His For Christmas Read Free Page B

her eyes. She was terribly sick of crying, and she felt as though she ’ d certainly done enough to last a lifetime, and then some. She did not want to cry, not anymore. “ Thank you very much, Mrs. Chang. ”
    Elliot turned to follow the woman out of the small, but elegant room with the prim sky--blue wallpaper and then paused at the threshold. He unsettled her, with his dark, piercing eyes that seemed to see far too much for her liking.
    “ You are welcome here for as long as you need, ” he said quietly. “ When you are ready to leave, I can arrange for travel to wherever you wish to go. ”
    Was this man forever going to render her wordless? He must think her a complete twit . “ That ’ s very generous, sir. ”
    Timothy walked to him, and leveled a small grin in her direction. “ Just sleep. Tomorrow, everything will be better. ”
    Such words of wisdom from one so young.
    The door closed behind the pair of them, leaving the once--heiress and toast of Seneca, New York, in silence and the memories she did not want .
    “ I fear you ’ re wrong, Timothy, ” she whispered to herself in the semi--darkness. “ Tomorrow will not be better. ”

     
     

Chapter Two
     
     
    The girl was kneeling on the floor.
    Elliot stopped at the threshold of the kitchen, initially drawn to the tantalizing smell of Mrs. Chang's special beef stew and dumplings.
    But this was not something he'd expected.
    “Er, Mrs. Chang?”
    The housekeeper turned around from the pot with something very akin to disconcertion. “Yes, Elliot?”
    He cleared his throat as he watched the girl industriously scrub the spotless floor on her hands and knees, hair tied back with a length of leather. “What...exactly is Miss Stevens doing, might I ask?”
    The person in question apparently didn't even notice he was there, so intent she was on getting a tar spot off the floor by the oven. It was not going to come off, not if Mrs. Chang had given up on it, but the girl did not stop scrubbing. At this point, Elliot was mostly worried he’d have a hole in his kitchen floor, and that would not do.
    Mrs. Chang sighed and crossed her arms. “There’s no stopping her, I'm afraid. The moment she rose from bed, she found one of my aprons, marched herself right in front of me and asked me for a rag.”
    For some reason, Elliot couldn't tear his eyes away from the image of Ivy Stevens scrubbing the same two inches of the shining wooden floor. “And it didn't occur to you to ask why she needed it?”
    The housekeeper shrugged. “You know me. I ask questions at the end. And to be quite frank, I was curious to see what she would do.”
    “Didn't you try to stop her?”
    She pulled an expression of extreme annoyance. “Well, of course, I tried! Do you really think I’m capable of pulling someone from their sickbed just to scrub a kitchen floor, which I may add, was perfectly spotless to begin with?”
    Elliot sighed and sat down on his haunches. “Mm. Miss Stevens?”
    She either did not hear him, or preferred to ignore him, as she scrubbed at the floor that was starting to look a little thin by the oven. Her head was down, startling bright violet eyes fixed on that one black spot.
    Mrs. Chang let out a small laugh. “You see what I mean? She's a bit occupied at the moment. If I might offer a suggestion, Elliot?”
    “Yes, Mrs. Chang?”
    “Perhaps it would not be the worst thing to wait?” she said with a small smile. “I don't think Miss Stevens is who she appears to be.”
    Of course, she wasn't.
    The girl, well, woman, really, although it was hard to see her as anything vaguely resembling one when dressed the way she was, in one of Mrs. Chang's castoff gowns and an apron that threatened to trip her with every move she made.
    He leaned against the doorway, arms crossed. “How long until lunch, Mrs. Chang?”
    “Well, I think it is time,” she replied. “However, I'm not sure what I ought to do. I've tried calling her name to get her attention, but