Read Loretta Chase - The Devil's Delilah for Free Online Page A

title and author were unknown to him. He drew it out, selected a capacious leather chair, and settled himself to read.
    What he found within the covers was not exactly what he'd expected, but after an initial gasp of surprise and a few moments of confusion, he became entirely deaf, dumb, and blind to all else but what he found in those pages.
    Utterly absorbed, Mr. Langdon continued reading as late morning warmed into early afternoon and luncheon passed unnoticed. The household being familiar with his ways, a modest array of sustenance was brought to him on a tray. It remained untouched and was later carried away by the same servant, who smiled indulgently as he closed the library doors behind him.
    The servant speedily erased his smile a moment later when he met up in the hall with his mistress and Miss Desmond.
    Lady Streetham frowned at the tray and then, more deeply, at the servant. "This will not do," she said. "You will bring him another, Nicholas, and this time be sure he is eating before you leave the room."
    "I am sure I have told them a hundred times not to leave it to him," said Lady Streetham after the servant had bowed himself away. "One would think after all these years they would learn, but they do not. Of course that tiresome boy will neglect his tea as well, and what good dinner will do him I cannot think, when he only daydreams at the epergne."
    Miss Desmond suppressed her own smile. "I hope Mr. Langdon is not ill," she said.
    "It is a miracle if he is not. He is always engrossed in one book or another, to the exclusion of all else — friends, family, even his own health. I do what I can, because he is very like a son to me, but one cannot watch him every minute."
    Especially not, Delilah added inwardly, when one is maintaining unwinking guard over one's actual offspring. She had no opportunity to make the obligatory sympathetic response because the butler now approached to inform the countess that Lady Gathers and her daughter had arrived.
    "So soon?" said Lady Streetham. "But Tony is not yet retur — Well, no matter." She turned to her guest with an expression of cold resignation. "Miss Desmond, if you are not too fatigued, perhaps you would enjoy meeting my neighbours."
    "I should like nothing better," Delilah answered.
    Her hostess's features grew more rigid.
    "Unfortunately," Miss Desmond went on, "I find myself unusually susceptible to the heat and am sure to make but poor company as a result. Would you think it unconscionably rude, My Lady, if I excused myself?"
    "Not at all," said the countess with a shade of eagerness in her customary chilly tones. "Quite oppressive, the heat. Perhaps you will want a long nap before tea?"
    "Actually, I had thought I would sit quietly in your cool library with a book. If Mr. Langdon is still there, I will certainly urge him to cease insulting your excellent chef."
    Lady Streetham's frigid countenance thawed ever so slightly. "Very well," she said, and took herself away.
    "Yes, it is very well, you stuck-up old battle-axe," said Delilah under her breath. "Far better than having to introduce Devil Desmond's daughter to your exalted friends." Not, Delilah told herself as she moved down the long hall towards the library, that she wanted to meet them. Lady Gathers was doubtless another battle-axe and her daughter a demurely proper nincompoop. The entire conversation would be devoted to tearing their friends' reputations to shreds.
    All the same, it was rather hard to be treated like a leper, for heaven's sake, when one's blood was every bit as blue as theirs. Bluer. In Charles II's time, the Melgraves had been mere jumped-up squires, while her papa's family had been Norman barons long before the Conqueror was an illicit gleam in his father's eye.
    Caught up in her angry reflections, Delilah neglected to knock. As soon as she entered she perceived that knocking would have been futile anyhow. Mr. Langdon did not even look up when she flounced into the room.
    He ought to