Mad for Love: Even Gods Fall in Love, Book 2 Read Online Free Page B

felt she deserved. That was why she’d faced so much. However, she’d prefer not to face them in her marriage. She refused to accept it.
    Even though her mother had the means to compel her, as she had before; too many times for her to doubt it. The times she’d felt herself doing things she had no intention of doing, even while she was in the middle of them. Telling convenient lies, talking to men she disliked. Parsing her Latin, though why she should learn Latin and ancient Greek still defeated her.
    However, she’d learned them, not willingly, but forced by some power beyond her control to go to the schoolroom when she’d wanted to take her horse out for a vigorous gallop in the sunshine. Her imagination, she’d always considered it, but over the years doubts had set in and she was no longer so sure.
    Now she was sitting next to a man she found amusing but faintly alarming, one with definite pretensions to her hand, one her mother approved of.
    Lord Stretton took a leisurely, meandering path to her, so that only ten minutes remained of his allotted time, if he stuck to the prescribed visiting period of half an hour. Finally he reached her. She almost breathed in relief, but held her sign in as she turned to him with a carefully controlled smile. “I thought you made a point of avoiding affairs such as this, my lord.”
    Blaize, his gaze said, his eyes holding a soft expression. But he only murmured what he should, and then added, “As if you didn’t expect me!”
    “Not here,” she said. She tried not to shift on the brocade-covered sofa.
    “The earliest possible opportunity,” he murmured, his voice far more intimate than it should be. Or was he playing with her? No, the expression in those eyes, so open, showed her he meant it.
    Dangerous. Now she realized why. If he could do that on demand, then yes, dangerous indeed.
    He straightened and gazed down at her. “I couldn’t stay away,” he added, but in a lighter tone, one that invited mockery. “I could not wait to see what confection of a gown you intended to present to the world today.”
    She glanced at the silk draped across her lap. Not for one moment had she imagined anyone noticed her fondness for clothes.
    Offering him a smile, her first truly sincere one of the day, she wished she could spend more time with him. So many questions she wanted answered, and so much she wanted to ask him. Of course he was dangerous, but last night he’d gone to great lengths to ensure her reputation remained intact, even though he’d taken more than any man before. Even Lyndhurst, who’d been assiduously courting her for the last six months, hadn’t gone that far. They’d managed one kiss, but nothing that had taken her as thoroughly as Lord Stretton—Blaize—had done last night.
    Yearnings she didn’t know she was capable of took her when she felt him nearby and surely she could not allow that, except that she couldn’t help herself. No fool, despite her mother’s strictures, she knew full well he could be toying with her.
    She should forget him and concentrate on the prospect seated next to her, except she could not. That edge of fear was there with Stretton. He had a reputation a man didn’t earn overnight.
    Aurelia dared a glance at her mother. Her eyes glittered like the diamond brooch on her gown, and as hard. Although she sat next to Lady Comyn and appeared absorbed in their conversation, Aurelia felt her presence like a living reproach.
    Beside her, the duke stretched one arm behind her head, in a proprietorial gesture she did not like, but he didn’t touch her. “I didn’t believe you could rise this early, Stretton.”
    Blaize raised a dark brow, his eyes sultry and unreadable, his lips quirked. “You’d be surprised what I can do, Lyndhurst. On the other hand, I believe you soldiers prefer an early night.”
    “Usually. We have to get up early most mornings to fight and plan the next campaign. You know, boring things like that.”
    “A war