Midnight Rose Read Free Page B

got to her feet and forced a smile she didn’t truly feel. “After you’ve had your bath, Letty will help you with your gown, and then I’ll meet you in the parlor.”
    Alone in the alcove, Erin looked at her reflection and wasn’t surprised to see the resentment and rebellion mirrored there. She didn’t want to be put on display like a slave at auction and had no intention of marrying only for monetary and social reasons. She’d gone to school in Atlanta and studied hard; she considered herself to have above average intelligence for a woman. Accordingly, she dared hope there might be more for her in life than being subservient to a man she didn’t love, giving birth to a baby every year, and filling her boring hours with tatting and sewing. Why couldn’t she find a job and support herself? Surely there was something she could do. Why did she have to adhere to unwritten laws that said she had to have a husband to take care of her, as if she were some kind of dependent simpleton? She wasn’t worried about finding one if she wanted one; she was not at all conceited about her looks. And men seemed to find her height of nearly five feet nine an interesting contrast to dainty, fluffy girls of diminutive size. Well, she might have to go to the ball, but she’d do absolutely nothing to entice or encourage any man.
    With that firm resolution, Erin had her bath, finishing, as always, by vigorously scrubbing with the strange solution. Letty helped her into the gown, marveling at her tiny waist, envying once more her generous bosom.
    “You don’t need no stays, and you don’t need them new-type corsets with the cup-shaped bust sections, either. I’d say you’ve got a figure any woman would die for, and a body any man would kill for,”she added with a rare devilish grin.
    It was like the old Letty, Erin thought, relieved things were starting to seem a bit more normal between them.
    She turned in front of the mirror. The bodice of the dress was crusted with tiny, precious pearls in white and smoke shades. From the narrow waist, the cascade of shaded colors began, from palest pink to deepest rose, with an overlay of pearl-studded chiffon. The sleeves were poufed, also interspersed with precious nacres.
    For any other occasion, Erin knew she’d be thrilled over such elegance. The concept behind the Rose Ball, however, she found degrading to women. “You know something, Letty?” she couldn’t resist proclaiming. “In a way, the only difference between tonight’s ball and a slave auction is hypocrisy.”
    At that, Letty scurried from the room, not about to indulge in such a delicate topic of conversation.
    When Erin entered the parlor, her mother cried, “Dear God in heaven, child, you’re beautiful!” Quickly she set aside her sherry and crossed the room to embrace her gently and exclaim with shining eyes, “I’m so very proud to be your mother.”
    Zachary Tremayne felt anything but fatherly as his eyes drank in the stirring sight of his stepdaughter. He didn’t dare stand, lest the desire she’d so instantly evoked be obvious in his tight trousers. He raised one hand, still holding his drink, in a toast. “To the most gorgeous enchantress Virginia has ever seen,” he said.
    Erin murmured an obligatory acknowledgment but didn’t look his way. She could actually feel the heat of his stare from across the room and wondered why her mother didn’t sense it. Yet Erin knew it was a blessing she didn’t. The man was evil, a reprobate, and she couldn’t stand even to be in the same room with him.
    “I think we’d better leave now,” she said, declining the drink that Roscoe, the butler, offered.
    In a thick, husky voice, Zachary protested, “You’ve got time for a sherry. After all, you’re supposed to be fashionably late, make a grand entrance.” He didn’t want her to leave, wanted to drink in the sight of her as long as possible.
    Erin bit back a sharp retort. She didn’t want to make any kind of