A Rogue's Proposal Read Free Page A

had her well and truly placed. Not Flick. Felicity.
    Eyes like slits, he held her trapped; reaching out, he tugged the concealing muffler from her face.
    And found himself looking down at a Botticelli angel.
    Found himself drowning in limpid blue eyes paler than his own. Found his gaze irresistibly drawn to lips perfectly formed and tinged the most delicate rose pink he’d ever seen.
    He was sinking. Fast. And he wasn’t resisting.
    Sucking in a breath, he drew back, inwardly shocked at how far under he’d gone. Shaking free of the lingering spell, he scowled at its source. “What the damn hell do you think you’re about?”

Chapter 2

     
    S he tilted her chin—a delicate, pointy little chin. Set as it was, it looked decidedly stubborn.
    “I’m masquerading as a stable lad, in your stables, so—”
    “What a damn fool lark! What the devil —”
    “It’s not a lark!” Her blue eyes flashed; her expression turned belligerent. “I’m doing it for the General!”
    “The General?” General Sir Gordon Caxton was Demon’s neighbor and mentor, and Felicity’s—Flick’s—guardian. Demon scowled. “You’re not going to tell me the General knows about this?”
    “Of course not!”
    The Flynn shifted; tight-lipped, Demon waited while Flick quieted the big bay.
    Her gaze flickered over him, irritated and considering in equal measure, then steadied on his face.
    “It’s all because of Dillon.”
    “Dillon?” Dillon was the General’s son. Flick and Dillon were of similar age. Demon’s most recent memories of Dillon were of a dark-haired youth, swaggering about the General’s house, Hillgate End, giving himself airs and undeserved graces.
    “Dillon’s in trouble.”
    Demon got the distinct impression she only just avoided adding “again.”
    “He became involved—inadvertently—with a race-fixing racket.”
    “ What? ” He bit off the word, then had to settle his mount. The words “race-fixing” sent a chill down his spine.
    Flick frowned at him. “That’s when jockeys are paid to ease back on a horse, or cause a disruption, or—”
    He glared at her. “I know what race-fixing entails. That doesn’t explain what you’re doing mixed up in it.”
    “I’m not !” Indignation colored her cheeks.
    “ What are you doing masquerading as a lad, then?”
    Her soft blue eyes flashed. “If you’d stop interrupting, I’d be able to tell you!”
    Demon reined in his temper, set his jaw, and pointedly waited. After a moment’s fraught silence, blue eyes locked with blue, Flick nodded and put her pert nose in the air.
    “Dillon was approached some weeks ago by a man and asked to take a message to a jockey about the first race of the season. He didn’t see any reason he shouldn’t, so he agreed. I suspect he thought it would be a lark—or that it made him more involved with the racing—but he agreed to carry the message to the jockey, then didn’t. Couldn’t. He got a chill and Mrs. Fogarty and I insisted he stay in bed—we took away his clothes, so he had to. Of course, he didn’t say why he kept trying to struggle up. Not then.”
    She drew breath. “So the message didn’t get passed on. It was an instruction to fix the race, so the race, therefore, wasn’t fixed. It now seems that the man who approached Dillon was working for some sort of syndicate—a group of some description—and because the race wasn’t fixed and they didn’t know it, they lost a lot of money.”
    “Men came looking for Dillon—rough men. Luckily, Jacobs and Mrs. Fogarty didn’t like their style—they said Dillon was away. So now he’s in hiding and fears for his life.”
    Demon exhaled and sat back in his saddle. From what he knew of the unsavory types involved in race-fixing, Dillon had good cause to worry. He studied Flick. “Where’s he hiding?”
    She straightened, and fixed him with a very direct look. “I can’t tell you—not unless you’re willing to help us.”
    Demon returned her gaze with