The Gilded Web by Mary Balogh Read Free Book Online Page B

known—ridiculous innocence—if it was proper to give her hand to the Earl of Amberley. She had not known if he was taking an unpardonable liberty by kissing that hand. Nothing like it had ever happened to her before. Yet she was one-and-twenty!
    Certainly she had felt unusually flustered when his lips had touched her hand. The gesture had seemed alarmingly intimate. She had felt sensation sizzle along the full length of her arm. And she had despised herself for allowing such a little thing so to discompose her. If it
were
a little thing! She did not know.
    The front door opened to the right of her window, and the subject of her thoughts emerged. Alexandra stepped back as a groom led forward a magnificent black stallion. She would not wish to be caught looking out if he should happen to glance up. But he did not do so. He mounted the horse, handed a coin to the groom, and turned the horse’s head in the direction of the gates.
    Alexandra could not remember seeing the Earl of Amberley before that morning, though she had been in London for a whole month. She hoped that she would never see him again. And she hoped that Lord Eden would not be sent to make his apologies. She really wanted the whole nightmare of the night before to be forgotten. She wanted life to be back to normal. His grace was to accompany them to the theater that evening and to attend Lady Sharp’s soiree the following evening.
    The door behind her opened and closed, and Alexandra straightened her shoulders and turned reluctantly to face her father. He was looking grim and tight-lipped, she saw with a sinking heart. His eyes were cold.
    â€œSo, Alexandra,” he said, “you have seen fit to refuse the offer of respectability the Earl of Amberley was willing to make?”
    â€œI refused his offer, yes, Papa,” she said in some surprise. “It was quite unnecessary for him to make it. And besides, I am to be betrothed to his grace during the autumn.”
    â€œPerhaps his grace will not be eager to ally himself to a slut,” Lord Beckworth said. “And am I to have you on my hands for the rest of my life?”
    â€œA slut?” Alexandra’s eyes were wide with disbelief.
    â€œWhat do you call yourself?” her father asked, striding toward her. “You were brought to London at considerable expense and trouble to me in order to make your appearance in society. You were to be made a more accomplished bride for the duke. Last night you were sent to a ball with both your mother and your brother to ensure your respectability. Yet you hoodwinked your mother by sending your aunt and your cousin to tell her you were leaving with them just so that you would be free to slip outdoors unchaperoned. Who was he, Alexandra? I mean to have the truth.”
    â€œI did not send Aunt Deirdre, Papa,” she said, bewildered. “And who is who? I do not understand.”
    â€œYou have had all the benefits of a good and virtuous home,” the baron said harshly, “but it has had little effect on your wicked heart, Alexandra. I want the name of the lover you were to have a secret tryst with.”
    Alexandra gaped at him. “I went outside to be alone for a few minutes,” she said. “I find the crowds at social gatherings overwhelming, Papa, and sometimes long for the quietness of home. I did not intend to be gone for longer than a few minutes. And I did not plan to meet anyone. I did not know about the misapprehension Mama was under. I did wrong. I know that, and I beg your pardon, Papa, as I have already begged Mama’s. You have taught me better than to wander about alone and unchaperoned. I have been justly punished.”
    â€œI left off thrashing you when you were sixteen,” Lord Beckworth said. “God is my witness that I did my Christian duty in trying to instill the principles of virtue in you. Perhaps I should have continued with the thrashings even after you left the schoolroom.