My Wicked Marquess Read Online Free Page A

the ratty bed.
    A moment later, striding down the shadowed hallway, he heard the woman’s exclamation of delight from her room as she counted his donation.
    With a hard gleam in his eyes, Max smoothly descended the brothel stairs. As he crossed the foyer, however, the mirror caught his eye. He paused.
    Chameleon time.
    Yes. An old, familiar game.
    In the blink of an eye, he had transformed his demeanor, untying his cravat to dangle around his neck, unbuttoning his waistcoat, messing up his clothes, and rumpling his hairwith a quick run of his fingers through it. He picked up an empty bottle of wine left behind on the window ledge after someone’s drunken revelries the night before.
    Damn, he thought, eyeing his changed reflection, now he surely looked the part of the debauched, pleasure-seeking Grand Tourist known to the world as the ne’er-do-well Marquess of Rotherstone.
    Not the introduction to Daphne Starling that he would have liked. First impressions could be lasting. But it did not signify. She was in danger, and he had no choice but to intervene.
    Taking out his coin purse, he loosened the strings with a slight grimace of regret. It would serve admirably as bait.
    Without further delay, he strode toward the exit, and, bringing up his arms, blasted out through the double front doors, ready and willing as ever to raise hell.

Chapter 2
    W ith catcalls and wolf whistles, rude leers and laughing invitations, the Bucket Street gang had begun surrounding her carriage. It did not take long for Daphne to realize they were still drunk on last night’s gin.
    She tried negotiating with them, but her voice was beginning to tremble. “Come now, pl-please! Step aside,” she cajoled them. “We really must be going—”
    When one of them grabbed her horse’s bridle, William barked at him, “Clear off!”
    â€œWhat are you going to do about it?” The miscreant stepped toward him, but at that moment, a roar erupted from some distance down the street.
    â€œBring me my bloody carriage—now!”
    The thunderous bellow brought all motion to a halt.
    The rough fellows surrounding her gig turned to look; Daphne and her servants did the same.
    A man—tall, handsome, and well-dressed all in black, and above all, quite intoxicated, judging by his weaving gait and the bottle still dangling from his hand—had just come staggering out of the brothel, squinting and shading his eyes against the daylight.
    â€œOw.” His mutter of pain could be heard as he visored his eyes with his hand, scanning the street. “You!” He suddenly pointed with his bottle hand at the gang member holding her horse’s bridle.
    â€œYou, there!” he clipped out again in a loud, slurred, but still lordly command. “Bring me my carriage. I am through here,” he added with a wicked little laugh that betrayed the fact that he, too, was still three sheets to the wind, and also seemed to insinuate that he had not deigned to leave the house of ill-repute until he had sampled every blasted woman on the premises.
    Good God.
    Daphne stared, utterly taken aback by this obviously highborn libertine’s shocking behavior and, worse, by her instant awareness of the raw masculinity that radiated from him.
    His magnetism was unmistakable, despite the fact that he was a mess with his shirt hanging open and his dark hair tousled every which way, as though he had just stepped off the windy deck of a ship. He wore a short, neat goatee that surrounded his hard mouth, defined his square chin, and made him look, she feared, just a tad satanic.
    Staring at him, Daphne found him something more than handsome. Compelling. Dangerous. A lawless sensation raced through her veins; she dropped her gaze in shock as he took a step closer, challenging the low ruffian who still held on to her horse’s bridle.
    â€œAre you deaf, man?” he insisted, unwittingly risking his neck in abusing these