Read Online Temptress in Training by Susan Gee Heino - Free Book Online Page B

hand shot out to rescue them, but it could not be done without noise. Too late she realized the voices outside had stopped.
    â€œWhat the devil was that?” Mr. Fitzgelder growled.
    Sophie desperately scanned the little room they’d been hiding in for any way of escape. What she saw made her draw her breath and utter a squeak very reminiscent of Miss Sands’s. The distinctive dark form of a man appeared in the far corner of the room and moved suddenly toward them.
    Before she could so much as draw breath to scream, light from the corridor fell onto his face. Lord Lindley.
    He’d been hiding in here with them all along? Good heavens! They’d been discovered right from the start! And now he would inform his awful friend.
    Yet his eyes met hers and he put one finger to his lips. He stepped past them and into the doorway just as footsteps approached from the corridor. Mr. Fitzgelder and his henchmen were coming!
    â€œLindley!” Fitzgelder exclaimed. “By God, what are you doing in there?”
    Lord Lindley stood in the doorway, securely blocking the view of anyone who might try to peer into the small room. Sophie didn’t take much chance, though. She and Miss Sands cowered in the shadows, barely breathing.
    Lindley gave a grunt and readjusted his clothing. “I availed myself of one of your little housemaids, old man. Quite accommodating, she was.”
    Sophie could hear the shifting footsteps. Mr. Fitzgelder was trying to look into the room!
    But Lindley just laughed. “Sorry, she’s been gone these last minutes. Sent her on her way so I could put things back in order, so to speak. How about you? Got all your business tended to?”
    â€œIt will be soon enough, I anticipate,” Mr. Fitzgelder said. “My friends here will see to it.”
    â€œAh, good thing. I say a man needs friends he can trust to take care of things for him. Good work there, men.”
    Did Lord Lindley have a clue at all what he was complimenting here? Could it be he was a party to it? Either way, it was clear Mr. Fitzgelder trusted Lindley and was comfortable with whatever he may have overheard. That in itself spoke guilt for the earl. Oh, how could she have ever thought him anything less than pure evil? He was everything Fitzgelder was and worse, because he was so casual about it.
    â€œAll right then, be off with you,” Fitzgelder said, presumably to the criminals he’d just been commissioning. “You’ve got your directions. Now don’t disappoint me!”
    The men mumbled their assurances, and their footsteps sounded in the corridor as they left to carry out their deadly orders. It was dreadful, knowing that someone would soon perish at their hands. If only there was something she and Miss Sands could do; but of course there was nothing. They’d be lucky to leave here alive themselves, as a matter of fact.
    â€œSo, are we off to join the others for some revelry? Where is it we are headed next, old man?” Lindley asked his friend when they were alone.
    â€œHaven’t you had enough sport for the night?” Fitzgelder scoffed.
    â€œHardly! That little maid I found was barely amusing. Honestly, I don’t know what you saw in her this afternoon.”
    â€œWhat? You shagged my little seamstress?”
    Sophie was quite sure her gulp had been audible to anyone in this half of the house. What on earth was his lordship saying?
    â€œIs that what she is? Well, let’s hope she sews with more than a halfhearted effort. Lord, quite enough to bore a man.”
    Ooo, how dare he! It was bad enough he was accusing her of engaging in illicit intimacies, but he was insinuating that she was not at all good at it! Most insulting and very uncalled for.
    â€œDamn the little minx. She’s been denying me since I brought her here!” Fitzgelder grumbled.
    â€œWell, maybe that’s the trouble then. She’s worn herself out playing hard to get with you,