Linda Needham by My Wicked Earl Read Free Book Online Page A

being as happily married as I am. I’ll scream the house down if you try.”
    “I assure you, madam, that I don’t take women against their will.”
    “As if I’m going to trust you.” But in the back of her traitorous mind, Hollie knew without a doubt that the beast wouldn’t need to force anywoman into his bed. They probably went there gladly, great hordes of them, standing in line to…well, to do whatever it was exactly that men and women did in bed together. She knew only which part went where and why and that by all accounts it was best done without clothing.
    And just now she was having no trouble at all imagining Everingham’s hands sliding across her bare skin. Starting with her ankles, rucking up her hem, ever upward—to the back of her knee, her thigh—
    “Give me your hand, madam.”
    “What?” Her heart took off with her pulse.
    “Your hands.” The firelight played across the planes of his face, down the broadness of his chest and the flatness of his stomach, caught the firm, bronze shadings of his hand outstretched to her.
    Wondrous hands.
    “Why?” she asked, her throat dry.
    “Do you mean to sleep in these, madam?”
    “Sleep? Oh.” A sultry band of fire burned around her wrist when he took her hand in his, and a zip of pure lightning raced up her arm, out of place and staggering.
    Then she realized her shackles were gone, just like that. Her heart hammered in gratitude that she damned well shouldn’t be feeling.
    “I’d say thank you, my lord, but we both know I wouldn’t mean it at all.” Shouldn’t, because he was the enemy.
    That made him frown as he bent over her wrist. “What the devil is this?”
    He ran his very capable fingers along the underside of her wrist and up her forearm, lighting more of his exquisite little fires as he went. Pleasure and promise, an astonishing trail of blue sparks and dizzying lightning that would make any blushing young bride forget that she was married, happily or otherwise.
    She found breath enough to say, “The price of your justice, my lord.”
    “Bloody hell,” he growled, then turned to the fire and examined her wrists in more detail, cursing under his breath. Then he glared down at her, more angry than she’d ever seen him. “You’ve brought this on yourself, madam.”
    “ I have, my lord?” She yanked her hand out of his, though his warmth still wrapped her fingers like a glove. “You’re blaming me for your highhanded mistake? You had no right to break into my home and bring me here and certainly no right to hold me.”
    “I have the right of law, madam, as magistrate of the county. And as far as legalities are concerned, since habeas corpus has been suspended—”
    “Conveniently suspended—”
    “I have not only the right to arrest you for no reason at all in these times of trouble, but I can also hold you for protecting an enemy of the king’s peace. In fact, I have the obligation to do so until—”
    “Until Lord Liverpool has crushed every breath of liberty out of innocent people who—”
    “Until I damn well see fit to give you liberty, madam, when I’m satisfied.”
    Hollie caught her unrepentant tongue between her teeth. A short hour ago, she’d been nearly doomed to a trial and prison for sedition; then Everingham had handed her this miracle of a husband.
    If she could keep her opinions to herself long enough to allay Everingham’s suspicion, then she could fly back to her shop and pack it and cart it away to a place where she could continue her campaign in safety.
    A half-day’s head start was all she would need.
    Oh, Papa, look what I’ve gotten myself into! A price on her head. A phantom husband. And now an earl breathing down her neck.
    Which wasn’t actually the case; he was standing at the foot of his magnificent bed in his linen shirt and waistcoat, bronzed and breathlessly handsome.
    She closed her eyes to keep her focus. “I’m sorry, my lord. It’s been a long day.”
    “Interminable, madam.