My Darling Melissa Read Online Free Page A

he sat her down. “Get back into bed,” he ordered when he’d divested her of both her shoes. “A porter will be along soon with more hot lemon juice.”
    Seeing that Quinn had turned his back, Melissa squirmed out of her charity dress and crawled back under the covers. She was wearing muslin drawers and a camisole now instead of Quinn’s shirt.
    “I’ve got it all figured out,” she announced, assuming an optimism she did not feel. “I’m going to prove to my family that I can take care of myself.”
    The porter brought the lemon juice in a crockery teapot. When he was gone Quinn poured the juice into a cup and handed it to Melissa. Only then did he comment, “I can’t wait to hear your plans, Miss Corbin.”
    Melissa took a noisy sip of the hot drink. “I’m not going to touch my trust fund, nor will I charge so much as a paper of pins to my mother’s accounts.”
    A wry grin twisted Quinn’s lips; by now he was settled in the bedside chair again. “Drastic measures,” he commented.
    “I do have a little money that I earned myself, though. From my writing, I mean.”
    Quinn sighed. “What does your family think of your—er—literary pursuits?”
    Melissa lowered her eyes for a moment. “They don’t know,” she confessed. “Except for Banner, that is.”
    “Banner?”
    “My sister-in-law.” Melissa was proud of Adam’s wife, and she could not contain her enthusiasm. “Banner, who’s married to Adam, is a doctor—not a midwife or a nurse, mind you, but a real doctor. Jeff’s Fancy was once a magician, and Keith’s wife, Tess, takes the most remarkable photographs.”
    Quinn gave a low whistle to prove that he was impressed and then ruined everything by saying, “The lady doctor probably has a face ugly enough to stop a grizzly bear’s heart.”
    Melissa took a great gulp of her lemon juice. “I’ll tell my brother you said so,” she purred.
    A slow, insolent smile touched Quinn’s mouth. “Do that. I’m not afraid of your brothers, Melissa.”
    She returned his smile. “All that proves is that you’re foolish,” she replied lightly. “But that’s neither here nor there. Is this train going to stop in Seattle, Mr. Rafferty?”
    He arched one eyebrow and then rubbed his chin before answering. “Briefly. Why?”
    “The money I mentioned is in an account there.”
    Quinn cleared his throat and sat forward in his chair, looking earnest and impossibly pompous. “Listen, Melissa—I think this whole idea calls for some careful reconsidering on your part. After all, you’re only a woman, alone in the world—”
    She smiled sweetly as she interrupted him. “But I’m not alone in the world. I have you, Mr. Rafferty.”
    “Me?” Mr. Rafferty echoed, looking stricken.
    Melissa nodded. “Even though you have in effect compromised my good name, I am in your debt. I’m going to Port Riley with you. I’m going to rent a room, land a job, and make something of myself.”
    Quinn was aghast but finally managed a raspy “You can’t do that!”
    Melissa deliberately widened her eyes. “Why not?” A horrible possibility struck her in that instant, and she gasped out, “You’re not married, are you?”
    “God, no,” Rafferty breathed. “But there is a woman… .”
    That admission injured Melissa, although she realized, of course, that Mr. Rafferty’s personal life was none of her affair. She bit her lip and willed tears into her eyes; it was a gambit that always worked with Jeff and Keith.
    “Gillian would never understand.”
    Melissa sniffled. “Gillian?” she whispered miserably.
    Quinn shot out of his chair so fast that it nearly overturned. “Damn it, stop that! Stop looking like that, stop sounding like that—”
    “I can’t go home,” Melissa reminded him.
    Quinn flung his arms out from his sides. “There’s always Seattle,” he suggested, with a note of wild desperation in his voice.
    “I know too many people there.”
    “I see that as an