A Rebel Without a Rogue Read Online Free

a mere mortal would overcome any obstacle to win the chance to touch his lips to hers, lips as ripe with promise as a lush summer plum. He’d always scorned them, the foolish men in the tales Uncle Christopher had brought back from Ireland, sacrificing everything in their all-consuming passion for a mere fairy girl. A leannán sídhe might gift the man of her choice with artistic inspiration, but she’d demand his life force in recompense. What rational man would give up his very life for a mere woman, fairy or no, he’d challenge his uncle, his words redolent with adolescent disbelief.
    One glance at this haunting creature and suddenly Kit knew how utterly foolish his doubts had been.
    But then Ingestrie had groped her, and slabbered over her, and the illusion had fallen away. She was only human after all. Less than human, if one took the church’s strictures against whoredom as guide, a low wretch who’d forfeited the character of woman. He’d preached against such creatures once, with a discomfiting sense of his own hypocrisy, in the days before he’d become disillusioned with his divinity training.
    He’d come here tonight for information, not to judge anyone’s morals. But the memory of his father’s death from the pox—a disease he’d picked up from his own kept woman—still sent a shiver of disgust tracing across his frame.
    She must have felt it, for her hand dropped from his arm. Was that hurt that flared in those wide green eyes? If it was, blinking lashes and a teasing smile soon hid it from view.
    Surely the feelings of a courtesan need be no concern of his. “The landing outside, perhaps, Miss Cameron?”
    She nodded, then took the stairs to the floor above, away from the male shouts and laughter. The light from a gas lamp on the street set a halo around her hair, but kept her face in shadow.
    “What is it you wish from me, Mr. Pennington?” she asked, her low voice nearly as enticing as her face. “I’ve no knowledge of firearms.”
    “Viscount Ingestrie suggested you might be able to aid me with a translation.”
    Her lips curved in an insolent arch. “Oh, are the lines your Latin tutor set beyond your ken, young sir?”
    “I’m hardly of an age to need a tutor, ma’am.” The petulance of his tone, though, would scarcely persuade her of the fact. Forcing himself to speak more evenly, he added, “What I require is someone who can read Irish.”
    “Read Gaelic?” She laughed, her arms crossing tight over her chest. “When the schools insist we learn only English?”
    “But surely, outside of school—”
    “In Ireland, sir, English is the language of power. Gaelic’s only spoken by the poor. And what cause have they to learn to read or to write it?”
    Kit frowned. He’d hardly expected to find a political radical in the midst of a viscount’s revels. “Why, then, would someone go to the trouble to engrave Gaelic words on a flintlock?”
    She took the pistol he held out to her, squinting at the letters in the dim light. After staring at it for several minutes, turning it to and fro in her small but strong hands, she shook her head, looking up with strangely blank eyes. “I’m sorry, sir. I wish I could help.”
    She held the pistol out to him, but just as he reached for it, she tucked it back against her chest. He jerked his hand away before it accidentally brushed against the small but lush curves of her breasts.
    His eyes narrowed. Had she intended to discompose him? Or was it only his own lust, reasserting itself after lying so conveniently dormant these past months, that urged his body forward?
    He took a step back, once again placing a decent distance between them.
    “Why would an English gentleman take any interest in Gaelic words, sir?” she asked, gazing not at him but at the weapon in her hands.
    “Not the words, but the man to whom they might lead. I’m searching for the owner of the pistol, and the engraving’s my only clue.”
    “You seek to return the firearm