Sebastian's Lady Spy Read Online Free Page B

time and ready for our encounter.”
    “As you were on time last night, my lord?”
    He raised a brow but remained stubbornly silent. What would it take to break through to the man she’d known in Venice?
    “Sebastian?” She softened her voice and reached toward his hand but dropped her arm before touching him. There was a part of her that ached to press against him, to lay her head upon his chest, and stand there inside his heat.
    He looked down at her hand. The expression didn’t change, but something in his eyes did. They became softer, and she saw the memories lodged in them. He remembered, and it hurt him to remember. It hurt her, too, but she refused to let the hurt and the memories make her cantankerous.
    “Yes?” he asked.
    “What happened to you?”
    His gaze cooled, and the hurt disappeared behind whatever wall he’d erected. “I have no idea what you mean.”
    “You are not the same man I knew in Venice,” she said softly.
    He stared at her for a long moment. “We agreed not to speak of this, Gabrielle.” His voice had softened, and she considered that a small victory.
    “That was in Venice, before either of us knew who the other really was.”
    “It will serve us no good to speak of it now. Nothing has changed. We are the same people with the same reasons as before.”
    True enough. But before she had time to respond, he was making his way to the door. “Where are you going?”
    “I have things to do.” He pulled open the door and stepped into the entryway.
    Gabrielle followed. “Wait a moment. What things?” She hurried to step between him and the front door. Riggs was conspicuously absent for once, and she was glad of it. “You’re going to attempt to find the spy, aren’t you? Without me.”
    He halted and pressed his lips together but would not look at her.
    Gabrielle drew in an outraged breath. “You
are.
” She pressed a finger into a chest roped with muscle. It didn’t budge him but bent her finger backward. “Atwater said we are to work together. You cannot go off on this mission without me.”
    He removed her finger from his chest. “Atwater said I was to take you to balls and such. He said nothing about us working together in any other area.”
    “You know that’s what he meant.”
    “I know no such thing.” He reached around her to open the front door, and it took everything inside Gabrielle not to flinch. He smelled just as she remembered, darkly spicy and of horse and man. She had to step back, lest she be pushed out of the way as he opened the door.
    “We are partners, Sebastian, and we
will
work on this together.”
    He stepped around her, jogged down the steps, and hopped in his waiting carriage—once again walking away from her, while Gabrielle could only stand there helplessly.

Chapter 4
    Godfrey Duncan, Lord Wilcott, handed his butler his coat, gloves, and walking stick with a defeated air. He’d been so convinced that Lady Marciano was the answer to his dilemma, and so convinced she would leap at his suggestion, that he had not been prepared for rejection. Distraught after leaving her residence, Godfrey had needed to speak to Charles for a few moments. He tried not to visit Charles’s store on Oxford Street too often, for fear his continued presence would be noted, but today he’d felt the need to see his friend.
    Unfortunately, Charles had been irked with Godfrey for revealing their secret to Lady Marciano. But Godfrey didn’t regret it. To his surprise, she proved to be a warm, compassionate woman, and he found himself telling her everything. Secrets he’d kept from even his closest family members. She had a way about her that inspired trust. Besides, she’d promised not to reveal their conversation, and he believed her, much to Charles’s disgust.
    She’d even offered to dance with him at the Buchanan ball tonight. He hadn’t planned on attending, but he might now. Just dancing with the widowed contessa would draw attention. His mother was becoming