Read The Bad Boy Billionaire's Girl Gone Wild Online
Authors: Maya Rodale
The Bad Boy Billionaire's Girl Gone Wild (12 page)
“Both of you, enough!” Emma cried. “You will be find good husbands in time. I am sure of it.”
“Words to live by. From the starry-eyed, deeply-in-love duchess,” Prudence remarked dryly. She and Olivia shared A Look. Ever since Emma had fallen in love and wed her handsome, charming, and utterly besotted duke, she’d been insufferably optimistic in all things. She’d even begun to play matchmaker, introducing Olivia and Prue to the duke’s eligible friends at every opportunity. Unfortunately it was all the more apparent that they just didn’t quite take. Their reputations as London’s Least Likely preceded them, and none of the rakes, rogues, or bachelors of the ton were inclined to forget it, as much as the Duchess of Ashbrooke might encourage them to.
Honestly, it was embarrassing. It was almost worse than the wallflower corner.
“Lady Penelope’s ball is but one night of torture, but this marriage will be for the rest of my life,” Olivia said.
“Which probably won’t be long,” Prudence said. “If you do marry the Mad Baron.”
“Prudence!” Emma exclaimed, horrified.
“Well that is some consolation,” Olivia said darkly. It also made her think.
If she didn’t have long to live . . . what would she do?
She wouldn’t marry the Mad Baron, for one thing. She wouldn’t paint another flower arrangement or stitch another sampler. She’d devote herself to what mattered: a delicious first kiss that made her weak in the knees, waltzes with handsome gentlemen who held her far closer than was proper, somehow finding the love of a reformed rogue, and above all, discovering what she liked and who she was when she wasn’t delicately walking the straight and narrow with the promise of a reward on some far-off day. She would find that handsome stranger from the ball the other night and kiss him until she was weak in the knees.
She would live now.
“I have been the perfect lady,” Olivia said slowly, stating the obvious. “We were led to believe that ladylike behavior would be rewarded with good husbands and happily-ever-after. We were gravely misled.”
“You’re right,” Prudence agreed. “All our lives we were told to stand up straighter, smile when we didn’t feel like it, never refuse an invitation to waltz, always be kind and obliging under every circumstance. How well has it worked out for us?”
The three girls fell silent. It hadn’t worked out very well for them at all. Two were practically confirmed spinsters and about to become the matrimonial failures of Lady Penelope’s Finishing School.
But one of them had landed a duke.
“Well, it worked out for Emma,” Olivia said finally. She was truly happy for her friend. Deeply and truly happy. Just weeks ago they’d all had such dismal prospects. But it wasn’t fair that Emma should have the magical experience of falling in love and she should be forcibly betrothed to the Mad and Murderous Baron.
“My luck didn’t change until we very improperly and wickedly and falsely announced my engagement to the duke,” Emma said. “And by ‘we’ I mean you two.”
“You’re welcome,” Prudence said kindly.
“Interesting point from London’s Least Likely to Misbehave,” Olivia said, referring to Emma’s old nickname. “We’ve all been far too good for far too long.”
“So it logically follows that we ought to misbehave,” Prudence stated. “Especially you, Olivia.”
“Do go on,” Olivia murmured. Her heart started thudding because Prue had that mischievous look in her eye that foretold mischief, possibly trouble, potentially disaster.
Prudence explained: “If perfect ladylike behavior has gotten you practically betrothed against your will to a man who desires you for precisely that quality, then it logically follows that unladylike behavior will get you out of it.”
“She has a point,” Emma said with a growing enthusiasm. “Your parents will never let you out of the match, but he might. Especially if the biddable bride he wanted turns out to be a hysterical, troublesome shrew who constantly plagues him with scandals.”
“They will pressure me into accepting,” Olivia said, seeing the potential of Prue’s plan. “But they cannot force him to wed me if he decides we don’t suit.”
It went without saying she would do everything in her power to prove to him that they did not suit. Her life and future happiness depended upon it.
“You must break all those ladylike rules of your mother’s,” Prudence confirmed.
Young ladies do not break the rules.
Olivia smiled mischievously.
They do now.
Maya Rodale began reading romance novels in college at her mother’s insistence, and it wasn’t long before she was writing her own. Maya is now the author of multiple historical and contemporary romances. She lives in New York City with her darling dog and a rogue of her own.
Please visit her at www.mayarodale.com.
Visit
www.AuthorTracker.com
for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.
The Bad Boy Billionaire’s Wicked Arrangement
Three Schemes and a Scandal (Novella)
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Excerpt from
The Bad Boy Billionaire: What a Girl Wants
copyright © 2014 by Maya Rodale.
Excerpt from
Wallflower Gone Wild
copyright © 2014 by Maya Rodale.
THE BAD BOY BILLIONAIRE’S GIRL GONE WILD. Copyright © 2014 by Maya Rodale. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition FEBRUARY 2014 ISBN: 9780062230843
Print Edition ISBN: 9780062230850
JV 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Australia
HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty. Ltd.
Level 13, 201 Elizabeth Street
Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia
http://www.harpercollins.com.au/ebooks
Canada
HarperCollins Canada
2 Bloor Street East - 20th Floor
Toronto, ON, M4W, 1A8, Canada
New Zealand
HarperCollins Publishers (New Zealand) Limited
P.O. Box 1
Auckland, New Zealand
http://www.harpercollins.co.nz
United Kingdom
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
77-85 Fulham Palace Road
London, W6 8JB, UK
http://www.harpercollins.co.uk
United States
HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
10 East 53rd Street
New York, NY 10022
