The Viscount and the Virgin. Annie Burrows
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Название: The Viscount and the Virgin
Автор: Annie Burrows
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Короткие любовные романы
Серия: Mills & Boon M&B
isbn: 9781408906194
isbn:
Monty grinned sheepishly. ‘I know. It is just that recently, I have begun to feel…’ he shivered ‘…hunted. You have no idea the lengths some females will go to in order to hook a viscount on their line. The most mousy, unkempt of creatures fling themselves in my path…’
Rick looked very pointedly at Monty’s silk knee breeches, then at the rings that sparkled from almost every finger. ‘If you will dress so extravagantly, what can you expect?’
‘Oh—’ his expression soured ‘—for people to show their true colours, of course.’
Monty had still been seething from the interview he had endured with his father, when he had first arrived in town. He had spent months trying to prove that he was well able to take up his position as his father’s heir. But nothing he did or said had made any difference. Nor would his father listen to a word of criticism against the steward, who was bleeding the tenants dry to line his own pockets. So far as he could see, it would take only one more bad harvest to have the lot of them rising up in protest at their lot.
‘You have spent too long abroad.’ The earl had sneered when he had voiced his concerns. ‘This is England, not revolutionary France. Your brother knew these people, and he never noticed anything amiss.’
His older brother had been cut from the same cloth as his father, though, that was the trouble. Piers had been indulged and pampered from the day of his birth. He felt the whole world existed only to provide his pleasures, so saw nothing wrong with letting his tenants endure hardship, so long as the rents that funded his luxurious lifestyle came in on time.
‘You would do better to go up to town to get yourself a wife. It is heirs I need from you, not interference in the management of my estates!’
He had never felt so worthless in his life.
And it might have been perverse of him, but his reception in town had made him feel ten times worse. People knew he had a title and wealth, and that was all they cared about. Dandies aped every ridiculous kick of fashion he instigated. The more jewellery he wore, the more the women’s eyes lit up. The more obnoxiously he behaved, the more they fawned round him, until it was hard to know who he despised more: them or himself. It was only with an effort that he managed to shake off the feelings of disgust with himself—and the world in general—and say to Rick, ‘Will you dine with me before coming on to Lady Carteret’s rout? A tedious affair, but for several reasons, I am obliged to go. Once I have shown my face, we can go on to Limmer’s.’
‘Why not?’ Rick replied, draining his glass and setting it down on the table. ‘I have no other engagements tonight. And I have heard you keep an excellent cook.’
‘It is one of the few benefits of civilian life,’ agreed Monty, ‘that I can now have as much to eat as I want, as often as I want.’
‘Then let us get started, Monty,’ said Rick. ‘Or am I being presumptuous? Do I need to My Lord you these days?’
Monty shuddered eloquently. ‘You cannot believe how glad I am to have somebody in town who knows me as Monty. Whenever anybody calls me by my title, I get the urge to turn round to see if my brother has walked into the room. And I find myself going to greater and greater lengths to demonstrate that I am nothing like the former Viscount Mildenhall.’
‘So that explains why you are playing the dandy these days.’ Rick grinned, eyeing his friend’s brocaded waistcoat. ‘Can’t tell you how relieved I am. Was beginning to think I didn’t know you any more!’
‘Sometimes, lately,’ he admitted, thinking of how very tempted he had been by that chit who had thrown her drink over him, ‘I hardly know myself.’
If it had been on just that one occasion, he could have put it down to a momentary aberration. But since that night, he always knew when she was at any function he attended. The nape of his neck would prickle, and he would turn and find those knowing eyes fixed on him, and instead of feeling the contempt for her that her behaviour deserved, he would want to stalk across the room, free all that luxuriant hair from the pins that were scarcely restraining it, yank her into his arms and yield to the temptation of those seductively parted lips. He was beginning to think she, or some woman like her, could offer him a temporary respite from his torment. If he could just bury himself in that tempting little morsel for an hour or two…But then what?
By making such a girl his mistress, he would only prove his father right. Only a worthless rogue would ruin a girl from his own class.
Even if she was asking for it.
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