Loving Julia by Karen Robards Read Free Book Online

bidding. “It be rainin’ outside, in case ya ain’t stuck yer nose out all day. Anybody’d be wet if they’d stood out in it, includin’ your bleedin’ lordship.”
    “How colorfully you express yourself,” the earl murmured, and Jewel had to squash an urge to hurl the vase right at that too beautiful face.
    Then the footman came back carrying a towel and a blanket, and at the earl’s nod offered them to Jewel. Figuring it was now safe to put down the vase, she did so, and accepted the articles with poor grace. The earl was already walking away from her down a hall that led toward the back of the house. She trailed him until he stopped outside a closed door, while the expressionless footman followed her.
    “Kindly wrap the towel around your hair and the blanket around your body, if you please. I object to having puddles of water formed in my office.”
    That cool, disinterested voice aroused the most violent emotions in Jewel’s breast. She wanted to do something outrageous, to shriek and claw and scream. But she didn’t. Something about the elegant, upright carriage, the lean, powerful body in its immaculate black evening clothes, the icy blue eyes and perfectly carved features discouraged her.
    “At once, if you please.”
    Jewel glared at him. He looked back at her out of eyes as blue as the sky on a cloudless summer day. His hair, a silvery gold that most women would have killed for, gleamed angelically in the candlelight. His brow was high and broad beneath the shining crown of hair; his nose was straight and elegant, his mouth finely chiseled with the lower lip slightly fuller than the upper. His cheekbones were high, his jaw square, and his skin tone was a fair golden bronze. Without a doubt, he was the most handsome man Jewel had ever seen in her life. Far too handsome to inspire fear—and yet there was something about his stance, about the expression in those celestial eyes, that discouraged her from arguing further. In a sort of compromise with the urgings of her more belligerent side, Jewel sniffed expressively before wrapping the blanket around her body. Its warmth was comforting, although she knew her comfort had been the last thing on his mind.
    “George will take your, er, hat.”
    Jewel looked up sharply, glaring at him again. But discretion triumphed, and she removed the sodden hat and handed it to the footman who, in response to a dismissive signal from the earl, bore it away.
    With as much dignity as she could muster, she wrapped the towel around her head like a turban and walked through the door the earl held for her into a book-lined study. A fire had been lit in the hearth, and a lamp glowed on a massive wood desk. A wine-colored leather chair had been pulled up behind the desk, and a matching chair faced it. Against the far wall rested a wine and gold striped velvet settee. Mounted firearms decorated the walls, and over the fireplace was a huge painting depicting a hunting scene in greens and golds and scarlets.
    All this Jewel saw in the instant before she sat in the chair facing the desk. And it dazzled her into momentary speechlessness. So much care and warmth and comfort for one man. It was almost a crime.
    “Now, please state your business.”
    Jewel found herself uncharacteristically at a loss for words. She fumbled in the beaded reticule at her wrist and produced her marriage lines, which she handed to him. He accepted the document as silently as she passed it over. Only the faintest wrinkling of his brow betrayed his feelings as he scanned the few lines that made her legally Mrs. Timothy Stratham. Then he looked up, his blue eyes colder than ever as they ran over her as if he were just now seeing her for the first time.
    “If you will forgive me for saying so, you’re remarkably poorly dressed for an adventuress.”
    Jewel blinked. Whatever reaction she had been expecting, it was not this. “Wot?”
    “My God, you even butcher the Queen’s English. And you are trying to