His Mistress by Morning Read Free

whispered, shooting a glance at her brother, then back at her friend. For a moment she wavered, but this was Hermione Marlowe, and she was always a veritable fountain of hope. “Is it a big ring? A large diamond perhaps, or a ruby or emerald? Just enough to buy the gown at Madame Claudius’s?”
    Charlotte tugged reluctantly at her glove until it came off. She turned her face away as she held out her hand.
    “’Tis lovely,” Hermione said, trying to sound cheerful as she inspected the odd little ring. She glanced up. “Are you sure there wasn’t more to your aunt’s bequest? Some property perhaps? An annuity the solicitor overlooked? Annuities are often overlooked, I’ve heard.”
    Charlotte shook her head. “Nothing. Nothing but this ring.”
    Her friend’s eyes grew moist with tears, the spring running over. “Oh, Charlotte, this is a tragedy. A horrible, wretched tragedy.” As a Marlowe, Hermione resorted to dramatics, pulling out her handkerchief and sobbing as if the lost fortune had been destined for her pockets.
    Charlotte gulped, holding back her own tears. She’d done admirably well at the solicitor’s office, but now in front of Hermione, and in front of those wretched orange blossoms, it was terribly hard not to give over to a well-deserved spate of tears.
    “Yes, well, if you will forgive me,” Sebastian said at all this overwhelming feminine display of emotion. He nodded to Charlotte, and then said to Fenwick, who until now had been standing near the stairs, ever at the ready to serve, “Tell my mother I will be dining with the Burkes, so do not expect me home.”
    “You’re dining with them?” Hermione sputtered, this alarming news shocking her out of her distress over Charlotte’s loss. “Whatever for?”
    “Because I was invited,” he told her. “And I like the company.”
    Hermione made a sputtering noise, then collected herself enough to follow him. “Am I to suppose you are also going to their Venetian breakfast tomorrow as well?”
    “Of course,” Sebastian told her. “You and Mother had better be there, and on time.” With that, he turned and opened the door.
    “There you are!” said the woman standing on the front steps, her hand upraised as if she had been about to pull the bell.
    Charlotte cringed. Cousin Finella.
    Because of their impoverished state, Charlotte and her mother, Lady Wilmont, lived with her mother’s cousin, Finella Uppington-Higgins. Finella had inherited the house years ago, and combined with the small amount Lady Wilmont received as Sir Nestor’s widow, it was just enough for three frugal women to scratch by on.
    “When I couldn’t find you in the park, I suspected you might come here .” Finella sniffed and took a discerning and critical glance around the Marlowe foyer. When her gaze fell on the fertility statue near the salver, what little color she did possess drained from her palefeatures, and she looked instantly away. A stickler for propriety, she thrust out her hand and said in a tight voice, “Come along, Charlotte. Your mother needs you at home. Now.”
    Oh, Charlotte knew what that meant. Her mother was in high dudgeons and wanted an audience for her laments and agonies over Aunt Ursula’s broken promises.
    Hermione leaned close and whispered softly, “I understand. Come back as soon as you can. We’ll find a way for you to have your heart’s desire.”
    At this, Charlotte’s gaze flew not to her friend but over to Sebastian.
    Her heart’s desire. Holding orange blossoms for another woman. A woman, if gossip was correct, he would most likely marry.
    Charlotte wondered what Cousin Finella—or, worse, her mother—would say if she let loose with her own loud and strident lament.
    Probably have the same shocked reaction as the one Finella was exhibiting, for the lady’s gaze remained locked on Lord Walbrook’s prize cock sitting atop the chest of drawers.
    A museum piece, he had written when he had sent it home from a South Seas