The Convenient Arrangement Read Online Free Page A

closed it, his nose wrinkling with disgust. He had no use for Marquis de la Cour’s sickish-sweet love poems. He set it back on the shelf and reached for another.
    â€œHow dare you!”
    He turned as Lady Fanning surged around the end of the shelf as if she had been shot at him in a flurry of fireworks. Frowning, he wondered what he had done to disturb her now when, in truth, she was the one disturbing him in his own home.
    â€œHow dare I—?”
    Her hand striking his cheek echoed through the room. As he stared at her, too stunned to speak, she cried, “Curse you, Lorenzo Wolfe.”

Two
    Lorenzo put his hand on his stinging cheek and bit back the retort he could not let ring in a lady’s ears. “Madam, I have no idea what—”
    â€œBetter acquainted?” Lady Fanning sniffed in outrage. “I should have listened to my better sense and stayed downstairs until David was found.”
    â€œI do not understand what you are babbling about.”
    â€œBabbling?” Her finger trembled as she pointed to the end of the bookcase where she had gone to explore. “You expect me to believe that after—after—”
    â€œAfter what?” He was trying to be reasonable, but he was hungry and his head had been aching even before she struck him.
    â€œAfter I saw that! I have no idea what kind of woman you think me to be, but I can assure you, I am a lady come in hose and shod.”
    â€œLady Fanning, I have not intimated otherwise.”
    â€œIntimated?” Her laugh was sharp. With fear? He could not understand why, when he had been the pattern-card of propriety, save when he had taken her arm to halt her from storming up the stairs. “Odd that you should choose that word.”
    â€œMayhap I would not have chosen it if I had any idea what in the blazes you are prattling on and on about.”
    Her chin lowered a finger’s breadth. Confusion filled her voice. “Are you asking me to believe you are unaware of what is on the other side of this bookcase?”
    He did not answer. Reaching through the thick fringe on her shawl to take her gently by the arm that was holding the candle, he steered her around the end of the shelves before she could fire another demure hit at him. She pulled her arm away, but he grasped the candle before she could walk away to leave him in the dark.
    In disbelief, he stared at the grand bed set behind the bookshelves. It must be of an age with the house, for its tester was hung by silken cords from the ceiling. The bed curtains were open. The headboard, that was carved with leaping stags and a unicorn, came alive as the candlelight skimmed across it.
    â€œNow I know why you have been lurking in the country,” Lady Fanning said coldly. “No decent woman would allow herself to be alone in your company. If you think that you can lure me up here and—”
    â€œLady Fanning,” he said, glad the shadows hid his smile which she was sure to misinterpret, “you must recall several things. First, the whole of this household could burst upon this room at any moment with the tidings that your nephew has been found. Secondly, I am, in spite of your low opinion of me, a gentleman, a fact that is generally known. Lastly, as I informed you in the foyer below, I have only arrived for the first time at Moorsea Manor. I have no knowledge of what is in any of these rooms.”
    She wrapped her arms and that ridiculous shawl even more tightly around her. “I am not interested in listening to your explanations and apology here. We must speak of this elsewhere.”
    â€œNonsense.” He pulled the curtains on the imposing bed and walked to the hearth. He looked back, sure she would follow instead of huddling in the darkness. He was right, but she kept more than an arm’s length between them and looked anxiously toward the door. “You cannot leave here until you learn where your nephew might be.” Turning