Jo Beverley Read Online Free Page A

scanned the audience of servants. “Where’s Nims. Nims! ” he bellowed. “Come and shave me, you damned idler!”
    Since most of the show was clearly over, the servants set to clearing up properly. But slowly, in case there might be an encore.
    Sax’s stocky valet backed in from the next room, agile despite a wooden leg, steaming water jug in hand, cloth over arm. “I’m coming, I’m coming! How could I be expected to be ready for you at this hour, then?” He looked around and rolled his eyes. “That much trouble, eh? Sit down. Sit down. You want shaving, or you want your throat cut?”
    A gray-blue parrot flew in behind him and landed on Sax’s shoulder. “Hello, my lovely,” it said in Sax’s exact voice.
    Sax relaxed and smiled, letting the adoring bird nuzzle around his ear. “Hello, my lovely.” Then he sobered. “Devil take it. Knox will throw a fit.”
    Indeed, Knox the parrot was glaring at the servants. “Women! Women! Road to hell.”
    As Sax sat in a chair so he could be shaved, Babs sashayed over, taking a hazelnut out of her pocket. “Go on, Knox, you love me really.”
    The bird eyed her, swaying. “Eve. Delilah.”
    She offered the nut, just out of reach. “Be nice, Knox.”
    â€œDelilah!”
    She waited, and when the bird muttered, “Pretty lady,” she gave him the nut and blew him a kiss. He turned his back to enjoy it.
    â€œSee,” she said to everyone. “You can handle any male if you find out what he really wants.”
    â€œBabs,” said Sax, “you’re a walking warning to the males of any species. But how, I wonder, did you find time with Knox to train him?”
    Babs didn’t answer, but she winked at the valet. To Owain’s astonishment, Nims blushed. Jupiter, but this place would drive him crazy if he wasn’t already beyond hope.
    â€œShift yourself, Knox,” said the valet, flapping a snowy cloth. When the parrot was safe on the back of the chair, he wrapped the cloth around his employer’s shoulders and started to shave him.
    â€œStart naming names, Owain,” Sax said.
    â€œNames?”
    â€œPotential brides.”
    Knox jumped. “Marry not! Marry not!”
    Sax rolled his eyes. “Names. And for heaven’s sake try not to use words that’ll set him off.”
    With a familiar feeling of being stuck in a mad house, Owain took out his notebook. Knox’s previous owner had trained him to warn against involvement with women, particularly marital involvement. Sax was right. A bride in the house was likely to give the bird a fit.
    â€œWhat kind of names?” he asked.
    â€œPotential . . . partners in connubial bliss.”
    â€œWhat sort?”
    Nims was stroking the sharp blade over Sax’s cheek so he spoke calmly. “One who’ll go through the ceremony with me tomorrow. Which means just about any of ’em.”
    Knox must have felt Sax’s tensions, for he hopped onto his shoulder and rubbed soothingly against his ear. Sax relaxed and stroked the bird. “Who was the one who sprained her ankle outside the door a couple of weeks ago?”
    â€œMiss Cathcart. You said you wanted to throttle her.”
    â€œI just wanted to twist her ankle properly for her.”
    Owain wrote on a clean page. “You want me to send a note to say you will call on Miss Cathcart’s father? I’m not even sure they’re still in town.”
    â€œProbably few of them are. Oh, ’struth.”
    He snapped his left hand and Brak slithered hesitantly out from under the bed, teeth still bared as if ready for the kill, but eyes anxious. The poor hound couldn’t help it. He’d been born with a deformity of the mouth that made him look fearsome. Unfortunately, he was an abject coward, and even now was hesitating, sniffing the air for trouble.
    â€œIt’s all right, Brak,”