Free A Perfect Gentleman by Bárbara Metzger

ready to kidnap her to force a marriage or a ransom.”
    “Until we know what happened to Isabelle, we ought to take care, is all.”
    “Is that what you are doing? I thought you were hugging shore to avoid being swamped by fortune-hunting swells.”
    Ellianne cut another article from a newspaper and pasted it down under the appropriate date, pressing firmly enough to tear a hole in the page. “Oh, bother.” She glued another scrap atop the first. Her project was a mess, and it was all that man’s fault. “I did not enjoy my last encounter with London’s bachelors. I do not intend to repeat the experience.”
    “Well, at least Wellstone is aboveboard in his goals. No secret that he sails under whatever flag is paying him. For what it’s worth, though, to my ears he did sound like he cared about leaving you on your own.”
    “Perhaps he did, a little.”
    “Well, you think on it, Ellianne. To my mind, he’ll do.”
    “Do for what, Aunt Lally?” Ellianne asked, peering at her aunt over yet another newspaper. “You would not be trying to matchmake, would you? You know I do not intend to marry.”
    If Aunt Lally had her own views about her niece’s intentions of remaining single, she was, for once, wise enough not to speak them. “Promote a match between you and Wellstone? Zounds, no. A blueblood like the viscount will marry one of his own kind when he gets around to it. An earl’s brat or better, I’d wager. You’ve too wise a head on your shoulders to expect anything else. If I thought the bounder would break your heart I’d not be encouraging you to keep him on, would I?”
    “I should hope not. There is no chance of my heart being remotely involved, at any rate. It would take a great deal more than a handsome face”—and a devilish smile, a Greek god’s build, and a courtier’s glib tongue—“to change my mind.”
    *
    Timmy agreed with Mrs. Goudge. “He’ll do, miss.”
    Contrary to popular opinion, the two households, the Kanes’ and Lady Augusta’s, were on long-standing terms of familiarity. The rift had been between Ellianne’s mother, Annabelle, and Annabelle’s father, Lord Chaston, not the two sisters. Like her father and then her brother, the current marquess, Lady Augusta never chose to socialize with Ellis Kane, but she did invite her nieces to spend school holidays or summer vacations with her in London or at the seaside. Lady Annabelle, Mrs. Kane, was pleased to send her daughters, perhaps to counter the influence of their other aunt, Lavinia Goudge. So Ellianne and Timms were old friends. Mellowed by the Madeira, the ancient butler sat in the kitchen, his aching feet up, his false teeth out, his spectacles on. Ellianne sat across from him, her charts spread on the table and her heavy, mantilla-like head covering spread on another chair. Her hair trailed down her back, and her shoes were back in the parlor. She too swirled a glass of wine between her hands.
    “That is what my aunt says, that the viscount might help find Isabelle.”
    “You should listen to her. Not in the general way, of course,” Timms quickly added. “But his lordship seemed a decent sort, bless his soul and hopes for heaven.” Timms recalled the second coin the viscount handed him, on his way out this time, while everyone knew the young peer’s own pockets were to let. Timms blessed him again.
    “But he is so very elegant,” Ellianne complained.
    “Aye, top of the trees, as they say. A Nonpareil.”
    “Precisely. He’ll think I am a desperate spinster, so starved for male attention that I have to pay for it.”
    “Now, missy, no heiress has to pay to have men at her feet, especially one as pretty as you, and Lord Wellstone is sure to know that. A downy one, he is, and right as rain, they say. You’ll not find a more honorable gentleman in all of London, as God is my witness. And discreet, which is what you need to save Miss Isabelle’s reputation if you find her.”
    “When I find her,” she