Argent (Hundred Days Series Book 3) Read Free Page B

loved her, and that she did not have to go. Alix rubbed a fist, smearing tears over tired eyes. She should have stayed on the ship with Edward, should have found the spine to fight Silas’s and Paulina’s threats. It was simple to blame tattling neighbors or a disapproving parson, but was she really the one at fault? When had she ever had the courage to run and keep running until she outpaced them?
    Shifting to get comfortable, Alix decided that she was too tired and too resigned to answer the question.
                  She should count her luck. It was only their first week in England. She had already laid money on an investment and made a very lasting memory. With a whole spring and then summer ahead, who knew what else could happen?

 
     
     
     
    CHAPTER THREE
     
    Broadmoore, The Hastings estate -- Derbyshire
     
                  Spencer hadn't appreciated how much he hated John’s house until his last deployment through Europe. As ruins went, the house would be an excellent place to visit: a wide lawn, a long pool framed by the boughs of newly green oaks. But it wasn’t a ruin, unfortunately. It was a functioning house and grounds, despite having falling into disrepair a century before. Broadmoore Abbey's crumbling skeleton was a fine landmark but a derelict residence. The house was drafty, dripping, and generally uncomfortable. Its cavernous fireplaces and furnishings would have been in vogue for the last Tudor king. The whole mess had been saddled to John by a father set on keeping tight reins on his heir, the same man who had reputedly sent his own sister running for the colonies, never to return.
                  In an accident of agreeable circumstances, that sister’s children, Chas Paton and his sister Alexandra, were eager to see their homeland. John was anxious for the financial opportunity they offered, happy to make his kin welcome. Chas Paton had managed his family's shipping business to a peak of success and had money -- coin John could use to dig himself out from under Broadmoore. In turn, John had connections that the Patons were eager to make use of.             
                  Spencer sighed and stretched his legs farther into the carriage's foot well, longing to be home. Whatever good the army had brought him, it had also meant long nights in wind and rain with thin blankets and worse rations. He was done with all that; he wanted a roaring fire, a sturdy chair, and the nearly endless parade of good food from his own Oakvale kitchens.
    John was a friend, though, and he would tolerate Broadmoore for the company. Intriguing company now, he amended. Mrs. Rowan would be there, too. After Bennet’s prodding, he’d found renewed courage, so why was he struggling now with seeing her?
    Because he didn't want to meet her, to know her. The real her. He wanted to preserve quite possibly his only impulsive decision outside of a battlefield. Her voice wouldn't be as deep and rich as he'd imagined. There would be a whining point to the sound of her words. She would be too well read to be talked to or so vacuous as to be limited to parasols and ribbons.
    Spencer laughed at himself, looking out the window at his waiting hosts. Age had made him impatient, rigid. Bored. Something in Mrs. Rowan's eyes, a clever playfulness when he had taken her hand, scolded that he was wrong to worry. Spencer rejected his fear and brushed away a disappointment which promised that reality could never equal his imagination.
                  The carriage lurched to a stop. Spencer bounded down, planted his hat back on his head and raised a hand to John and Laurel where they waited at the yard's edge.
                  He started forward, girding himself. Once more into the breach.
     
    *              *              *
     
    Seated before a frightened little desk in the small parlor, Alix hunched and braced elbows as she wrote, and