Merline Lovelace Read Online Free Page A

met his sardonic look with a steady one of her own. “Macao is a small community. It would be strange indeed for me not to recognize someone of your reputation.”
    That black brow went up another notch.
    “And it would be stranger still,” she continued, “not to notice someone of your…generous…proportions. Which explains how I know you, my lord. Now perhaps you’ll explain how it is that you recognize me?”
    The saturnine expression on his face deepened. One corner of his mouth curled downward as he crossed both arms, straining the shoulder seams of his linen shirt.
    “As you say, Macao is indeed a small community. There aren’t more than a handful of Englishwomen inresidence. It would be difficult for any man not to notice someone of your…generous…proportions.”
    Sarah didn’t care for the way he’d turned her words back on her. She’d never enjoyed anything close to Abigail’s sylphlike slenderness, but until this moment she hadn’t considered herself more than well-boned. She soon realized, however, that Lord Straithe considered only a particular portion of her anatomy generous. His blue eyes traveled once again down her throat to her bosom and stayed there for a thoroughly unnerving length of time.
    Heat surged through Sarah’s cheeks with a vengeance. The urge to cross her arms over her chest and shield herself from Straithe’s inspection battled with an equally compelling urge to smack his face.
    These very proper impulses gave way almost immediately, however, to the very improper one that frequently overtook Sarah at the most inopportune times. After a brief struggle, her sense of the absurd won out over other, more violent emotions. Lifting rueful brown eyes to the blue ones watching her with such lazy menace, Sarah gave a low, reluctant chuckle.
    “Touché, Lord Straithe. Or, as my brother Harry would say, a neat riposte.”

Chapter Two
    A t the sound of her low, musical chuckle, Jamie Kerrick felt his jaw tighten ominously. He was in no mood for laughter.
    “You have a damned peculiar sense of humor, Miss Abernathy,” he growled.
    She nodded. “I fear you’re right. I’ve been told on more than one occasion that it’s my worst fault Or one of the worst,” she amended with a small smile.
    Jamie glared at her, unable to comprehend her levity. If the truth were told, he was having difficulty comprehending much of anything at this moment. His temples pounded from cup after cup of syrupy-sweet plum wine and his temper tugged at a short rein from hours of fruitless negotiation with the mandarin who controlled the port. More to the point, his loins ached in anticipation of what normally occurred in this chamber.
    From the instant he’d turned and discovered that the woman waiting for him wasn’t his usual companion, his tenuous hold on his temper had grown more uncertain with each passing moment.
    He’d identified her immediately, of course. Thereweren’t many young Englishwomen in Macao with her generous physical endowments, and damned few who’d have the audacity to track him down to the House of the Dancing Blossoms. She was certainly her father’s daughter, Jamie thought sourly.
    He’d met The Reverend Mr. Abernathy briefly the last time he was in port, just before his first mate pitched the missionary overboard. The crew of the Phoenix hadn’t taken kindly to the wild-eyed zealot who’d stormed aboard and tried to point out the error of their admittedly loose ways. Especially since they’d just completed a rough, three-month voyage and were far more interested in boat girls than baptisms.
    Jamie had glimpsed the man’s daughter for the first time just a few days ago. She’d been taking the air on the Praya Grande with a lively young lad at the time. At first he’d mistaken her for a governess, given her dowdy dress and sturdy, no-nonsense walking boots. But even the unadorned green gown couldn’t disguise her noble feminine attributes. A man would have to be blind or