Kresley Cole - [MacCarrick Brothers 02] Read Online Free

half-clad woman sauntered by, breasts bouncing as she smiled flirtatiously up at her. Jane gave her a saucy wink back, as was polite. “Otherwise,” Jane continued dryly, “I might have opted for a lower-cut bodice and a bigger brick.”
    Maddy sniffed her glass with a discerning expression, then took a hearty drink just as Claudia raised her own and said, “I’m just glad to be at a ball with punch I don’t have to spike.” Having seen her older brother Quin doing that once and noted the raucous results, Claudia never failed to bring flasks to staid gatherings.
    When a middle-aged roué exposed himself to the Persian-rug women and they laughed, Belinda harrumphed. She shoved her glass at Jane so she could surreptitiously take notes, like a first-year plebeian might write up boys’ school demerits. Jane shrugged, placing her own finished glass on a tray, and started on Belinda’s.
    She nearly choked on the last sips as she spied a towering man in a long black domino pushing through the crowd, clearly searching for someone. His build, his stride, the aggressive set of his lips just beneath the fluttering veil drop of his mask—everything about him reminded her of Hugh, though she knew it couldn’t be him. Hugh wasn’t in London.
    But what if it had been him? Sooner or later, he would have to return to the city, and they would run into each other. It was possible she might see him on the carpets, with his knees falling open and eyelids growing heavy as a woman’s skilled hand rubbed him. The thought made Jane drain Belinda’s cup. “Going for more punch,” she mumbled, suddenly longing to be away from the warm throng of bodies.
    “Bring us back some more,” Claudia called.
    “A double,” Maddy added absently. She was watching the tall man wending through the crowd as well.
    As Jane made her way toward the punch table, she recognized that the restless feeling in her belly that she continually battled had grown sharply worse. Ever since she could remember, she’d been plagued by an anxiety, as if she were missing something, as if she were in the wrong place with greener grass calling to her. She felt an urgency about everything.
    Now, after regarding the man who was so like Hugh, and imagining Hugh being serviced by another woman, she felt an urgency for fresh air. Else she’d lose her punch.
    Once she had glasses in hand, she returned to the group to see if they wouldn’t mind going outside—
    But Maddy wasn’t there.
    “I turned around and she was gone,” Claudia said, sounding not too concerned. Maddy had a habit of slinking off whenever she felt like it. The more she did it, the more Jane realized Maddy didn’t find environments like the Hive threatening.
    “Shall we start looking on the dance floor?” Jane asked with a sigh.
    The three began maneuvering through the crowd. Unfortunately, Maddy was short and had an uncanny way of blending in. A half an hour passed, and they still hadn’t spotted her—
    A shrill whistle rent the din; Jane’s head jerked up. The band whimpered to a lull.
    “Police!” someone yelled just as more whistles sounded all around them. “ It’s the bloody peelers!”
    “No, no, that isn’t possible,” Jane said. These dance halls always paid off the police! Who in the devil had forgotten the “payment for protection”?
    All at once, waves of screaming people clambered toward the back entrance, jostling them. The Hive was suddenly like a bottle turned upside down with the cork pulled out. The entire building seemed to rock as people fled, colliding with Jane and her cousins until a current of bodies separated them.
    Jane battled to reach them, but was only forced back. When Belinda pointed to the back door, Jane shook her head emphatically—that way out was choked with people. They would be crushed to death. She’d rather get nicked and have her name printed on the page of shame in the Times .
    When Jane lost sight of her cousins completely, she backed to the