Free Sins of a Wicked Duke by Sophie Jordan Page A

the caller covertly as she did.
    A curious feeling of unease settled in her stomach as he rapped on the front door, the line of his back ramrod straight, inflexible, reminiscent of another lord. One who had never cared if his requests were an imposition on others.Viscount Hunt . Unreasonable or not, the viscount expected Da to do whatever he asked. Da was simply O’Rourke. Not a person. Not a man. Not a father struggling to provide for his daughter, striving to give her a home, to be everything for his motherless child.
    Shaking off bitter thoughts of the man who drove her father to an early grave, she shut the gate. The stranger rapped on the knocker. He removed his hat, revealing a head full of lush white hair. Acrimony radiated from him, and she suspected this caller bore no love for the duke. A footman opened the front door. The gentleman swept inside without a word, the door clicking shut behind him.
    She stared after him for some moments, curious despite herself. Why should she care if he bore no love for the duke?
    It wasn’t as though she had taken Mr. Adams words to heart and adopted a sense of loyalty for her employer. It wasn’t as though his naked torso flashed through her head at night. Alone in her room, when she closed her eyes, his voice did not roll through her head, filling her ears with his heated promise.I can bring you pleasure. That , she swore, cheeks itchy hot, simply never ever happened.
     

Chapter 8

“Wake up, you forsaken sodomite!”
    Dominic pulled a pillow over his head, telling himself the harsh voice that invaded his head was only a nightmare. The voice could not be real. Could not behere . And yet even as he told himself this, Dominic knew that the old mancould be standing in his bedchamber—that hewould . Rupert Collins’s letters had chased him across two continents. Discovering his grandson was on English soil again, he wouldn’t wait for an invitation.
    The end of a cane landed on the bed, dangerously close to Dominic’s side. The bed dipped and shuddered as his grandfather gave it a shake. “I saidup with you!”
    Groaning, he pulled back the pillow and leveled a glare on the one man he had never wanted to see again. And yet he had known when he returned to England that he would have to face the bastard again. Sooner or later. His grandfather would make certain of it.
    The tip of his cane dug into the mattress, the cold polished wood scraping his ribs. “Up with you.” At that moment, his aged eyes fell on Dominic’s tattoo. He pointed a shaking finger at it. His voice quavered, “You bear Satan’s symbol?”
    Dominic glanced at the tattoo. “What? This?”
    “It symbolizes evil.”
    His lips twisted. “Fitting I should wear it, then.”
    His grandfather’s wrinkled lips disappeared into his mouth. He was a shadow of his former self. His once brawny frame no longer the intimidating figure of Dominic’s youth.
    Dominic knocked the cane off the bed with the back of his hand and settled against the pillows with an exaggerated sigh. “So. You’re still alive.”
    His grandfather’s gray brows winged high. “A disappointment for you, I know. You’d like nothing more than for me to be dead and rotting.”
    Dominic shrugged, the idle motion deceptive as his fingertips brushed the inside of his palm, tracing the puckered flesh of a scar given to him at the tender age of nine. He inhaled, almost smelling the stink of smoldering flesh. The echo of his sharp cries reverberated in his head, pleas for Mrs. Pearce, his grandfather’s minion, to stop, to lift the fire-hot poker from his palm.
    “I could not yet meet my Maker until I’ve done all I could by you.”
    “You mean you haven’t done enough already?”
    “God knows I’ve tried. Tried to prevent you from becoming your father, but there is yet one more thing I can do.”
    “I am a little too old for you to administer your usual punishments. Besides, hasn’t Mrs. Pearce retired from her post as your