A Notorious Countess Confesses (PG7) by Julie Anne Long Read Free Book Online Page B

to distraction and hungry for the sound of your laughter, and I am unfashionable enough not to cut you should you deign to return to London. Unless you forbid it, I will visit you in Sussex—you! In the country! How quaint!—a fortnight hence. Send me a letter to tell me I’m welcome. I still enjoy lamb and all of the other things we’ve discussed at length in our acquaintance. I harbor the fondest hope you’ll make me the happiest man alive and indulge me in them one day.
    Yrs,
    Frederick,
    Lord Lisle
    Lisle
    It was so alive, his letter, so very Frederick, in all his elegant, wry, self-important glory. Something flickered in her, possibly hope or familiarity. Or perhaps it was simply hunger—oughtn’t Henny ring for supper soon? It was undeniably pleasant to know she was wanted and remembered. By a staggeringly wealthy viscount, who was invited to dine with the King, no less.
    Take that, Reverend Sylvaine.
    Although the impenetrable Reverend Sylvaine, he of the blue eyes and towering cheekbones, would likely be unimpressed, as he seemed impervious to everything else: insults, flirtation, her very best unblinking gaze. And then she recalled again the casual gift of the cravat and felt another wash of shame at her gracelessness. Not her finest hour. If only she could undo it.
    If only she could undo him.
    Because something about the man—the stillness, his calm confidence, the see-through-her blue beam of his gaze?—made her itch to unravel his control. Though to what purpose, she didn’t know. To prove that she could? To prove she could gain the upper hand over someone who was better, as Henny had put it, and who had so effortlessly, through doing almost nothing at all, reduced her to breathlessness today? More likely it was to see why he was wrapped so very tightly. Because once she uncovered that secret, undoubtedly he’d lose the power to unnerve her, the way a revealed magician’s trick lost the power to awe. She couldn’t recall a man ever scrambling her wits with just a few words.
    She’d vowed long ago to never allow herself to be at the mercy of a man. She had made certain she was in control of whom she chose and whom she left, that the choices were all hers to make.
    For look how surrendering to a man had turned out for Mama.
    She absently rubbed the foolscap of Frederick’s letter between two fingers. Perhaps she should write to Frederick and tell him that she had sworn off men, that no man on the face of the earth could every again possibly inspire desire in her. That she’d decided she’d never again be a commodity for men.
    Knowing Frederick, he’d consider it an aphrodisiac and come running straightaway.
    At least then she wouldn’t be alone.
    She placed his letter carefully aside. She would perhaps write to him later. But her thoughts shied away from London; her memories of it were edged all around with razors, now. They had all turned on her so thoroughly, so relentlessly, and with such vicious glee, all while she struggled with loss.
    The silence of the place enclosed her again. She tapped the feathered end of her quill pen against her chin and gazed out the window. The view offered nothing to distract her, just more of those rolling Sussex hills and small, bushy, green trees, which likely meant everything to a boy like Paulie, for instance, who would grow up knowing all of them by heart.
    And it was this she wanted, she realized suddenly. An opportunity to create her own history. To begin again. To decide what she wanted rather than allowing the needs of survival to dictate her life. But damned if she would be bored in the process.
    She refused to languish here, like the Queen of Scots in exile (things certainly hadn’t ended well for her, regardless). Enough wobbling about directionless, like a spun top. There was no undoing what was done: The people of Pennyroyal Green seemed to know about her. Or at least some of them knew something about her, which meant that in all likelihood all of