Some Like It Wicked (Mills & Boon Historical) (Daring Duchesses - Book 1) by Mortimer Carole

Author:Mortimer, Carole [Mortimer, Carole]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781408943915
Publisher: Mills & Boon
Published: 2012-12-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

‘It is not that I am ungrateful, Rupert—’

‘No?’

‘Of course I’m not.’

‘You don’t sound grateful, Pandora.’

‘It is only—I wish you might at least have allowed me the time to dress before carrying me from my home. Or for Henley to pack a bag so that I might dress once I arrived here.’

‘It is time for bed, Pandora, a time for undressing, not dressing. Nor,’ Rupert continued hardily, ‘am I in any mood to deal with that ninnyhead of a maid tonight.’

‘She means well.’

‘I am sure that Attila the Hun believed himself to be in the right of it, too!’

‘Now you are being unkind—’

‘A trait for which Stratton is known far and wide, I do assure you,’ a third voice cut in with scathing hauteur, bringing an abrupt end to the conversation that had been taking place between Pandora and Rupert since he had carried her out of her home and deposited her in his carriage some minutes earlier, before instructing his driver to depart for Stratton House. ‘Good God, how dare you bring one of your whores into my home, Devil?’ The woman’s voice now rose accusingly.

‘I believe you will find that it is my home, madam, and I advise you not to forget it,’ Rupert bit out coldly as he turned with Pandora still held firmly in his arms. ‘Nor will I tolerate your behaviour in calling the lady in my arms by such a foul name!’

‘I will do exactly as I— Is that—can that possibly be the Maybury woman?’ Patricia demanded in obvious disbelief.

Pandora had stilled in Rupert’s arms the moment the other woman first spoke, relieved anew at having his evening cloak wrapped about her own scorched robes. She looked up warily at him now. She could clearly feel the leashed tension in his body as, having once again scooped her up into his arms once they left the carriage, he now held her imprisoned against his muscled chest.

A shiver run down the length of her spine as she found herself unable to look away from Rupert’s furious face; his eyes had turned a hard, icy grey as he scowled at his stepmother, cheekbones sharp as blades against the tautness of his flesh, his mouth a thin uncompromising line, the squareness of his jaw rigidly clenched.

He and Pandora might have disagreed all the way here from Highbury House, concerning Pandora’s reluctance to go to Stratton House with him, but never once during that time had Rupert looked at her with the intense and deliberate dislike with which he now so obviously viewed Patricia Stirling.

A woman whose existence Pandora had completely forgotten about until now, as well as the fact that she was already in residence in Rupert’s home!

‘It is indeed Pandora Maybury, the Duchess of Wyndwood,’ he rasped. ‘The lady whom I hope will very soon consent to become my own Duchess of Stratton.’

‘I believe you will find that I am the Duchess of Stratton!’

‘Not for much longer,’ Rupert said with grim satisfaction.

The outraged screech that split

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