Luck Be a Lady by Meredith Duran Read Free Book Online

furtive than hers. So far, she had managed to keep out of his sight, her hood disguising her from his backward glances. But it alarmed her that he seemed to know where he was going. Peter was a man of fine tastes and lofty ambitions. Whom could he be meeting here?
    Peter drew up at an undistinguished row house, whose brick face had been handsome once, but now sported several broken windows. The front door swung open. An unseen hand admitted him, then closed the door.
    Catherine came to a stop. Somebody had been expecting him. Watching for him—here, of all places!
    She grew conscious of the curious looks of two girls strolling by, arm in arm—factory girls, she judged by their leather-stained hands. To her right, a rutted alleyprovided a place of relative concealment. She slipped into it and pressed herself against a damp wall. Her cloak was plain enough, for she had dressed today with the aim of receiving a cargo shipment. But it sported no patches, no rips or stains, and that alone made her stand out in this neighborhood.
    Hurry, Peter. She had no wish to be in White­chapel when twilight fell. Lilah had spoken highly of her uncle’s ability to impose law and order—but she had warned Catherine just as volubly about the dangers of prowling here as an outsider.
    She sighed, drawing her cloak tighter. She might as well admit it to herself—she missed Lilah. She could not begrudge her a honeymoon, particularly since Lilah had never traveled outside England before. But now, of all times, she could use a friend. And she had only the one, really, if one did not count Mr. Batten. Everleigh’s had always kept her too busy to socialize, and even when she had tried, she had little in common with other women of her rank. She had no interest in discussing the latest gossip or fashions, and no time to read novels. Nobody seemed much interested in her thoughts on the art market, or how to tell an old master from a very convincing fraud . . .
    Well, she was proud of the business she’d helped to build. Her work gave her purpose; it challenged and sustained her. But . . . it did make for a lonely routine. As a child, she’d longed desperately for a true friend. And secretly, in some corner of her soul, she’d never stopped wishing for that.
    An icy drop of rain hit her nose. Alarmed, she looked up into the clouded sky.
    â€œHiding from somebody?”
    She jumped. Around the corner stepped a familiar figure. Astonishment briefly caught her tongue.
    She was not good with faces, but it would take a blind woman to forget Lilah’s uncle. He was nature’s cruel trick on the fairer sex, the perfect picture of dark, charming, masculine wickedness. Shining black hair, high cheekbones, lips as full as a woman’s . . . That was surely a flaw. But then, he had that brutal jaw and chin to make up for it . . . and the slight bump to his high-bridged nose, suggestive of some violent fracture in his past.
    â€œMr. O’Shea.” She spoke very stiffly, for she had never liked his effect on her. She herself was counted beautiful, and she had seen what power she could wield when she cared to try. She refused to fall prey to a similar spell.
    But what a miserable coincidence to meet him here!
    He propped his shoulder on the brick wall and looked her over. “Dressed for prowling, I see. Did you steal that cloak from one of your maids?”
    She took a strangling hold on her collar. “It is mine, in fact. But I thank you for the insult.”
    His black brows arched. “Don’t think much of your maids, do you?”
    She opened her mouth, then thought better of it, and settled instead on a scowl. She had only met him twice, and both times he had looked at her in this smug, infuriating way, as though she were a joke designed for his private amusement. He made her feel . . . judged and ridiculed, found wanting as a woman.
    As though he were in