Free When Good Earls Go Bad: A Victorian Valentine's Day Novella by Megan Frampton

like the curve where her neck slid into her shoulders or her delicate collarbones or the inside of her wrist.
    And more, besides. He wanted to know, rather than just to suspect, what her body might look like, lit by as many candles as she wanted as he just got to look at her. And touch. And be touched by her, her not-a-housekeeper hands trailing all over his skin.
    He could imagine she would be just as inquisitive in her lovemaking as she was in her questions about tea and Edinburgh and what he wanted in his life.
    And right now, he was perturbed to admit that he knew the answer: her. In fact, he wanted to know all about her, understand how a female came to own any kind of business and what first got her interested in reading and if she’d always spoken so much and been so direct and literal.
    He couldn’t imagine being able to find any other woman who could possibly fascinate him to such a degree as she had, in such a short amount of time. The thought should have terrified him more than it did, only now he just wanted to discover more of what fascinations she held.
    “S o what do you think now?” she asked, her eyes still bright with curiosity, even though they had been looking at swatches and discussing what ladies did and did not wish to buy for well over two hours.
    Matthew honestly wished ladies would walk around naked, not so much so they’d be on display for him, but because then they wouldn’t have this need for fabric, and he could have gone to bed an hour ago.
    “I think I don’t know what to think,” he replied. And wasn’t that odd, since it was unusual for him not to know at least how he was leaning in his opinion after so much research.
    But it wasn’t the fabric or the multitude of papers Mr. Andrews had blessed him with that left him unthinking. Or thinking too hard.
    It was her, and damned if he couldn’t get her off his mind, as well as other parts of his body. Maybe he’d be happy if she did walk around naked. Although then he would miss the opportunity to watch as she disrobed.
    Just now, for example, she was leaning forward, causing the most intriguing gap in her bodice. He could see the shadow between her breasts, the curve of her skin, just enough to make his imagination strip her slowly, each reveal causing more and more of her skin to be exposed to his view.
    He needed to think of something else before she realized where his thoughts had turned.
    “My lord?” She had reached her hand across the table to clasp his fingers. Perhaps it was too late. Perhaps she knew.
    And perhaps that was wonderful.
    “Miss Tyne? That is, Annabelle,” he said, lifting his hand up to capture her hand, then drawing both their hands back to his chest. He placed her palm flat against his heart, the one that was beating so hard it threatened to pop out of his chest, or at least that was what it felt like.
    “Yes, my—” She wrinkled her nose in annoyance. Adorable annoyance, to be sure, but annoyance nonetheless. “I don’t know your first name. It seems to me that if someone has kissed someone else, and that someone else is currently holding someone’s hand up to a body part, that someone should at least know the other someone’s name, and—”
    “Matthew,” Matthew said, before she could go into any more about names, or their use, or what they meant, or someone kissing someone when all he wanted to do was find out what she would say.
    “Matthew.” She tilted her head and looked at him, her usual look of curiosity even curiouser, if possible. “Are you named for anyone in particular, or is that just what your parents like? What were your parents like? You mentioned sisters, is your mother alive? Is she in Edinburgh?”
    Matthew squeezed her hand. “I was going to ask you a question, Annabelle.”
    “Of course you were, only I realized I didn’t know your name, and then I had to.” And then she caught his eye, and her mouth widened into a delicious, intoxicating grin, and she was laughing, her