The Marquess Who Loved Me Read Online Free Page A

weakness. But he’d seen the first tiny cracks in her armor.
    Ellie — beautiful, traitorous bitch that she was — hadn’t forgotten him.
    Nick leaned against the pillar, searching for a comfortable angle. Women had frequently danced for his pleasure when he visited the Hyderabadi court. This dance wasn’t for him. None of it was for him, unless Ellie’s memory for dates was as good as his. But it was somehow more seductive than anything he’d seen with bells and scarves. Ellie moved through the patterns perfectly, effortlessly, tantalizing him every time she disappeared behind another couple.
    Tormenting him every time she smiled at the prig who was her partner.
    Those who didn’t dance gave Nick a wide berth. He heard the whispers, though, and knew they guessed his identity. Whether they avoided him because they hadn’t been introduced or because of his heavy involvement in trade didn’t matter — he didn’t mind their aversion, at least not tonight. The less others disturbed him, the more he could look his fill.
    One guest, though, found him almost immediately. The man, two inches shorter and much slimmer than Nick, wore an elaborately embroidered doublet and breeches that would have done a young Henry VIII proud, and the disbelieving look of one who has seen a ghost.
    “I should kill you for coming back without so much as a warning letter,” his brother Marcus said, clapping him on the shoulder.
    “You know the vagaries of communication,” he replied. An exact account of why Nick had returned now, and the possible threat he faced, could wait until morning. Instead, he offered a more innocuous reason for his return. “I trust that with Grandfather Corwyn’s death last year, you’ll be happy to have me back at home despite my lack of notice.”
    Marcus laughed. “Of course I’m happy to have you home. Rupert would be happy too, if he weren’t still in the West Indies. With you here, perhaps I can finally take a holiday.”
    Marcus was Nick’s middle brother, and had managed the London office of Corwyn, Claiborne and Sons, Ltd., with their maternal grandfather while Nick focused on their India operations and their youngest brother, Rupert, concentrated on the Caribbean trade. But after their grandfather’s death the previous year, the burdens on Marcus would have increased substantially.
    “Take all the holiday you want, if it makes you happy,” Nick said. “But when have the Corwyns — or Claibornes, for that matter — ever been satisfied with idleness?”
    “Never in my memory,” Marcus said. “But I would be more satisfied if we could have this conversation in my office — or rather, your office — and I wasn’t dressed like a prime fool. Come have a drink with me and escape this nonsense.”
    The lure of a drink with his brother, after years of inferior libations taken alone, was strong. Ellie’s pull was stronger. “You’re not the only one the marchioness has turned into a fool,” Nick said, gesturing at the dancers.
    “I would say the same, but I doubt for the same reasons.”
    Nick’s gaze had unerringly found Ellie, but he pulled back to look at his brother. “Gone over to the enemy, have we?”
    Marcus adjusted the ruffled lace at his neck. “My vow to you comes first — always has. But at least she was here the last decade.”
    Nick’s eyes slid back to Ellie. “You never told me she’d become such a…topic of conversation in London.”
    The whispers he’d heard about her in London over the past five days had made her into an almost legendary figure — a goddess with the beauty of Aphrodite and the appetites of a female Dionysus. He’d been disbelieving enough — and angry enough — that he had to see for himself.
    He wasn’t disbelieving anymore.
    Marcus sighed. “You left me here to manage your estate, but I won’t spread tales about people.”
    “How many of them are true?”
    “Ask her yourself. You might not like the answer, though.”
    Nick’s anger