Free My Scandalous Viscount by Gaelen Foley

how it was made, though as a lady of information, she knew she had to have one. A spying window disguised as a mirror!
    The dancing flames atop the candles were obviously the light source that had drawn her. Then, peering through the treated glass into the room, she beheld Lord Beauchamp.
    Shirtless.
    Tending to his wound. Oh, my. She stared.
    The man was utterly beautiful.
    No wonder the scandalous hussies of the ton couldn’t leave him alone. A mild swooning sensation made her feel light-headed, but she assured herself it was only due to blood loss. Still, she barely blinked, staring at his magnificent body with only a hint of guilt, safely hidden behind the glass.
    Perhaps it was just as well for her morals that whatever treatment had been applied to the mirror to render it transparent had also darkened the glass a bit. Her view was slightly veiled, as if she were gazing through brown bottle glass. She could see line, but not much in the way of color . . . and, truthfully, that was enough of a visual feast. The shape of his broad shoulders. The muscled swells of his chest, his brawny arms. Sleek waist. The breathtaking sight of his chiseled abdomen. To be sure, all that was quite enough without adding to it the true, warm tones of his skin, the jade blue seduction of his eyes, and the angelic gold of his hair.
    But she jerked herself out of her dazed staring, for she could also hear through the mirror, and the conversation in progress was most intriguing.
    “I can hardly believe Lord Forrester shot you!”
    She leaned forward to see who had spoken.
    An aged butler with a gaunt, unsmiling visage marched into view, bringing the viscount a writing set. The butler stepped around the large guard dogs lying on the floor and placed it on the table near Lord Beauchamp.
    Egads, she thought, staring at those panting beasts sprawled on the floor, their big, fanged mouths drooling as they panted. She’d be lucky not to get eaten if she ever managed to find a way out of this labyrinth.
    Beau, meanwhile, had shrugged. “Well, but how can I be angry? The man’s like a brother to me. I’m just glad he’s alive.” He winced as he doused the wound on his arm with a slosh of brandy. She was relieved to note that the bullet had only grazed him. “I got him, too. In the leg. Obviously, neither of us really wanted to hurt the other. It’s the girl’s doing, frankly.”
    Carissa frowned.
    “She hit me in the back with the door. I thought Nick had brought reinforcements. She’s lucky I didn’t accidentally kill her, thinking I was being attacked from both sides.”
    The butler nodded. “Well, a leg wound should slow the baron down, at least.”
    Beauchamp nodded. Drying the wound with a fresh rag, he dabbed blood and liquor off his arm. “Anyway, that’s why I’m not angry. You must know what I’ve been thinking all this time, Gray, though I refused to say it aloud.”
    “Indeed, my lord. We all feared the worst,” the old fellow agreed with a sympathetic look.
    “Now that I know he and Trevor are alive, that’s all that matters.”
    “Do you mean to tell the Elders?” the butler asked with a nod toward the writing set.
    “Certainly. Just not . . . yet.”
    “Sir?” he countered in surprise.
    Elders? Carissa wondered.
    “Gray, they won’t understand,” he said with a frustrated glance. “They’ll put a price on his head, just like they did with Drake. I’m not sending assassins out after my best friend. I’ll tell them everything, after I’ve got all this sorted out.”
    “After?”
    “After,” he repeated. “And I’m counting on you, Gray. I’m going to need your silence and your cooperation. You’ll be as loyal to me as you were to Virgil, I trust?”
    Carissa watched the scene unfolding in confusion. To be sure, this was far more intriguing than the play at Covent Garden Theatre.
    The butler, Gray, meanwhile, had folded his hands behind his back and fixed the rakehelly viscount with a skeptical