The Magic of His Touch (May Day Mischief) Read Online Free

thought of that lovely
girl taken advantage of by a louse made him burn up inside.
    The housekeeper arrived to escort them to their rooms. Alexis
had almost finished changing for dinner when a tap sounded on the door, followed
by Lucasta’s voice. “Are you decent?”
    “I’m afraid so,” Alexis said, opening the door. It was
improper, but this wasn’t the first time Lucasta had seen him in his
shirtsleeves. They’d never stood on ceremony; one didn’t, when one had been
friends since the age of two. “Unlike Elderwood, who has already exchanged
ogling glances with several of the housemaids. Have you come to compromise me
and force a speedy marriage? I warn you, I should make a horrid husband.”
    She rolled her eyes, slipped in and shut the door. “As a matter
of fact, I think you’d make a perfect husband—for a woman who wants to get
married. You’re kind and patient and protective and not the least bit
overbearing.”
    “Thank you,” he said, after an instant of dread that she might
have decided she liked him a little too much. She was wrong in her assessment;
he wouldn’t make a good husband unless that perfect woman he sought came along.
Oh, he would do his best to be kind, patient, et cetera, but both husband and
wife deserved more than that...affection, for example, and respect—even love, a
rare commodity these days.
    Qualities that Miss Whistleby couldn’t have found in her
paramour. Anger and uneasiness roiled together in Alexis’s gut.
    Lucasta took a seat on the sofa, a gilt-wood affair of the sort
popular two or three decades earlier. “I’ve got to talk to you about Peony.”
    He frowned. “Miss Whistleby? What about her?”
    “Her father and Aunt Edna have told her to set her cap at Lord
Elderwood,” Lucasta said, “but she doesn’t want to.”
    This hardly came as a surprise. “Because she has a tendre for
some other man.”
    She stared. “Whatever gave you that idea?”
    He couldn’t bring himself to tell her, so he said, “I assumed
there must be some local fellow she prefers, since most women are only too happy
to set their caps at an earl.” He fetched his coat from where he’d thrown it
over a chair.
    “Not at all. The problem is that Peony is too tall and boyish,
so she is socially awkward and has never learned to put herself forward where
men are concerned.”
    Miss Whistleby had seemed extraordinarily bold and not at all
boyish this morning, but again, Alexis found himself unable to correct his
betrothed. He tugged his coat on and adjusted it.
    “Besides, she took a dislike to Lord Elderwood last Season,”
Lucasta said.
    At last, something he could believe. “He does tend to put
people off,” Alexis said, “except the benighted women who throw themselves at
him, whom nothing can deter.”
    Lucasta sniffed. “Would you mind asking a favor of him? That
is, if he is capable of suspending both odiousness and seduction for a week or
two.”
    Alexis blinked. “Have you taken a dislike to him, as well?”
    Lucasta made a face. “I hardly know him. I’m concerned for
Peony, that’s all. I’ve never heard anything to Elderwood’s credit, but since
you’re his friend, I thought he might deign to be helpful if you were the one to
ask.”
    It was unlike Lucasta to pass judgment based purely on
reputation, but he let that go. “What do you want him to do?”
    “Merely to discourage Aunt Edna and Mr. Whistleby without
making it appear that Peony isn’t doing her best. They make her life miserable,
but it’s not her fault she’s not very appealing to the opposite sex.”
    Again, he wondered if he should correct her, but a
disinclination to discuss Miss Whistleby held him back. “I’ll see what I can
do.” He just wasn’t sure about what. He would get Lord Elderwood’s cooperation
easily enough, but the more he imagined Miss Whistleby stripping naked again for
her lover—a secret she’d kept even from Lucasta—the more it ate away at him.
    * * *
    Aunt Edna