Forget-Me-Not Bride Read Free

her face to Lilli’s, her eyes widening, hope shining so strong that Lilli’s heart tightened. ‘Oh, Lilli! Can we? Can we really? Will Uncle Herbert allow it?’
    Lilli’s face was grim. ‘Uncle Herbert is going to have no say in the matter. From now on we’re going to make our own decisions.’
    As Lottie sighed in ecstasy Lilli looked around the study. Normally it was a sacred sanctum that no-one entered unless commanded to do so. That her uncle had walked out of it leaving her behind him, alone in it, was evidence of how intently his mind had been focussed on the prospect of ridding himself of her.
    â€˜I’m going to have to visit lots of employment agencies,’ she said to Lottie, taking hold of one of the hands clasped tightly around her waist. ‘I want you to look after Leo and to collect all your clothes and belongings together. I don’t know where Aunt Gussie has put the bags we brought with us. They’re probably in an attic somewhere.’
    â€˜Do you want me to look for them?’ Lottie’s voice was eager. ‘I’ve always wanted to go into the attics and …’
    â€˜No.’ With one hand holding the newspaper and the other hand still clasping Lottie’s, Lilli began to walk out of the room. ‘Goodness only knows how many attics this house has. You could be days looking for them. I’m simply going to tell Aunt Gussie that I’m taking the two of you with me and that I need our travel-bags.’
    â€˜She won’t like it,’ Lottie said prophetically. ‘She likes our being here. It stops her from being lonely.’
    As they began to walk across the hall and back into the breaskfast room Lilli felt a stab of guilt. What Lottie said was true. Their aunt did like them being there. Ineffectual though she was, her affection for all three of them was sincere, and when Herbert discovered he had been robbed of Leo it would be her aunt who would suffer the consequences. For the merest fraction of a second Lilli’s resolve faltered. Then she remembered her uncle’s intention of changing Leo’s name from Stullen to Mosley. With steely determination she entered the breakfast room.
    Her aunt was still seated at the table, one arm comfortingly around a bewildered Leo, the other clutching a tear-damp handkerchief.
    â€˜Oh, my dear Lilli!’ she said in distress, rising clumsily to her feet. ‘What on earth are we to do? Once your uncle makes up his mind about something nothing will change it! Oh, if only you hadn’t antagonised him so!’
    Lilli suppressed a surge of exasperation. Her antagonising her uncle had had very little to do with his decision to order her from the house. It had merely served as an excuse for an action he had long wanted to take, and it was typical of her aunt that she should fail to see that. The large hand on the grandfather-clock in the corner of the room was coming up to half-past-nine, and she was acutely aware of how much she had to accomplish, in such little time, if Leo and Lottie, as well as herself, were to be out of the house by the time her uncle returned to it. She certainly had no time to waste in comforting her aunt.
    â€˜If you could ask one of the maids to hunt down our travel-bags I’d be very grateful, Aunt Gussie,’ she said practically.
    It wasn’t the reaction her aunt had anticipated and her eyes flew wide. ‘But where will you go?’ she protested. ‘What will you do?’
    There were times when Lilli found it near impossible to believe that her much-loved dead mother had been her Aunt Gussie’s younger sister. Her mother hadn’t possessed an impractical bone in her body. It had been her Irish husband who had been the day-dreamer and the incurable romantic. Only physical resemblance had borne witness to the blood relationship between the two sisters. Even now, in her late forties, Gussie Mosley was still a stunningly