Read Devil's Bride for Free Online Page A

find Tolly—and Honoria Prudence. Fate had all but waved a red flag; no one had ever suggested he was slow to see the light. Seizing opportunity was how he’d made his name—he’d already decided to seize Honoria Prudence.
    She would do very well as his wife.
    For a start, she was tall, with a well-rounded figure, neither svelte nor fleshy but very definitely feminine. Hair of chesnut brown glowed richly, tendrils escaping from the knot on the top of her head. Her face, heart-shaped, was particularly arresting, fine-boned and classical, with a small straight nose, delicately arched brown brows, and a wide forehead. Her lips were full, a soft blush pink; her eyes, her finest feature, large, wide-set and long-lashed, were a misty grey. He’d told true about her chin—it was the only feature that reminded him of her grandsire, not in shape but in the determination it managed to convey.
    Physically, she was a particularly engaging proposition—she’d certainly engaged his notoriously fickle interest.
    Equally important, she was uncommonly level-headed, not given to flaps or starts. That had been clear from the first, when she’d stood straight and tall, uncowering beneath the weight of the epithets he’d so freely heaped on her head. Then she’d favored him with a look his mother could not have bettered and directed him to the matter at hand.
    He’d been impressed by her courage. Instead of indulging in a fit of hysterics—surely prescribed practice for a gentlewoman finding a man bleeding to death in her path?—she’d been resourceful and practical. Her struggle to subdue her fear of the storm hadn’t escaped him. He’d done what he could to distract her; her instantaneous response to his commands—he’d almost seen her hackles rising—had made distracting her easy enough. Taking his shirt off hadn’t hurt, either.
    His lips twitched; ruthlessly he straightened them. That, of course, was yet another good reason he should follow fate’s advice.
    For the past seventeen years, despite all the distractions the ton ’s ladies had lined up to provide, his baser instincts had remained subject to his will, entirely and absolutely. Honoria Prudence, however, seemed to have established a direct link to that part of his mind which, as was the case with any male Cynster, was constantly on the lookout for likely prospects. It was the hunter in him; the activity did not usually distract him from whatever else he had in hand. Only when he was ready to attend to such matters, did he permit that side of his nature to show.
    Today, he had stumbled—more than once—over his lustful appetites.
    His question over underdrawers was one example, and while taking off his shirt had certainly distracted her, that fact, in turn, had also distracted him. He could feel her gaze—another sensitivity he hadn’t been prey to for a very long time. At thirty-two, he’d thought himself immune, hardened, too experienced to fall victim to his own desires.
    Hopefully, once he’d had Honoria Prudence a few times—perhaps a few dozen times—the affliction would pass. The fact that she was Magnus Anstruther-Wetherby’s granddaughter, rebellious granddaughter at that, would be the icing on his wedding cake. Devil savored the thought.
    He hadn’t, of course, told her his name. If he had, she wouldn’t have fallen asleep, restlessly or otherwise. He’d realized almost immediately that she didn’t know who he was. There was no reason she should recognize him . She would, however, recognize his name.
    Her peculiar profession would make keeping up with ton gossip imperative; he had not a doubt that, had he favored her with his name, she would have made the connection and reacted accordingly. Which would have been trying for them both.
    Convincing her that she had no reason to fret would have taken a great deal of effort, which he did