Last Night's Scandal by Loretta Chase Page A

she said.
    “Since when?” he said, his too-keen gaze coming back to her. “I told you only a moment ago what’s happened.”
    “I’ve been thinking about the castle,” she said. That was absolutely true. It was better to stick as close to the truth as possible with Lisle. He was not only viciously logical and straightforward to a fault, but she thought he could read her mind a little. “I was trying to devise a plan to save you from it.”
    “You are not rescuing me,” he said. “You are not my knight in shining armor or whatever you think you are. I’m nearly four and twenty years old, and perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”
    “Please don’t turn all proud male on me,” she said. “If you would only listen, you’ll understand how practical my Idea is.”
    “Nine years ago you had the practical Idea of saving your mother from penury by running away to Bristol to dig up a pirate’s treasure in the Earl of Mandeville’s garden!”
    “Yes, and it was fun, wasn’t it?” she said. “It was an adventure. You have adventures all the time. I—” She waved one gloved hand in the air. “I break engagements and hit men with my umbrella.”
    He shot her a glance she couldn’t read. Then he nudged his horse into motion.
    H e needed distance.
    He didn’t want to be thinking about this, about the girl she used to be, who wanted to be a knight and undertake Noble Quests.
    She followed him. “Don’t close your mind,” she said. “You’re a scholar, and a scholar keeps an open mind.”
    “Not to insanity,” he said. “You can’t simply jaunt off to Scotland because you’re bored with breaking engagements and hitting men with your umbrella. I’m sorry you have to abide by silly rules for women, but I can’t change them. And even I know you can’t pop into a Page 31
    ABC Amber ePub Converter Trial vers ion, http://www.processtext.com/abcepub.html
    carriage and travel four hundred miles on your own without stirring up a terrific scandal.”
    “I always stir up scandal,” she said. “I’m known for it. Whatever I do or say at this dinner or that party makes the rounds of the ton the following morning. Olivia Carsington, Last Night’s Scandal, that’s me. I should have it engraved on my visiting cards.” He looked about him. The park was quiet this morning, activity in the surrounding streets sounding so faintly that one heard clearly the leaves rustling in the trees, the clip-clop of their horses’ hooves, and the call of a pair of birds, one to the other.
    He could hear his heart pounding, too. He was tempted, horribly tempted.
    But she always tempted him. She’d been doing it since she was twelve years old. If he hadn’t spent most of the last ten years in Egypt, she would have made a shambles of his life.
    “I should not have to tell you this,” he said. “But since you’ve lost your mind, I reckon I must: You may think of me as a brother but I’m not. You can’t travel with me unchaperoned.”
    “Of course I must be chaperoned,” she said. “But you can leave all the arrangements to me. All you have to do—”
    “I’m not doing anything,” he said. “Of all the harebrained schemes—” He broke off, shaking his head. “I can’t believe this. My father has cut off my money, I have nowhere to go and nothing to live on—and you want me to take you four hundred miles to a moldering old castle. In October, no less! Do you know what Scotland’s like in October?”
    “It’s dark and wet and cold and gloomy and terribly romantic,” she said.
    “I’m not going!” he said. “I can’t believe I’m even arguing with you about this.”
    “It’ll be fun,” she said. “An adventure.”
    An adventure. He had them all the time. But not with Olivia. Not in years.
    But this wasn’t the same Olivia. He’d been able to manage that one. To a point. But then he’d been a thirteen-year-old boy, oblivious when not actively hostile to females.
    “It’s my one and only,