor-to-ceiling columns on either side. “This is lovely.” She faced him, and felt another chunk of her resentment of him fall away. “Thank you for bringing me here.”
    “Of all the rooms at Bouverie, I confess this is my favorite.” He cocked his head in that annoying way, except this time it wasn’t as annoying as usual. “Just as Camber has given Hester permissions to the conservatory, so I grant you permissions to the library. Come here whenever you like.”
    His invitation was genuine, without the least hint that he intended anything but that she be able to enjoy the library whenever she liked. She found it disturbing and, yes, flattering, that he understood she was as book-mad as Hester was plant-mad. She curtseyed her acknowledgment. “Thank you.”
    “You are more than welcome.”
    She took a step toward the shelves. “I warn you, I might never leave.”
    “We’d find a way to make do, I suppose.” He gave her a lopsided grin. “I’d have the servants throw in a bone now and again. Leave a bottle of wine outside the door for you.”
    “So gracious a host.” She’d stopped mistrusting his charm, and that was yet another disconcerting change in her feelings about him. Then again, Robert had admired him, and that would not have been the case if there were nothing to the man but his future title.
    Fenris took her arm again and walked the room with her, crisscrossing from time to time to a specific shelf in order to show her a rare or interesting volume. “Is there really a secret staircase?” she asked.
    “There is. But first, allow me to show you the orrery. We’re quite proud of it here.”
    “Please.”
    The orrery was at the far end of the library in an alcove built to display the device, a moving mechanical model of the solar system that included all the planets with any moons that attended them. Beside it stood a celestial globe, but for now, she could only stare at the orrery. It was magnificent. The base of the orrery was a freestanding piece of carved cherry into which had been set a gold plate that housed the clockwork that moved the planets and the moon. A gold ball represented the sun; the moon was a sphere of half ivory, half jet; and the other planets and moons were likewise various gemstones or other semiprecious materials.
    “It’s beautiful,” she whispered.
    “Yes, it surely is.” He took a step forward. “This one works by means of a key.” Fenris set off the mechanism, and, with a whirr of parts and gears, the planets and their moons began to move. Eugenia watched, transfixed.
    She drew in a breath and waited for her emotions to settle. She didn’t want him to think she was overcome. “I could watch this all day.”
    “It is wonderful to see in motion, isn’t it?”
    “One feels very small indeed, imaging all this above and around us.” She gave him a quick glance, and was relieved to see he was intently watching the orrery. If he thought her maudlin, she couldn’t tell.
    “Indeed.” She felt a tug on her heart at his reverent reply. Like her, he was fascinated by the device. She looked awaybecause she did not want to admire him, or find him attractive, nor admit he had any qood qualities.
    “If I came to live in your library, I’d stand right here for hours and hours and never move except to wind the mechanism.”
    He walked to the other side of the orrery. “You are welcome to, of