Lord Perfect by Loretta Chase Page A

Lisle's ridiculously expensive lessons,
her finances had improved markedly, but she feared they had not
improved enough to make any significant difference in her
circumstances.
    London had turned out to be a great deal more costly
than she'd expected. Not for the first time she wondered whether
she'd done the right thing in coming here. Dublin was cheaper and
friendlier.
    Yet Ireland was poorer, and obtaining artistic work had
been even more difficult there. Good, affordable schooling for Olivia
certainly was easier to find in London.
    In less than a year, Miss Smithson of New Ormond Street
had eradicated all traces of Olivia's brogue. She spoke as a lady
ought to speak. If only one could teach her to behave as a lady ought
to behave. In school, among her classmates and under Miss Smithson's
basilisk gaze, Olivia was a model of ladylike deportment.
Unfortunately, like so many of her maternal relatives, she was a
chameleon, adapting easily to her surroundings. Out of school, among
a different class of persons, she was another girl altogether.
    Matters would not improve if they returned to Ireland.
    London was the place of opportunity. But it did not
offer opportunity cheap or make the way easy.
    It was not going to make way for Bathsheba Wingate
today, obviously.
    Time to give up and go home.
    She started down Meard's Court as the first cold drops
of rain began to fall. She was used to rain and cold, but today,
weary in both body and spirit, she minded it very much.
    The rain pattered on her bonnet and the shoulders of her
cloak. Soon it would beat harder, she thought, glancing up at the
blackening sky. She would be wet through by the time she had walked
home.
    When she reached the corner of Dean Street, she found
herself gazing southward toward St. Anne's Church. There was a
hackney stand at the church.
    But if she splurged on a hired vehicle she must scrimp
for dinner.
    She put the hackney out of her mind and hurried across
Dean Street, her gaze darting north and south. If she had been
looking straight ahead she might have been run over, for the grey
veil of rain turned her into a dark blur. But she didn't look
straight ahead. She very sensibly watched the street for oncoming
carts and carriages.
    And so she ran straight into the man on the walkway.
    She heard a grunt, and felt him stagger a little. She
grabbed two fistfuls of coat to keep him from toppling over. This was
not the most intelligent move, but she acted instinctively. It took
her brain another moment to point out that he was taller and heavier
than she was and would only take her down with him.
    By this time, he'd regained his balance.
    "Oh, I do beg your pardon," she said,
releasing the coat. Out of maternal habit, she smoothed it down where
she'd wrinkled it. "I was not looking—"
    That was when she lifted her head and did look, finally.
Rain drizzled into her face and the daylight was all but gone, yet
she had no trouble recognizing the coal-black eyes gazing down at her
over the patrician nose or the firm mouth with its provoking promise
of a smile.
    She simply stared, one hand falling away, the other
still resting on his coat.
    "It is I who ought to beg your pardon," Lord
Rathbourne said. "I seem to have acquired a troublesome habit of
standing in your way."
    "I did not see you," she said. She snatched
her hand away from his coat. Once, only once, could she not meet up
with him in a civilized and graceful way? Embarrassment swept over
her in a hot rush, sharpening her tone.
    "I shouldn't see you here. What could possibly
bring you to Soho?"
    "You," he said. "I have been looking for
you for hours. But I shall not keep you standing in the rain while I
explain myself. Let us make a dash to St. Anne's Church for a
hackney. We can speak more comfortably then."
    Involuntarily, her gaze shot southward again, to the
church.
    Oh, it was tempting.
    But riding in a closed carriage with a man who turned
her into a witless sixteen-year-old was asking for trouble.
    "No,