Slightly Sinful Read Free

not already fled had expected an imminent invasion by war-maddened French soldiers. But news had come late in the evening that the battle was over, that the British and her allies had won the victory and were chasing the French army back in the direction of Paris.
    "A fat lot of good that will do us," Geraldine had commented, her hands splayed on her magnificent hips. "All those lovely men gone and us sitting here like a quartet of poor church mice."
    But it was not just the war news that had kept them all up. It was dismay and fury and frustration-and the burning desire for revenge.
    Geraldine was pacing, her purple silk dressing gown billowing out behind her with each long stride while the violet nightgown beneath it molded her voluptuous figure, and her loose black hair bounced against her shoulders, and one arm sawed the air as if she were a tragedian onstage. Her Italian heritage was very obvious to Rachel, who sat to one side of the fireplace, hugging a shawl about her shoulders even though it was not a cold night.
    "The slimy, villainous toad," Geraldine declaimed. "Just wait till I get my hands on him. I'll tear him limb from limb. I'll squeeze the life out of him."
    "We have to find him first, Gerry," Bridget said. She was sprawled in a chair, looking weary. She was also rather dazzling on the eyes, her shocking pink dressing gown clashing horribly with her improbably red hair.
    "Oh, I'll find him, Bridge, never you worry." Geraldine lifted her hands before her face and made it very clear what she would do with them if the neck of the Reverend Nigel Crawley had just been obliging enough to appear between them at that moment.
    But Nigel Crawley was long gone. He was probably in England by now, a great deal of money that was not his own on his very handsome and pious and villainous person.
    Rachel thought she would rather enjoy blackening both his eyes herself and knocking his perfect teeth down his throat, though she was not normally of a violent turn of mind. If it were not for her, he would never have met these ladies. And if he had not met them, he would not have made off with their savings.
    Flossie was pacing too, somehow avoiding collisions with Geraldine. With her short blond curls and big blue eyes and tiny stature and pastel-colored garments, Flossie looked as if her head might be stuffed with nothing more valuable than fluff, but she could read and write, and she had a head for numbers. She was the treasurer of the partnership.
    "We have to find Mr. Creepy Crawley," she said. "How or where or when I do not know since he has the whole of England to hide in-or even the whole of the world for that matter, and we have almost no money left to go after him with. But I'll find him if it's the last thing I do in this life. And if you have claimed his neck for your own, Gerry, I'll take another part of him and put a knot in it."
    "It's probably too little to tie in a knot, though, Floss," Phyllis said. Plump and pretty and placid, her brown hair always neatly styled, her clothes always plain and unremarkable, Phyllis looked the least like Rachel's image of a whore. And ever practical, she had just come back into the sitting room with a large tray of tea and cakes. "Anyway, he will have spent all our money long before we find him."
    "All the more reason," Geraldine said, "to mash up every bone in his body. Revenge can be sweet for its own sake, Phyll."
    "How ever are we going to find him, though?" Bridget asked, pushing the fingers of one hand through her red tresses.
    "We will write letters, you and I, Bridge," Flossie said, "to all the sisterhood who can read. We know sisters in London and Brighton and Bath and Harrogate and a few other places, don't we? We will put out the word, and we will find him. But we are going to need money to chase after him with." She sighed and stopped pacing for a moment.
    "All we need to do, then, is think of a way to get rich quick," Geraldine said, sawing the air again with one arm.