Captured by a Gentleman (Regency Unlaced 6) Read Free Page A

Ranulf called on the other man yesterday evening.
    His eyes narrowed. “Where is your maid?”
    “I left her in London. She was employed by my uncle, not me,” she added defensively at Ranulf’s frown.
    “So you are completely unchaperoned?”
    “Yes.”
    Ranulf breathed deeply through his nose. “Did Sugdon put you up to this?”
    “Up to what?” Darcy looked genuinely bewildered.
    “Hiding in my carriage,” Ranulf answered her impatiently. “I can think of no other way in which you could have known I was leaving London this morning.”
    “I…I was standing in the gallery above the entrance hall when you said your good-byes to my uncle yesterday evening,” she acknowledged guiltily.
    “Eavesdropping!” Ranulf snorted his disgust. He had visited Sugdon so that he might return Millicent’s dowry in full to the older man. He wanted nothing in his life that belonged to any of the Sugdon family. “Or is it possible you and your uncle have schemed together to compromise me into now marrying you?”
    She recoiled back a step. “Marrying you…? Why on earth would you ever think such a thing?”
    Ranulf snorted. “The Montgomery family is a powerful one in Scotland.” Which had been the reason Sugdon had granted permission for Ranulf’s betrothal and marriage to Millicent the previous year. “I am also now a wealthy man in my own right.”
    By the sweat of his brow. Ranulf had invested the money he had originally intended using to buy a house in London. He had needed to do something to occupy his tortured mind and spirit. Perhaps because of that unhappiness, he had been completely ruthless in his business dealings and was now as wealthy, if not more so, than the cousin whom Millicent had plotted to kill for his fortune and title.
    The irony was not lost on Ranulf.
    As he was sure it had not been lost on Sugdon. “Having once lost that powerful and now very wealthy son-in-law, it would be just like Sugdon to arrange for his niece to take his daughter’s place as my wife,” he said scornfully. “Possibly he and another witness are standing ready to leap out and claim wrongdoing on my part before forcing me into marrying you?”
    “I am running away from my uncle, not acting as his accomplice in some grand scheme to entrap you into matrimony,” she insisted heatedly. “Why would I? I barely know you, let alone feel any desire to marry you. And you obviously do not remember having met me at all. I was present at your wedding last spring,” she explained as Ranulf frowned.
    His wedding to Millicent. When Ranulf only had eyes for his beautiful bride and thoughts for the wedding night ahead of them. Completely ignorant of Millicent’s true nature. He had been a fool living in a fool’s paradise.
    No longer. Ranulf was now all too aware of the vagaries of human nature. The greed and ambition. The callous intent. The betrayal…
    Having completely abandoned his political ambitions, Ranulf had no wish to become embroiled with any of the Sugdon family ever again. For any reason. He and his family had barely escaped unscathed the last time.
    Even if it should transpire Darcy was telling him the truth, Sugdon was now her legal guardian. There was nothing Ranulf could do about whatever her unhappy situation was.
    The rift, if there was a rift, between uncle and niece, was probably over something minor anyway, which this young woman had blown up out of all proportion inside her head. Sugdon had probably turned down a marriage proposal on behalf of his niece that she wanted to accept. Or maybe it was something as silly as her wanting a new bonnet her uncle disapproved of.
    Who knew what manner of nonsense Darcy Ambridge had considered important enough to have run away from her guardian’s home so that she might now throw herself—literally—at Ranulf’s feet.
    “My Uncle Sugdon—” She drew in a deep and shuddering breath before continuing. “Yesterday, he stated that, after my birthday next week, when I