Countess of Scandal by Laurel McKee Read Free Book Online Page B

gone, a minor skirmish in a bigger war.
    Will tugged his cap down over his bright hair and gave her a jaunty salute. "We will meet again soon, my lady, I promise. Try not to miss me too desperately."
    Despite herself, Eliza wanted to laugh as he ran off, disappearing into the shadows. Perhaps, deep down inside, there was a spark of her old Will. The one who always made her laugh, teased her out of her seriousness. The one who made the dark world brighter. And she feared it was that spark that could be her undoing.
    She shut the window, locking it securely and pulling the curtains tightly against the growing light Then she turned back to her silent room, her gaze alighting on the secret drawer of her dressing table. The one where the United Irish badge hid, its green ribbons glowing.
    "I am new-strung," she whispered, "and shall be heard."
    That was when she realized the papers on her desk were gone.
    Will made his stealthy way through the deserted Dublin streets. It was eerily silent; even the hardiest of merrymakers had gone home, leaving the elegant lanes empty. The sharp whistle of cold winter wind was the only sound. That, and the sound of his own blood in his ears.
    He felt tautly alert, as just before a battle, that moment when every sense was heightened, the very air crystalline and sharp around him. The instant when the world grew still—just before it exploded.
    It was a battle about to be joined by a formidable foe, indeed—Eliza Blacknall.
    Will shook his head, kicking out at a broken bottle with his scuffed boot. He wasn't entirely sure what he had expected when he broke into her bedchamber, climbing up the ivy to slither in the window and hide under her very bed. Such poor security for the house of a rumored United Irish partisan.
    Perhaps he thought that once they were alone he could finally make her listen to reason. To his warnings. Make her see the danger and folly of the path she had chosen. But he proved to be the fool, for once he was near Eliza, he forgot all but her. His Eliza—the girl who had taught him the ecstasy and pain of love.
    Was he now in danger of remembering those old lessons all over again? He feared he was. The old clumsy, youthful, wild passion between them was still there, sharpened and honed by the years and ready to catch fire again.
    Yet, he had to face a conflagration of a far different sort now—the fires of rebellion and war. They threatened to consume Ireland, the country he loved, and Eliza with it. Worse, it seemed she fed those flames herself.
    If he did not stop her, he would lose her again—forever this time. He would not let that happen. Even if he had to fight her every step of the way.
    He had come to the embankment along the Liffey, and he stopped to stare down into the night-black waters. They looked thick and inky, lit only by the reflected gleam of a few faded stars. Boats were moored there, more than usual at that time of year, waiting to carry the frightened populace to safety in England.
    If only he could just kidnap Eliza and toss her in the hold of one of those vessels! Send her to safety whether she would have it or not But he knew that would never work. She would swim all the way back across the Irish Sea if she had to.
    Thus, he needed a new strategy. A new battle plan.
    He took the paper from his coat pocket, the scrap he had snatched off Eliza's desk while her back was turned. It seemed to be a scribble, but for a mere scribble it was dangerous, indeed—a page labeled for the Northern Star, the United Irish newspaper printed secretly somewhere in Belfast and passed around the country.
    ... call for an equal and just distribution of the benefits of our country, this particular article said. An equal and full representation of all Ireland's people and an end to absentee landlords who care nothing for our traditions and our populacd It was accompanied by a pencil cartoon of a fat landlord grinding tenants under his boot
    And the article was signed By A