England's Assassin by Samantha Saxon Read Free Book Online Page B

caustic, so jaded that one could not help but feel its bite, but she continued to feed.
    “And while I do appreciate the gesture, I can assure you that I have no need of rescuing, so allow me to do it for you.” She met his eye. “Go home, Monsieur Damont before you are arrested and hanged for espionage.”
    “I have been commissioned to deliver you a warning—“
    “Consider me warned.”
    “And,” Daniel spoke over her interruption. “Bring you home to London.”
    “I won’t go.”
    “Why?” he asked in an airy rush.
    She placed her fork down and smiled. “London is far too oppressive in autumn.”
    How could one possible argue with such a bizarre declaration? He could not, so he simple reiterated. “I will assist you until the assassination is complete and then we will revisit the subject of returning to England.”
    The woman ignored this pronouncement, saying only, “You may assist provided that you do exactly as I instruct.” She took a sip of wine, her authority absolute. “You must trust my judgment and remember that I have done this successful many times.”
    Daniel’s heart bumped in his chest but curiosity got the better of him.
    “How many times?”
    Mademoiselle Beauvoire looked up, intentionally holding his gaze so that she could watch him flinch when she said, “Nine.” 

Chapter Ten
     
    Daniel towered over the petite woman as she fumbled with a ring of keys just outside the apartment door. She was so small, so beautiful that he could not imagine her harming anything, much more killing nine men.
    Nine! 
    “You’re staring at me again,” she snapped in French, pushing the gilded door open before stepping inside the darkened apartment.
    “My apologies,” he whispered in English, following her in with his trunk biting into his right shoulder.
    He watched as she set her keys on a small marble table then lit a candelabrum that illuminated her face, emphasizing a profile that any artist would long to paint. She was study in contrasts, black eyebrows and crimson lips against a canvas of creamy white skin.
    Soft, feminine… deadly.
    “But I canna seem to help myself.”
    The woman ignored him and walked along the inlaid wooden entry and opened the first door to the right.
    “This is the dining room and the kitchen is through that door,” she said, clinging to her patrician French as she pointed down the corridor. “I never hire staff. So, if you are determined to stay, you will have to prepare your own meals.”
    “No problem.” Daniel grinned and picked up the gauntlet. “My mother insisted that we all know our way round a kitchen.”
    The woman stopped walking, her violet eyes wide with surprise. “The males as well?” Mademoiselle Beauvoire asked in English, giving ground.
    Daniel leaned forward as if he were confiding some great secret. “We’re all male.”
    “Seven boys?” She stared, remembering their previous conversation.
    Daniel nodded, amused.
    “Your poor mother.” She continued down the hall. “You must be Catholic.”
    Her pronouncement was said with that touch of superiority that every Protestant injected into observations of the Catholic faith. But at seven and twenty and a longtime resident of Protestant London, Daniel was impervious to insult.
    “Aye,” he said, deliberately thickening his brogue. “’Tis my favorite doctrine of the Holy Catholic Church.”
    He waited and curiosity eventually caused the woman to stop in her tracks.
    “What doctrine is that?” She turned to look up at him.
    “That a wife canna deny her husband his marital rights,” he teased, thinking it more likely that his mother had demanded hers.
    But rather than lightening the mood his jesting had pulled her eyes into angry slits.
    “Yet, another reason I am not Catholic.” She scoffed. “Nor Protestants, for that matter, as they are equally barbaric to their women.”
    Bloody Hell . Perhaps he could see her killing nine men after all.
    “We shall allocate this as your