Read Online The Price of Pleasure by Kresley Cole - Free Book Online

enough.” Grant swiped at his boot with the polish brush, missed much of the leather, and blackened his hand.
    Ian slapped his knee and cackled. “Why am I asking? It’s obvious she’s got you tied up in knots.”
    â€œI won’t say this again. Leave me the hell alone.”
    â€œSo you caught her and she escaped. The nerve of the little minx, absconding with your boot and shirt! She’s clever, I take it.”
    She was clever, all right. In the newly declared war between them, she was winning all the battles—or, as Ian had sniped under his breath, “Round three to Victoria.”
    â€œYou know, this whole experience could be good for you. Loosen you up a bit.”
    Grant glowered at him. “I do not want to be loosened up.”
    â€œWound up too tight—that’s your problem.”
    Grant faced down his younger cousin. “Do you really want to discuss our respective problems? Solve the number of them you have yourself before you focus on me.”
    â€œI can’t do anything until I return.” Ian raised his hands in the air. “And I can’t return because you sailed to the bloody other side of the world!”
    Grant was unprovoked. “You ran aboard my ship.”
    â€œBetter your ship than the pack of thugs chasing me,” Ian blustered. “Or so I believed. I thought you were sailing to the Continent. Or even America. Not Oceania. ”
    â€œThat’s the thing about thugs,” Grant began as though imparting a secret. “Generally, they don’t chase you if you don’t owe them money.”
    Ian’s face fell. “I thought I was paid up. I really did.”
    â€œYou thought?”
    â€œSome of us aren’t financial wizards.” Ian shot him a pointed glare, but Grant refused to apologize for his one true talent.
    â€œIf you actually are paid up, then it has to be about a woman,” Grant reasoned. There wasn’t a man in the kingdom more cosseted by ladies, and Ian lapped it up. “Some cuckolded husband probably got sick of sharing.” Besides gambling, drink, and debt, Ian had a reputation for midnight leaps from his married lovers’ windows.
    â€œAt least I take what’s offered to me,” Ian snapped.
    Grant stomped into his boots. No, he didn’t toss up the skirts of every society woman who offered. He had his reasons. None of which were Traywick’s business.
    When he snatched up his pack, Ian said, “Wait for me.”
    Grant turned, raising one finger. The look on his face stopped Ian.
    â€œPerhaps I’ll let you go at it alone today.” With wary eyes, Ian sank into the hammock.
    Later, Grant was glad to be alone as he labored up a root-strewn trail, again replaying the sparse minutes with Victoria and his own unusual reaction. If she were the society lady lifting her skirt, would he be able to resist? He feared not.
    In less than half an hour, he’d been enlivened by the chase, then angered, then aroused. The cold water had had no impact on his erection—he wondered if anything would have—until she went under. Alarm had gripped him before fury overwhelmed again.
    He checked his disappointment as the setting sun closed yet another day. She might return in the night. When she came back to add company to his pallet, he’d grab her.
    She didn’t return that night.
    He knew he’d catch her, so why did he feel like he needed to see her at that moment? Where was his hard-won patience? His brother would be alternately amused and encouraged if he could see his notoriously unemotional sibling now.
    Grant looked up at the stars. His image of Victoria Dearbourne as a helpless, sweet girl had certainly been shattered. She’d grown into a spirited young woman, but she was still a small thing, hardly above five and a half feet—well, small compared to him at least, and thin. Though he’d sensed a latent strength in her, he still was