Clandestine Read Online Free Page A

stared blindly at the spine.
    The scent of green apples dampened by rain—fresh and crisp and sweet to the tongue—eddied among the stuffy smells of the bookstore.
    If he glanced up, would he still see her, frowning with apprehension? The green skirts and modest cloak. The proud tilt to her bonnet. The sensually rounded figure. The firm chin and changeable hazel eyes, glaring up at him beneath long, sandy lashes, like the eyes of a tigress.
    Mrs. Sarah Callaway possessed a striking face, compelling without being beautiful: the opposite of her cousin, Rachel Wren—no, Mansard .
    As if to mock his memory of Rachel’s cool, pale skin, flecks of brown rioted over Sarah’s cheeks to meet in a frantic dance on the bridge of her nose. More freckles cavorted over her perfect little chin to race along her jaw like a flock of tiny sparrows. Even her earlobes were speckled, as if finely crumpled autumn leaves had been mixed into cream.
    My maiden name was Sarah Hargreaves. You once met my cousin. She was calling herself Rachel Wren—
    Sarah probably had no idea that any man who saw all those little freckles would burn to touch them. From her straightforward manner, she probably thought she was plain.
    Rachel, of course, had always known that she was beautiful, even when she carried a mop and bucket.
    Guy dragged his palm down over his mouth. He had not even known that Rachel had a cousin. Especially one so very upright and interesting and…freckled!
    The very proper teacher of botany and dancing and geography possessed very lovely skin, shaped delicately over lush female flesh. For all her lack of flirtation, Sarah Callaway was hiding what he suspected was a wanton mass of hair, not entirely successfully pinned back in a knot beneath her bonnet.
    He cursed under his breath. Was Theseus really expected to plunge, sword in hand, back into the Labyrinth?
    The hazel eyes had seemed stunningly honest, yet almost every word that she’d told him was a pack of lies. So either the redheaded schoolteacher had not been entirely frank with him, or her cousin had fooled her very seriously. And, as he knew to his cost, Rachel was perfectly capable of skipping out on a relationship without leaving any forwarding address.
    Thus he very much doubted the reality of any villainous abduction.
    He almost doubted the existence of the room at the end of the hallway at Brockton’s Hotel, and even of the late Captain Callaway.
    Guy had definitely begun to question the motives of this dappled lady with the self-possession of a queen, who might have danced, like autumn, directly out of summer.
    He would, of course, help her anyway.
    Though he would make a few inquiries first.

    U MBRELLAS sprouted around her like mushrooms as Sarah hurried back to the hotel. She ordered hot tea, then ran up the stairs to her room. It was small and mean, the cheapest the hotel had to offer, and lacked a working fireplace. But the long summer days were busy stealing time from the night, so she did not need a fire.
    At least Brockton’s was safe and decent, as even Mr. Devoran had acknowledged.
    An impeccable reputation was essential, of course, if a young lady with no other prospects was to keep her employment and not starve. Especially a widow who had just run out on her teaching post with no guarantee that Miss Farcey would ever take her back.
    Sarah tugged off her bonnet and stared at herself in the mirror. Her eyes were angrily rimmed in red. Her lashes burned like dry grass. The lady of misrule, her hair a damp mass, like a tangle of spun copper.
    It was hard to remain respectable when one possessed such riotously wicked hair and skin that betrayed one’s every emotion, however fleeting. Without her bonnet she looked like a loose woman who had dipped her head in a dye pot.
    When she had first applied for her position with Miss Farcey, she had wet the most wayward strands to darken them, then dragged them back beneath a modest little