Surrender To A Scoundrel Read Free Page A

hammered noisily in her chest, until she couldn’t take the stress of it any longer. She had to know if he was looking at her, so she discreetly turned her gaze in his direction.
    To her utter horror, he was staring at her, squinting irritably with pure venom in his eyes.
    Evelyn sucked in a quick breath and looked the other way. Good God, he did know.
    “This is becoming ridiculous,” her mother said, checking her timepiece again and tapping her booted toe on the ground. “Stay here with the bags, dear. I’m going to ask the guard how much longer it will be.”
    Before Evelyn could voice a protest, her mother was heading back into the station, leaving her completely alone on the platform.
    Well, not completely alone. She was standing next to Lord Martin.
    Evelyn wet her lips. Her heart raced madly asshe struggled to act casual. Could he see her chest heaving?
    Then he did the unthinkable. He spoke.
    “Well, well, well,” he slowly said, rocking back on his heels. “If it isn’t Miss Evelyn Foster.”
    She felt her eyebrows fly up in shock. She hadn’t thought he’d known her name—because he never seemed to remember it—and he’d certainly never addressed her before or acknowledged an acquaintance, much less given her the slightest notion that he even knew she existed.
    “Do you have any idea what havoc you caused?” he asked, glancing over his shoulder toward the station door, watching for her mother.
    Evelyn fought to hide her unease and somehow managed to return his dry but heated gaze. “Havoc I caused? It’s my fault, is it, that you had a woman in your bed? Pardon me, but I beg to differ.”
    She could hardly believe she was engaging in such an improper conversation. And with Lord Martin, no less.
    His blue eyes—with their impossibly long, black lashes—narrowed. “It’s your fault I was caught , Miss Foster.”
    All at once, the anxiety she was feeling turned to anger, because she hadn’t even wanted to be sneaking into his dormitory in the first place, and everything was his fault for being such a habitualflirt and leading Penelope Steeves to believe he was in love with her!
    Evelyn couldn’t contain herself. With all her many frustrations boiling up to the surface, she faced Lord Martin and narrowed her own gaze from under her thick spectacles. “I do beg your pardon, sir, but when a gentleman like you behaves inappropriately—leading an impressionable young lady to believe there is some genuine affection between you—that gentleman must accept the consequences of his actions.”
    Martin gazed at her for a long, heated moment, then appeared almost amused, but not quite, for there was a perceptible bitterness about him when he scoffed.
    “I beg your pardon, Miss Foster, but your friend has a head on her shoulders that is in working order, does she not? You and she both should have known it was unwise to sneak into a male dormitory, where women are strictly prohibited.”
    Evelyn glared at him. “And what of the woman in your bed, sir? Where was her head?”
    His mouth curled up in a patronizing grin. “ I don’t think you’d want to know. ”
    Evelyn sucked in a breath. She didn’t know what he was implying exactly, but was quite sure it was beyond scandalous.
    But heaven forbid he should think her frazzled by the remark, so she raised her chin, squaredher shoulders, and pretended she was unruffled. Though she had no idea what to say.
    Martin clenched his jaw and faced forward again, evidently also at a loss for words.
    They stood in silence for a few seconds, while Evelyn wallowed in her anger, for what right did he have to blame her for his indiscretion? He’d had a woman and a bottle of rum in his room during supper hour, for pity’s sake!
    Evelyn checked over her shoulder to see if her mother would soon be returning, but she was still inside the station, chatting leisurely with a woman in a large hat.
    As the seconds ticked by, the tension on the platform seemed to grow heavier