Free To Be Seduced by Ann Stephens

until recognition dawned. In a gesture he started to recognize, she stopped walking. Praying for patience, he asked the reason.
    “You shall not take me back to your lodgings!” She looked over at him. The familiar storm gathered in her eyes under the brim of her hat.
    “Of course I’m taking you back to my lodgings. Ladies of breeding do not wander the streets unaccompanied.” He spoke in the firm voice that usually cowed his sister. His fiancée remained unimpressed. To his astonishment, she stated her intention to accompany him to the banker.
    To her astonishment, he flatly refused. No female ever appeared in the precincts of a financial institution, he assured her. Over her protestations, he informed her that she could return to his rooms either at his side or over his shoulder.
     
    On the verge of daring him to pick her up in the middle of the street, she caught the icy expression in his green eyes and stopped. Bethany realized with a shock that he was completely serious. Distracted by the memory of his solidly muscled arms holding her to him, she shook her head, trying to think clearly.
    She capitulated, and he uncrossed his arms to walk beside her, offering her his arm. It might be possible to follow him, she decided.
    To her dismay, he suavely ushered her to his rooms, then promptly shouted for Lane. As soon as the good man stumped down from an upper floor, Richard bade him keep watch in the front hall in case Mistress Dallison attempted to leave on her own.
    “She is naturally anxious to call upon a number of shops,” he explained blandly to the coachman, “but I fear the chill weather may be injurious to her health.”
    Lane looked at her from his place on the landing and nervously observed the lady’s mutinous expression. Nevertheless, he assured Master Richard that he would take care not to let her endanger herself.
    At that, milord smiled sweetly over at her and bade her enjoy the afternoon. Indignantly she watched him clap his hat on his head and make his way back down the stairs. Lane shrugged his shoulders apologetically at her and followed him.
    Uttering a wordless cry of frustration, she left the landing and shut the door behind her.
    Looking about the still cluttered room, she supposed she might as well finish cleaning it up. Hanging up her hat and cloak, she started in, careful not to muss her new, and currently only, dress.
    Not long afterward, she stood in the center of the room, pleased. The last piles of trash lay outside on the landing. Lane, citing his orders to watch the front door, had regretfully declined to carry them outside the building. He promised to do so the instant his lordship returned, however.
    With the main room clean, she considered starting on the bedchamber. Remembering her body’s reaction to Richard’s lovemaking, she decided instead to go through the papers covering a table in the corner.
    Before long, she learned why he had been driven to kidnap her. Besides hundreds of pounds’ worth of bills, she found lists of gambling losses and thousands of pounds’ worth of repairs to his Yorkshire estate. He had not paid Lane in seven months, nor his rent for the last two. He had avoided debtors’ prison only by frequently changing addresses.
    She shook her head. This would not do at all. Finding a piece of clean paper, she dipped a quill into the inkstand. Midday came and went as she patiently wrote out columns of figures and added them up.
    When her belly growled for the third time in as many minutes, she stretched and got up for a dinner of bread and cold meat. Remembering Lane patiently sitting below, she carried some down to him.
    When she returned, she eyed the paper-covered writing table with distaste. She had not fully assessed the entire amount of Richard’s debts, but she knew not whether to feel relieved or discouraged. He undoubtedly needed to marry her to save himself from ruin, but she wondered if the man knew the value of a shilling.
    Thinking to ponder the