Heartless: The Parasol Protectorate: Book the Fourth Read Online Free Page A

lupine spouse, “My love, lead them off. Go for the lime pit.” She remembered Conall complaining to her about running into the pit by accident only a few nights previous, singeing all the hair off of his forefeet.
    Lord Maccon barked his agreement, understanding her completely—as Alpha, he was one of the few who held on to his wits when he lost his skin. He began backing off the road and down the gully toward the nearby pit. If the creatures had any wax components at all, the lime should at least seize them into immobility.
    The porcupines followed.
    Alexia had only a moment of reprieve to appreciate the macabre sight of a wolf luring away a flock of porcupines like some Aesop’s version of the Pied Piper. A thud resounded on the driver’s box on the outside of the carriage. Something far larger than a porcupine had hit the claviger coachman and knocked him out. Seconds later, for speed was always their strong point, the parasol was bashed out of Alexia’s grasp and the carriage door yanked open.
    “Good evening, Lady Maccon.” The vampire tipped histop hat with one hand, holding the door with the other. He occupied the entrance in an ominous, looming manner.
    “Ah, how do you do, Lord Ambrose?”
    “Tolerably well, tolerably well. It is a lovely night, don’t you find? And how is your”—he glanced at her engorged belly—“health?”
    “Exceedingly abundant,” Alexia replied with a self-effacing shrug, “although, I suspect, unlikely to remain so.”
    “Have you been eating figs?”
    Alexia was startled by this odd question. “Figs?”
    “Terribly beneficial in preventing biliousness in newborns, I understand.”
    Alexia had been in receipt of a good deal of unwanted pregnancy advice over the last several months, so she ignored this and got on to the business at hand.
    “If you don’t feel that it is forward of me to ask, are you here to kill me, Lord Ambrose?” She inched away from the carriage door, reaching for Ethel. The gun lay behind her on the coach seat. She had not had time to put it back into its reticule with the pineapple cut siding. The reticule was a perfect match to her gray plaid carriage dress with green lace trim. Lady Alexia Maccon was a woman who liked to see a thing done properly or not at all.
    The vampire tilted his head to one side in acknowledgment. “Sadly, yes. I do apologize for the inconvenience.”
    “Oh, really, must you? I’d much rather you didn’t.”
    “That’s what they all say.”
    *   *   *
    The ghost drifted. Floating between this world and death. It felt like being trapped in a coop, a cage for chickens,and she a poor fat hen kept to lay and lay and lay. What could she provide but the eggs of her mind? Nothing left. No more eggs.
    “Bawk, bawk!” she clucked.
    No one answered her.
    It was better—this was better, she had to believe—than nothingness. Even the madness was better.
    But sometimes she was aware of it, the reality of her coop, and the substantial world around it. There was something very wrong with that world. There were parts of it missing. There were people acting indifferent or incorrect. There were new feelings intruding that had no right to intrude. No right at all.
    The ghost was certain, absolutely certain, that something must be done to stop it. But she was nothing more than a specter, and a mad one at that, drifting between undead and dead. What could she do? Who could she tell?

CHAPTER TWO
     

     

Wherein Alexia Will Not Be Flung
     
    L ord Ambrose was an exceptionally well-formed gentleman. His perpetual expression was one of pensive hauteur exacerbated by aquiline features and brooding dark eyes. Alexia felt that he had much in common with a mahogany wardrobe that belonged to Mrs. Loontwill’s great-grandfather and now resided in embarrassed austerity among the frippery of her mother’s boudoir. That is to say, Lord Ambrose was immovable, impossible to live with, and mostly filled with frivolities incompatible with