Bound by the Earl by Alyson Chase

Author:Alyson Chase
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: 0
Published: 2018-03-14T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter Fourteen

A floorboard creaked, and Amanda called out, “Hullo? Is anybody there?”

It was the second time she’d asked, and like before only silence greeted her. Standing from the small desk in her bedchamber, she picked up her candle and crept to her door. She stretched her hand to the latch, pulse pounding, and jerked it back.

She was being silly. Houses settled. Boards creaked. It didn’t mean there was anyone lurking outside her door, peering through the keyhole, ready to burst in on her with a knife in his hand and murder in his eyes.

She twisted the lock in the door and stumbled back. Her imagination was running wild. But with the wind howling outside, rain pounding against her window, and Julius gone out, it was a night for dark inventions. The friendly blaze in her hearth wasn’t enough to dispel the gloom.

Reggie snored on her bed, apparently unconcerned of the potential for nighttime intruders. Amanda returned to her desk, ignoring the shadows thrown into the corners from her flickering candle. She was used to the dark. The dark was her friend.

Another squeak, and her shoulder blades slammed together. Just the house settling.

There was a loud thud, and the door rattled in its frame. A curse followed.

Leaving the candle on the desk, she flew to the door and unlocked it, pulling it open. Julius stood in front of her, rubbing his nose. He pushed past her, frowning.

“Why the devil is your door locked? Is someone here?” He paced to each corner, looking behind chairs and curtains.

Amanda scowled. “Who would be here? Mr. Carter?” She shouldn’t blame Julius for being suspicious. Since they’d started their affair, she’d never locked her door. “How long were you lurking out there? The creaking floors … concerned me.”

“I just arrived home.” He flopped into her armchair and stretched his legs out to the fire. His silk waistcoat pulled tight across his chest. “It was probably just one of Marcus’s many servants, creeping about. We should go to my house. We’d have more privacy.”

“And Lady Mary? She’s to join us in such an improper situation?” Amanda wrapped her arms around her body. “We are already skirting the appearance of respectability by you being placed here as my and Lady Mary’s protector. A move to your house would lose even that vestige.”

“Blast.” He scrubbed a hand across his jaw. “Just as well. Marcus would have my hide if I secreted you away. Although he won’t be too pleased with the situation here, either.”

Amanda stood next to him, her night rail brushing against his thigh. Her fingers itched to tuck the errant lock of hair out of his eyes and smooth the wrinkles from his brow. But something about such an intimate gesture made her shy. She’d opened her body to him. She was being silly. Still, she couldn’t make her hand stretch forward. A world of meaning would be in that simple caress. It would tell Julius more than she wanted him to know.

“I won’t tell Liz about us, not if it will endanger your friendship with Marcus.

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