Free The Cheer in Charming an Earl (The Naughty Girls) by Emma Locke Page B

I’m quite glad you reminded me. It’s distressing to think that I’d almost forgotten how much she detested Latin.” He chuckled and shook his head. “I used to sneak the correct answers to her before the weekly exam was administered. Poor old George. It never occurred to our tutor that I still had my papers, seven years later. He never could discern how someone as dreadful at conjugation as my sister managed to earn firsts.”
    “ My sister would have given me the wrong answers,” Aunt Millie said. Her tone held no pity, a fact Lord Chelford acknowledged with a grateful smile.
    Elinor followed her lead. “And my brother would have rapped my knuckles with a switch, after he gave me the wrong answers.”
    Lord Chelford smiled and clasped his arms behind his back. “Did you choose a book? Unless you like card games, I’ve not much to offer you ladies in the way of after dinner entertainment.”
    Elinor glanced at the leather-bound novel in her hand. One she’d read twice, but never mind that. It wasn’t as though she’d be able to concentrate while he sat in the same room, anyway.
    Before she could speak, however, Aunt Millie cut in. “Cards? We can have none of that, my lord. When I play at cards, I crave a fine cheroot, and when I smoke cheroots, I gamble. You shan’t have a penny out of me, not tonight.” She twirled in a circle as if searching the bookcases for something in particular. “Where are your plays?”
    He pointed at a crowded shelf to their right. “Will you perform for us, ma’am? I should like that a sight more than staring at Miss Conley while she reads her book.” He glanced at Elinor. “Not that I would mind doing so.”
    A flush raced up her neck. Even her ears blazed hot. Particularly when he held her gaze behind her aunt’s back.
    What did he mean?
    “Chelford.” All three turned in the direction of the doorway.
    Lord de Winter didn’t quite smile; he never quite smiled. “I promised Smithers I’d call you to dinner. But before you make haste, tell me, who is this goddess who deigns to join us tonight?” He made a show of beholding her aunt.
    Elinor rolled her eyes. But she was charmed when de Winter strode up to Aunt Millie and made a fuss over her hand. “It would appear I came just in time to make even numbers,” he said, folding Aunt Millie’s gloved fingers into the crook of his elbow. “Shall we?”
    Elinor snatched her own gloved hand behind her, though Lord Chelford hadn’t tried to take it yet. Then she felt silly. She’d come to his house . Why, by dint of being here, she’d essentially promised him the pleasure of escorting her into the dining room.
    His pleasure, she reminded herself. It shouldn’t send her into raptures.
    She allowed him to see her in. Each step took her in a direction filled with more than the anticipation of a delicious meal. She recalled the lacy underthings Aunt Millie had helped her select and felt a stirring at her core. Did he feel the same? Stretched taut by an aching longing to have her, and a frantic desire to do so now?
    She was glad of her gloves. Without them, he would surely know how damp her palm was, nestled in the crook of his elbow. How could she feel this nervous around a man she didn’t even approve of?
    They managed dinner without incident. To her grudging enchantment, Lord Chelford led the conversation along pleasant subjects, even drawing a laugh from her with his disenchanted description of Almack’s. Given that she’d passed the last five years of her life pining for an invitation to its hallowed halls, that was quite the accomplishment, indeed.
    “And what is Gloucester like?” he asked her after all that was left of her crème brûlée dessert was a sticky puddle of syrup.
    She reached for her wine glass. Unlike the last time they’d dined together, she’d been careful not to let her cup be refilled. “I adore Gloucester,” she hyperbolized, for she nonetheless was feeling the wine’s loosening effects.