Rogue's Reward Read Online Free Page B

myself if I were as poor as a church mouse, but it would ruin Walter if we ran away, don’t you see? He would never get a decent living. Oh, Eleanor, what am I to do?”
    “Yes, it’s a problem, I see. But don’t despair, dear Di. I’ll help you if I can, I promise. Just let me know what I can do. In the meantime, I confess I’m dying to get out of these clothes and take a bath.”
    “Can you meet me in the long gallery as soon as you’re changed? It is urgent. You see, Walter’s coming to Norfolk very soon.”
    “Very well, the long gallery as soon as I’m presentable.”
    An hour later, Eleanor emerged from her chamber and took a critical look at herself in the long mirror in the hall. She had bathed and was dressed in a fine white silk dinner gown, which was caught up beneath her breasts with a sash of pale apricot. The ends trailed down the front of her skirts to finish in two gold tassels. Small pleated sleeves gathered into apricot trimming showed off her long smooth arms.
    At least she had nice arms and hands, she thought ruefully. As for the rest, Lady Augusta was right, it certainly wasn’t ravishing—perfectly ordinary, in fact. Brown hair, brown eyes, a nose and a mouth occupying all the right places. What more could a girl want?
    She laughed at herself and walked rapidly in the direction that Diana had described.
    The long gallery was hung with portraits from one end to the other on one paneled wall. The opposite wall was lined with bookcases punctuated with tall windows. An embroidered cushion covered a window seat beneath each one.
    Eleanor perched herself on one of these and composed herself to think about Diana’s problem. It was already twilight. The room began to fill with shadows as dusk swallowed the view outside.
    “I hope you have hooked up your dress this time,” a cultured male voice said in her ear. “Have you lost another locket?”
    She spun around and leaped to her feet. As she did so, she heard a small tearing sound and looked down to see that she must have been sitting on one of her gold tassels, and in her haste she had ripped it off. She caught at it in her hand and held on to it as if it were a lifeline.
    “Of course not,” she said calmly, though her heart was pounding loudly enough to summon at least three footmen. “But instead it seems I have lost my composure and ruined my sash. May I ask what you’re doing here?”
    “I might ask the same, mightn’t I?” the owner of the violet eyes said.
    He leaned one shoulder against a bookshelf and crossed his arms over his chest. Except for a newly changed shirt and cravat, he was dressed in the same traveling clothes he had worn at the inn, his coat as dark as his head. The faintest sheen of moisture further darkened his hair, as if he had just washed it. Eleanor had to crush the most unholy impulse to reach out and see.
    “It’s raining outside,” he said dryly. “You must have noticed, since you were studying the gardens so intensely. And must I answer my own question? Though it’s probably easy enough. Lady Eleanor Acton and Lady Diana Hart were at school together? I wish I’d known.”
    “Why? Is Lady Diana another of your attempted schoolgirl conquests?”
    Tiny creases marked the corners of his eyes. “Why, do you think I’m her type?”
    “Not in the least,” she snapped. “Lady Diana has flawless taste and is guided always by the strictest propriety. She would never fall for a conceited libertine, without honor or scruple, who likes to practice idle flirtations on girls half his age.”
    “Half his age? My dear Lady Eleanor, I am only five-and-twenty. Surely you’re at least seventeen?”
    “Eighteen. Does Diana love you?”
    “I hope so, for I love her very dearly back.”
    “You’re an accomplished liar, too, I see. How did you get in?”
    “Why, the butler opened the front door in the usual way.”
    “You mean you’re a guest of Lady Augusta?” It came out as a distinctly undignified