Love's Price (Lord Trent Series) Read Online Free

I won’t!”
    She was carrying on like a spoiled toddler, and he grinned. The money had already been paid, and Mrs. Ford—for all her accommodating ways—was a shrewd businesswoman. With the bank draft having been deposited in her cash drawer, she would never give it back.
    “You humor me with your protests,” he advised Miss Stewart, “but they grow tedious. Shall we go? I’ve had your room prepared, so you can unpack quickly, because Miranda needs you to accompany her on a shopping excursion.”
    “I must speak privately with Mrs. Ford,” she said, fit to be tied. “Would you excuse us?”
    “No.”
    She growled with frustration and strutted past him so she could whisper in Mrs. Ford’s ear, but James was only a few feet away. He could hear every word.
    “Don’t make me to this,” she begged.
    “Why are you in such a dither?” Mrs. Ford responded in a temper. “You’re embarrassing me.”
    “Have you any idea what the result will be if I work for him? When I’m finished, my reputation will be in shreds.”
    “What foolishness! After you’ve been in his employ, every woman in town will want to hire you. Now get going.”
    “I can’t imagine what—”
    Mrs. Ford cut her off. “You will take this position, and you will perform your duties with as much grace and courtesy as you can muster, or you will no longer use my placement agency. Am I making myself clear?”
    Miss Stewart’s shoulders slumped with defeat. Mrs. Ford’s agency was the best in the city. If she declined to continue with Miss Stewart, the girl would very likely never find another job. Miss Stewart knew it, and he knew it, though he tried not to be too smug.
    He tamped down another grin.
    “Shall we go?” he said again.
    “I have to get my bag.”
    “Mrs. Ford had it put in my coach.”
    “Fine then. Yes, we can go.”
    She swept by him, regal as any queen, and he followed her out, watching how her shapely hips moved under the fabric of her horrid gray dress.
    It was the same one she’d been wearing the prior afternoon, and it occurred to him that perhaps she didn’t have any others, and he made a mental note to have his clerk order her some clothes.
    She might be a lowly lady’s companion, but he liked to see pretty women display their charms, and if he had to have a new servant underfoot, he refused to have a drab.
    They walked outside, and as she espied his coach, he was amused by her reaction. Deliberately to intimidate her, he’d arrived in his grandest vehicle that was pulled by a team of magnificent white horses. Their manes and tails were braided with red ribbons to match the red and gold livery of the driver and six outriders.
    He loved traveling in it, loved how heads turned when he passed by. The petty vanity was irksome, but he couldn’t set it aside and he’d given up trying.
    The ostentatious carriage was the first item he’d retrieved after his father had died and James had inherited the title and bankrupt estates that went with it. The vehicle had been his father’s pride and joy, but he’d lost it in a bet. James had been a seething adolescent when the new owner had come to seize it, and James still reeled with irritation whenever he recollected the humiliating episode.
    His life had been spent observing his father fall apart from gambling and drink, and James was determined to recoup the family’s fortunes. His father had been a weak and despairing man who’d made one bad decision after the next. Nearly everything that could be wagered had been, and the games hadn’t been won by strangers—but by his father’s so-called friends. They’d taken advantage of his wretched condition to plunder what never should have been theirs.
    Upon becoming earl, James had sworn to himself and to his brother, Tristan, that—eventually—he would get it all back, whether through fair means or foul. He was well on his way to financial security, though a few knaves had eluded his grasp.
    One in particular, Charles