Secrets of a Scandalous Bride Read Free Page B

test to his finely honed discipline. It had been a while since he’d jousted with an aristocratic female with morals to let. And he needed the practice, if this damned unflagging peg leg bobbing between his hips was any indication, for gawdsakes .
    Yes, he had a score to settle with the Upper Ten Thousand. And he was doing it through the deep pockets of the lords who flocked to him for superior mounts, and their fickle wives who came to him for an entirely different sort of ride. The past few years,he had accommodated the latter only out of necessity and only when the blackest of moods was upon him.
    This pampered lady was ripe for the plucking. She was everything his small ragtag family had not been—well fed, elegantly dressed, and clearly an inveterate charlatan. The only question was how much blunt he could extract from her and in what fashion.
    Yes, the lovely Mrs. Ashburton would rue the day she chose to throw her lot in with him instead of going quietly to face her transgressions. Yet those damned eyes of hers flummoxed him with their false innocence. By God, he would wipe that expression clean by the time he was done with her. She knew nothing of his game.
    They never did.

Chapter 2
    T he storeroom was hot and filled with the most unpleasant scent of decaying cabbage mingled with unplucked fowl. But nothing could induce Elizabeth to descend again into the cooler cellar as the sound of scurrying confirmed even worse accommodations.
    Although…she did not doubt she would jump into the awful, dank darkness at the first echo of Pymm’s officers. Dear Lord. She prayed no one had followed Manning’s carriage.
    In an effort to stem the cascading thoughts of the morning’s events, Elizabeth continued reorganizing the goods lining the rows of cluttered shelves. The pickled vegetables were improperly potted, the spoilage evident. Ugh . Why, half of the food here would have to be carted away.
    She wondered if and when Mr. Manning would allow her to be carted away from this awful place. She leaned her head against a shelf. God . She’d never been so mortified in all her life.
    His raw actions were forever imprinted in her memory—his large hand gripping her knee wide while his hips flexed against hers. And each time she pressed her nose into the folds of her fichu to escapethe dreadful smells of the storeroom, his lingering masculine scent brought her right back to the scene in the carriage. His was the aroma of fresh-cut hay and bayberry shaving soap, along with starch and the indescribable scent of his skin. She shivered in remembrance of his vulgar words and actions.
    Oh, she should have been terrified, but for some absurd reason, she had not been. She had not been afraid of him for a moment. It was ridiculous. She had thrown herself on the nonexistent mercy of a famous black-hearted, fire-breathing tyrant. But then again, wasn’t that precisely what she had needed against Pymm’s well-organized detail of officers?
    After a slight rustling sound, the storeroom door swung open, and Eliza gratefully breathed in a great lungful of fresh air. “Oh, Mr. Lefroy, thank goodness you’ve returned. Mr. Manning has no authority to hold me.” She stepped over the threshold. “I shall just be on my way, now, and here is the guinea I owe you, sir.” She held out the promised coin.
    Flustered, the thin man dipped his head. “I’m sorry, lovey, but the master says you’re to stay. ’e wants you to ’elp Cook. Said it were part o’ the bargain. The two under cooks left wivout notice yester eve.”
    Elizabeth gazed past Mr. Lefroy’s shoulder, only to finally notice a large matron, wearing a filthy apron, studying her with a bleary eye. “But this is impossible. I must go. I’m certain Mr. Manning doesn’t want to incur the displeasure of my friends.”
    Mr. Lefroy scratched his grisly, thick side-whiskers, which hung low on his cheeks and were shaped like iron clubs. “Don’t rightly think the master cares if ’e