To Seek a Master Read Free

described in rather more detail.
    She was disappointed, although not entirely. Mark Frobisher had no sooner dealt with Evangeline’s bottom than he was neatly coshed from behind by Lord Jasper Mauleverer, who turned out to have watched the entire procedure. That was quite exciting for Laura, with the added humiliation of an audience, but Lord Jasper proved to be a pretty poor villain, enjoying the view and making a few intimate remarks to set Evangeline’s upper cheeks aflame as well as her lower ones, but completely failing to take proper advantage of her dishevelled state.
    He did force her to walk behind him on a string and with her hands tied behind her back as they returned to his car, but that was plainly necessary, as he’d already tied her up once when he first kidnapped her. Both scenes were good, but fell well short of the spanking, while the ensuing car chase through the Sredna Gora mountains provided no more than conventional thrills. Only when Mark Frobisher’s Bentley overheated did things start to look up, with Lord Jasper declaring that it was about time Evangeline paid for all the trouble she’d caused before giving a single laugh of unspeakable malevolence.
    The train had been filling up as she read, with a typical assortment of complete strangers, Darcy, Mr Brown and Hovis Boy at King’s Lynn, the Grey Man and the Tramp at Downham Market, Miss Scarlett and the Devil at Ely. By then only a few free seats remained, and the Devil excused himself politely as his hip bumped against Laura’s. She murmured something in reply and shut her book, embarrassed by the thought of him reading it out of the corner of his eye while she enjoyed the horrid thrill of discovering what Lord Jasper planned for Evangeline.
    Instead, she let her thoughts drift, thinking of how much the Devil resembled Lord Jasper in her imagination, which presumably meant that she’d subconsciously connected the two. It was easy to go further with the idea. Darcy was the perfect model for Mark Frobisher, and Miss Scarlett perhaps not unlike the chaperone who might have been bribed to allow Evangeline to give her the slip. The only one remotely like the Bulgarian chief was Mr Brown, and he needed a darker complexion and rather more hair, including a large and bushy moustache, while he was really too dull to fit in with Laura’s fantasies in any case.
    She was still in a daydream when the train pulled in at Cambridge and as she walked to work, but was brought suddenly down to earth by the sight of Mr Henderson standing beside his company Mondeo in the car park at EAS. She ducked down to check her appearance in the wing mirror of a convenient 4x4, only to end up blushing as she realised it was occupied by an elderly woman with an expression of carefully cultivated disapproval. As she approached Mr Henderson she wished she’d spent a bit more time on her hair, gone for another suit, higher heels, a splash of colour somewhere and, most especially, the seamed stockings that always earned her one of his approving nods but cost the earth, were a pain to put on and seemed to ladder at a single glance. He clearly agreed.
    ‘Not quite the style I’d have expected today, Laura. Look smart, look smart, that’s my motto.’
    ‘Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.’
    ‘Well, we shall just have to do our best. This is an important contract, Laura, not just for the company, but for me personally. Land this one and there’s every chance I’ll be head of marketing this time next year. I need you to be one hundred and ten per cent behind me.’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    Laura got into the Mondeo, wondering how it would be possible to be one hundred and ten per cent behind anybody, unless it involved having a bit sticking out to one side or at the top, which in Mr Henderson’s case would have been impossible for her and most other people. She had at least got the relevant papers together, and began to go through them as he pulled out of the car park, heading east on the