Trust Me Read Online Free Page B

to overcome them
unless she pushed herself, would she?
    She had to try.
    If she failed, if she
froze or burst into tears or became suddenly ill and fainted… only Jon would
see. He hadn’t judged her for those things in the past.
    But if she didn’t at
least try, she might lose his respect. Respect she’d worked so hard to earn.
    She tiled her face to
his and forced a smile. “A quail.”
    “Quail?”
    She traced a
fingertip down the folds of his simple cravat. “Yes, you must promise to bag me
a quail, else I shan’t go riding with you.”
    She fluttered her
lashes whilst looking up at him through them.
    The pupils of his
eyes enlarged and he grinned. “My lady is demanding today.”
    “Your lady is weary
of those pigeons the cook keeps serving us.” She shuddered at the memory of the
stringy roasted chicken that had graced last evening’s table.
     
    Jon watched Anne’s
generous breasts shake with her affected trembling and then he chuckled deeply.
“Pigeons indeed.”
    He bent and placed a
kiss on her forehead, then stepped away and walked to the stable entrance.
Riley was leaning against the outside of the stable, chewing on a stalk of
grass.
    “Put a saddle on
Hades,” Jon said.
    “Yes, my lord,” Riley
said and hurried to obey. Jon followed him back into the stable and went to the
corner and picked up a bundle he’d placed there earlier.
    When he glanced back
at Riley, the groom was attempting to set the saddle on Hades’ back but his
eyes were focused intently upon Anne.
    Her chest, to be
exact.
    The fine-worsted wool
clung to her full, round breasts in a fuzzy-soft sort of invitation for a man’s
hands.
    Not that Jon
particularly begrudged another man’s looking at Anne. She had magnificent
breasts. They were made to be appreciated—with some discretion, though, and
under the proper circumstances. And yet… All right, he must admit that it
pleased him to see the open admiration and lust for his wife’s breasts in other
men’s eyes, knowing that he alone possessed the right to touch them.
    But a servant should
never be so disrespectful of his own lord’s wife as to ogle her openly.
    He glanced at her
face. Irritation crackled through him.
    She was a thousand
leagues away. Lost in her own thoughts.
    He’d known so many
aristocratic women who discounted any man beneath the rank of baronet as being
somehow non-existent except in a servile fashion.
    To be precise, he’d
known so many aristocratic women who had looked upon him thus, back when he had
been common Mr Jonathon Lloyd standing beside his cousin, Charles Lloyd,
Viscount Midhurst, the heir to the Earl of Ruel.
    But that wasn’t what
was so disquieting about this current situation. It was that she hadn’t told
him about Riley’s improper interest.
    All right. Jon had
known of this problem of Riley being unable to keep his eyes respectfully
focused whilst around the new Countess of Ruel. And yes, Jon had been testing
Anne, to see if she would bring the issue to his notice.
    He was her husband,
damn it, she should come to him with any concern whatsoever. How was he to
maintain control over the male servants if she neglected to alert him to such
problems?
    He walked to her and
touched her hand.
    She startled and
gaped at him, so obviously trying to reconnect into the moment. Lines from
Grandmother’s letter played once more in his mind.
     
    So, my mighty lord earl, you have chosen to gift Ruel with a
bride who sounds as though she is even more flighty and self-absorbed than your
mother. Let’s just hope your countess proves to be a shade more steadfast to
the house of Lloyd, at least long enough to present you with an heir.
     
    A jangle hit the air
and drew his attention back to Mr Riley. The saddle slipped yet again. Jon
pressed his lips together, resisting the urge to vent himself in a cynical
laugh. “Riley.”
    The groom looked up
with a slightly confused expression.
    Jon let his lip curl
upwards. “The day grows old. Shall I