A Nobleman's Guide to Seducing a Scoundrel (The Doomsday Books, #2)

by K.J. Charles

I want you to explain why you’re roaming the house, or the grounds, at this hour!” “I am conducting my life,” Doomsday said, with something of a hiss. “I don’t see I need to account for that.” Rufus had dressed down too many misbehaving junior officers not to spot evasion when he saw it. “Oh, yes you do. I won’t have my staff creeping round doing God knows what at God knows when. Explain yourself. Now.” “If you insist. I had an assignation.” “A—” “Assignation. An appointment to get fucked, if you want it spelled out. Which, sadly, did not come to pass, so it seems I got up for no reason. I trust that suffices?” “No, it bloody doesn’t,” Rufus said, on a wave of feelings he didn’t stop to examine. “Your private life is your business, but my household is my responsibility. I won’t have local girls popping out my staff’s bastards—” Doomsday’s head went back as though he’d been slapped. “It is my business, and I am not basket-making, and if I were, that would also be my business and I would deal with the consequences. Which will not in any case happen, so—” “You know damned well you can’t promise that, and don’t try to distract me,” Rufus said. “This is a bloody lie. Why the devil would you be meeting girls at two in the morning?” Sneaking off for a roll in the hay was a time-honoured country activity, but nobody was wandering around the Isle of Oxney at this hour for that. There was no shortage of opportunity for a fumble in this barely-populated place: a girl could surely eva...