Read Online Once Upon a Wallflower by Wendy Lyn Watson - Free Book Online Page A

down the right sleeve.
    He looked up when Nicholas entered, and then visibly cringed. “What—or should I say who—has got your dander up at such an early hour, my lord?”
    Nicholas threw himself into his favorite chair. “I do. I am angry with myself. And I suppose I should be angry at you for encouraging me.” He paused to take a steadying breath. “I kissed her.”
    Pawly laughed. “So you kissed her, where’s the harm in that? Unless she absconds beforehand, you will be doing a lot more than that in a week.”
    Nicholas scowled ferociously. “Watch your tongue, Pawly,” he snapped.
    Pawly’s eyes widened in surprise, and he held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Here now, it was only a jest. I meant no disrespect, to you or Miss Fitzhenry. I just do not see what is so horrible about a kiss.”
    With a heavy sigh, Nicholas relaxed back in his chair. “Mmmm. Well, for one thing, I did not wake this morning intending to kiss a young woman at the breakfast table. Yet suddenly, I was doing just that. Without meaning to. It was just an, an impulse.”
    “And what is so wrong about acting on impulse? It wouldn’t be the first time you have done so.”
    “This is different,” Nicholas muttered. “I moved close to her intending to intimidate her, to make her uncomfortable, not to woo her. But I sat next to her in the morning sunlight, eating a bloody scone, and I had this irresistible urge to kiss her.” He took a deep breath, remembering the moment. “She tasted like strawberries.
    “Why can I not control myself around her, Pawly, when the rest of the world thinks her so plain? The day after I met Mira, Blackwell went on and on about how he had been duped, how he had heard the available Fitzhenry chit was a stylish beauty, and the Fitzhenrys must be trying to pass off lesser goods.”
    Pawly huffed in disgust. “She looked fine to me.”
    Nicholas shrugged. “But she is not a fashionable beauty. The Haute Ton is quite particular about what is and is not beautiful, and Mira is too—” he struggled to find the right word “—too lush to fit the current mold.” He paused, thinking. “And then there is the matter of her wit. And her intensity, her passion. Neither is considered an admirable trait in a young woman.”
    Pawly chuckled. “Lush, intelligent, and fiery…if that is unfashionable among the upper crust, I am glad to be a poor working man.”
    “Yes, well, unfashionable or no, Miss Fitzhenry is like no other female of my acquaintance. She does not look as I expected her to look. She does not behave as I expected her to behave. She seems to lack any sort of guile or experience with the world. I haven’t the slightest clue how to deal with a female of her stripe. I was not even aware that females of her stripe existed. And,” he concluded with an irritated wave of his hand, “the whole situation is going to prove a monumental distraction. I cannot afford a distraction with Midsummer so fast approaching.”
    Nicholas did not like Pawly’s expression. It was smug and knowing, and he had the distinct impression that Pawly was amused by Nicholas’s plight.
    “So,” Pawly drawled, “you think this girl might distract you. Interesting.”
    “What are you getting at?” Nicholas growled.
    “Just that I have never known you to be distracted by a girl. Other men make cow-eyes at women all the time, make complete cakes of themselves. But you have always seemed immune to the fair sex. So I find it puzzling that you think this particular girl, this naïve and unfashionable girl, will divert your attention from more pressing matters.” Pawly smiled. “That’s all.”
    Nicholas flushed. “It is not as though I am smitten with the girl. I will confess that I find her…interesting. But I cannot allow her to run amok, asking questions and…and…and thinking too much. I must manage her somehow, and I cannot imagine how best to do that as she defies my most basic understanding of the female of