Once Upon a Scandal Read Online Free Page A

dangling out before him, her arms and long braid dangling behind him with her bum in the air. His grip dug into her hips and the night bounced with each large step he took back to the portico.
    “What are you doing?!” she shouted, smacking his hard backside hidden beneath his soaked shirt. She froze, realizing she shouldn’t even be touching any part of him, and certainly not his backside. She twisted against his shoulder. “My stockings! I… This isn’t respectable! I am still in my nightdress!”
    “So I have noticed,” he drawled as he kept toting her back toward the house.
    She collapsed against him, plotting her escape.
    Stepping in through the doorway, Remington finally plopped her down onto the marble floor of the large foyer. She slipped and stumbled against the water pooling beneath her cold, bare feet.
    He slammed the doors and bolted them with quick sweeps, flinging water everywhere. He turned and fell back against the doors. Blowing out a breath, he paused and glared down at her, his rugged face glistening from the water that continued to dribble down from his matted hair. “You do realize your father, not to mention your cousin, would have held me accountable for whatever happened to you out there?”
    As if she cared. “I am not abandoning Flint on a night like this.” She scrambled around him, trying to get to the doors, but he set his back against both knobs.
    She pushed at his massive, wet body.
    “I am not moving,” he gruffly announced. “Step aside.”
    “No.”
    “Step. Aside.”
    “No. You are not going back out into that rain.”
    She shoved at his body again, trying to get him to move away from the knobs, but her feet kept sliding against the smooth marble. Annoyed to no end, she gritted her teeth, fisted her hand and punched his shoulder.
    He seized her upper arms, his hard grip pinching her skin beneath the sleeves of her nightdress, and fiercely spun her around, yanking her back against himself so she couldn’t hit him again. He leaned over her, his broad chest and arms locking her against his chest. Icy water cascaded down onto her neck and arms from his drenched clothing. She stiffened, her eyes widening, realizing she was officially at his command.
    He leaned farther down, bending her far forward and in turn, keeping her in place with his weight. “Cease being an impertinent child,” he demanded, his warm breath heating the side of her chilled cheek. “He’ll be fine. You, on the hand, won’t be if you get any more drenched.”
    She trembled within his arms, the cold seeping deeper into her skin. “He is all I have left of Victor. And if that makes me a child, so be it. Now let me go. Let me go!”
    Remington released her, allowing them both to straighten. Turning her toward him, he grasped her shoulders, pulling her close. The few waning candles in the sconces of the entrance hall dimly illuminated his rain-moistened face. He rubbed her shoulders. “Forgive me. Grayson has often told me how close you and your brother were.”
    She looked away, refusing to give in to emotions that were pointless to feel. It wouldn’t change the fact that her brother was gone, having succumbed to smallpox after a servant had exposed him to it. Sometimes she wondered why it hadn’t been her.
    Remington’s fingers pressed into her shoulder blades, silently assuring her that she was not alone. Not wanting or needing his pity, she pushed away his heavy arms and swiped away droplets of water running down the sides of her face and chin.
    “Victoria.”
    She glanced toward him. “What is it now?”
    “I…leave for Venice tomorrow.”
    She sighed, unable to hide her own disappointment knowing she wouldn’t see him until her coming out. “Yes. I know.”
    “I may not return in time for your debut. Which is why I was hoping you could…” He winced.
    She stared up at him, dreading whatever he had in mind. “You were hoping I could what?”
    He shrugged and glanced away. “I…wanted to