The Stolen Bride Read Online Free Page B

thoughtfully and then sat down plump between his legs to gather daisy heads.
    Verderan was turning to Chloe to complain when a cry spun him back in time to intercept a ball thoroughly walloped by Frederick heading straight for the child. He threw the ball back to the bowler then tucked the child under his arm, walked over and dropped him ungently by his mother. Without a word he returned to his place in the field.
    Chloe took a firm hold of her son’s gown when he attempted to follow Verderan again. “No, you bad boy.” She turned to her grandmother. “How is it that this child has no discrimination? That man is a dueler. He has killed two men!”
    “I hear they wanted killing,” replied the pragmatic duchess. “I gather that as much as his money kept him out of the hands of the law.” She laid a hand on her granddaughter’s arm. “Neither we nor the Wraybournes are overly keen to have the man in our homes, but he is one of Randal’s closest friends. As long as he is willing to behave correctly we can accept him. You can hardly say he is working to attract the child.”
    “I don’t understand it,” complained Chloe. “His father spoils Stevie. The duke dotes on him and all the staff at the Towers are slaves to his dimples. Yet the person he haunts is Verderan, who just scowls at him and tells him to go away.”
    “Perhaps that’s the secret of his charm,” said the duchess cynically. “With women at least. There’s many a woman can’t stand to see a man ignore her.”
    At that point Frederick was caught out and Sophie bounced to her feet. “At last,” she said. She hastily pinned back her rose-sprigged muslin and hurried out to bat. When she found she was facing Randal as bowler, she grinned cheekily, confident of a soft toss—especially as she’d pinned her skirt to show a good few inches of her calves.
    True enough, the ball was popped gently down and she swung mightily, sending the footman fielding deep nearer the coppice off running. With a cry of triumph she hitched her skirt a little higher and ran down the pitch and back, crossing her brother, David, both ways.
    When she stopped before the footman had reached the ball, David Kyle called, “Run again, Sophie!”
    “No,” she said pertly. “I prefer to be in to bat. Randal wouldn’t send you soft balls.”
    David turned to his friend. “Are you going to stand for that, Randal?”
    “And how would you bowl to Jane, then?” was the amused reply.
    David laughed and looked over at his wife, sitting awaiting her turn at bat, long hair in a braid and hat carelessly abandoned by her side. She blew him a kiss ...
    Randal poked him. “I have bowled, Sophie has walloped it, and you’re supposed to be running.” David hastily sprinted down the pitch, then refused to run back, despite Sophie’s shouts.
    “I have to get a turn somehow,” he called.
    “Are you perhaps avoiding me?” murmured Lord Randal to his betrothed, now at his end of the strip of grass. “Always trying to keep to the other end of the pitch.”
    Sophie felt his lips brush softly at her nape and turned suddenly, but he had already gone. It was always the same. Brief promises that never amounted to anything.
    She watched him hungrily, the sheer beauty of the man a painful pleasure. In loose canvas trousers and an open-necked white shirt he was still the most elegant man in the world. His bright yellow curls were naturally windswept and yet some would pay a coiffeur a fortune to achieve the effect.
    He turned and ran back, tossing a hard, fast ball at his friend, who turned it, but not far enough for a run.
    “I don’t think I am the one doing the avoiding,” said Sophie sharply as Randal strolled back past her.
    He stopped and rubbed some dirt off the ball against his trousers. “Don’t pick a fight here, Sophie,” he said gently. “It’s rather public.”
    “Since you avoid being private with me—” But he had gone and was preparing to make his run. She could have