Free The Savage Miss Saxon by Kasey Michaels

they find I am come of age and not bound to obey any man!
    While Alexandra had been thinking her private thoughts, the Earl had been telling Sir Alexander that, since the weather had cleared so nicely after the gloom of the morning, he had had the happy notion of taking Alexandra out for a ride in his curricle. Knowing her absence from the Hall for a few hours would make any search for gin bottles that much easier, Sir Alexander hastily gave his blessing to the outing, and before she knew how it had happened, Alexandra found herself changed into her driving outfit and up alongside Linton as he tooled his matched pair of greys down the hill outside Saxon Hall.
    “Congratulations,” he said by way of opening the conversation. “I could not help but notice that the drawbridge now operates with nary a squeak.”
    Alexandra only shrugged.
    “The whole castle, as a matter of fact, already reflects your good housekeeping,” he pressed her, refusing to succumb to her bad mood.
    “It was no great feat, I assure you,” was all she answered.
    This was not going well, Lord Linton told himself. Pinning on his most winning smile, he said, “The boys all send their best. They have been champing at the bit to come pay you a visit—or should I say, pay friend Harold a visit. I believe they mentioned something about viewing what they sincerely hope is his extensive collection of scalps.”
    Alexandra could not hide her smile. “They seemed to be nice boys.”
    Nicholas gave a bark of laughter. “Nice, is it? They’re all next door to yahoos, that’s what they are. Cuffy, that Master Jackanapes, was born to be hanged, while friend Billy has an attic that positively crawls with maggots. Jeremy, my dear brother, like Billy is not remarkable for his quick wit, but he is at heart a good boy. I guess all three of them are, but sometimes their antics tend to make me question that fact. I’m happy, though, to hear you don’t bear them any ill will. After all, it was their prank that landed you in this muddle.”
    “It’s not them I blame for this ‘muddle,’ ” she told him now. “It was you who made such a fuss and then dragged me off to tell my grandfather the whole. I still say the whole thing could have been neatly brushed under the rug with none the wiser.”
    “Then obviously you do not know England, Alix,” he returned with maddening calm. “Besides, now that the deed is done, I’ve my own reputation to consider, you know. I don’t wish it bruited about that Lord Linton has been jilted twice .”
    Alexandra couldn’t help noticing a touch of bitter self-mockery in Nicholas’s voice. “So that’s it,” she accused him, turning in her seat to face him head-on. “Already left at the gate once, your pride can’t stand the thought of another bride getting away. Well, you should have thought of that before you dragged me into your plans. I’ll not be used to revenge yourself on some wayward fiancée.”
    “Is that what you think? That I’m using you?”
    Alexandra took the time to look—really look—at Nicholas. What a handsome specimen he was, with his dark hair and dangerously romantic eyepatch. Certainly if it were only a bride he was seeking, he would have had no trouble finding one. So why had he picked on her? Could it be that he had not been planning to beat his erstwhile bride to the altar and that he truly believed her compromised and was just doing the honorable thing? Yes, she mused, it was possible.
    Or perhaps he was suffering from an incurable wound of the heart and looked upon marriage to a near stranger as a fitting way to continue his line without running the risk of having some love-struck bride disturbing his mourning for his lost fiancée? If so, she had certainly fallen into his hands like a ripe plum.
    “Why did she jilt you?” she round herself asking.
    Now it was Nicholas’s turn to be silent. This girl was no milk and water miss to be turned off with some farradiddle or other. No, she