Secrets of Surrender Read Online Free Page B

thing to jump from one hundred to two, then to four and then on up. It is another to jump from seventy-five to a thousand. It would have had to be a thousand, of course. Nine hundred seventy-five would sound small and mean.”
    “Yes, I see what you mean. Bidding a thousand so soon or right away would give anyone pause. It is such an undeniably foolish amount.”
    So was nine hundred and fifty, especially if you barely had it. A year ago he could cover it easily enough, although few men would not notice the depletion of their purses. A year hence he probably could too. Right now, however, paying Norbury would make somewhat shaky finances wobble all the more.
    Miss Longworth had chosen a bad time to need rescuing. It had been the only thing to do, however. He wanted to believe he would have done the same for any woman.
    Of course, she was not just any woman. She was Roselyn Longworth. She had been vulnerable to Norbury’s seduction because she had been impoverished by her brother’s criminal acts. He did not miss the irony that Timothy Longworth had, in a manner of speaking, just managed to take yet more money from Kyle Bradwell’s pocket.
    “You are aware, I think, that I will never be able to pay you back nine hundred and fifty pounds. Do you hope that I will agree to do so in other ways? Perhaps you expect me to feel an obligation and thus remove the question of importuning.”
    Is that what she thought had just happened out on the lane? He had not been thinking about repayment, or anything much. Nor did he believe that she had felt any obligation to respond as she had. And she had responded. Before she tried to bite him, of course.
    “I have neither expectations nor delusions of enjoying your favors in that way or for those reasons, Miss Longworth.”
My, how noble you are, Kyle lad. Such an elegant idiot too.
    Those speculations kept having their way, however. The memory of that embrace remained fresh. He would probably indulge in a few dreams. Since he would pay dearly for them, he would not feel guilty.
    “Perhaps instead you spoke of the brothel to make certain that I understood that tonight makes me fit for little else. I am all too aware of that. I know the high costs of what has occurred.”
    Yes, she probably did. Her poise had made him wonder, though. And the boy from the collier pits of Durham County had resented her reclaimed composure even while he admired it. A woman ruined irredeemably should not be so cool. She should weep the way the women of his mining village wept over loss.
    “Miss Longworth, your accounting will have nothing to do with me. Forgive me for teasing you so unkindly. My annoyance at my own costs got the better of me.”
    She angled forward, as if peering to see if he was sincere. The vague moonlight leaking into the middle of the carriage gave form to her features—her large eyes and full mouth and perfect face. Even this dim view of her beauty made his breath catch.
    “You have been kind and gallant, Mr. Bradwell. If you want to scold and remind me of my compliance in my final fall, I suppose that I should show the grace to listen.”
             
    He did not scold. He did not speak much at all. She wished that he would. Their brief conversation left her feeling less awkward. During the silences she could only sit there with her worry while his presence crowded her.
    She could not really move farther away. A collection of large rolls of paper filled almost half the carriage. She wondered what they were.
    An inner instinct remained alert for any movement from him. She knew that she was at the mercy of this man’s honor. He knew it too, and that moment out on the lane had confused matters. There had been a second or two, no more she was sure, when that embrace had been less than adversarial.
    She put the memory of it out of her mind. She did not want to dwell on how quickly her stupidity lured her to misunderstand a man again. She did not want to remember how she had stirred