One Perfect Rose Read Free Page A

balls.” He lifted his gold card case from his desk drawer, then dropped it in again. Since he wouldn’t be traveling as the Duke of Ashburton; there was no need for calling cards.
    Then he sat down and wrote brief notes to his secretary and steward, telling them to proceed as usual. He considered writing his brother and sister but decided against it. There would be time enough for that later.
    As the duke wrote, Hubble packed the saddlebags. When he finished, he asked in a subdued voice, “Where shall I send urgent messages, Your Grace?”
    Stephen scaled the last note. “Nowhere. I don’t want to receive any messages.”
    â€œBut, sir…” Hubble started to protest, then quieted when his master gave him a gimlet stare. He settled for saying, “How long will you be gone, Your Grace?”
    â€œI have no idea,” Stephen said tersely. “I’ll come back when I’m ready, and not a moment before.”
    Beginning to look frantic, Hubble said, “Sir, you can’t just run off like this!”
    â€œI’m the most noble Duke of Ashburton,” Stephen said, a bitter edge on his voice. “I can do any damned thing I want.” Except live.
    He slid his arm under the bulging saddlebags and lifted them before remembering something else that must go. There was just enough room to add Blackmer’s jar of pills.
    Then he spun on his heel and headed for the door. He didn’t know how much time he had left, but he intended to enjoy every minute of it.

Chapter 2
    â€œRose!” Maria Fitzgerald cried. “My left wing is falling off!”
    â€œJust a moment, Mama,” Rosalind replied. Swiftly she pinned the end of a long swath of shimmering blue-gray fabric onto the rough boards of the barn wall. The generous folds of material had done duty as royal hangings and misty seas, and they made quite a decent magical cave. She attached the other end of the fabric twenty feet away, studied the effect, then went to help her mother.
    The barn was bustling as the Fitzgerald Theater Troupe prepared for the performance that would begin in a few minutes. Even though they were staging The Tempest in an isolated market town and half the people in the cast weren’t really actors, the members of the company took their work seriously.
    Sure enough, one of Maria’s silvery wings was drooping. Rosalind retrieved needle and thread from her kit, then ordered, “Turn around.”
    Obediently her mother pivoted so Rosalind could make repairs. Maria Fitzgerald’s lush womanly curves were not what Shakespeare had in mind when he described the delicate sprite Ariel. However, the gauzy, floating layers of her costume would win approval from male members of the audience, and her acting skill allowed her to make any role her own.
    Rosalind anchored the sagging wing to her mother’s bodice with a dozen swift stitches. “There you are, as good as new. Just don’t go flying into any trees.”
    While her mother chuckled, a clear soprano voice wailed, “Rose, I need you most desperately ! I can’t find Miranda’s necklace.”
    Rosalind rolled her eyes as she responded to her younger sister’s plea. Jessica, a blood-and-bone daughter of Thomas and Maria Fitzgerald, had inherited her parents’ beauty and expressive nature. Her dark lashes sweeping upward, she said dramatically, “If I don’t have my glittering sea creatures around my neck, everyone will watch Edmund instead of me. It will quite upset the balance of the play.”
    Rosalind made a rude noise. “You know very well that the men who aren’t staring at Mama will be staring at you. As to your necklace, I think it’s in that box.”
    Jessica dug into the chest that doubled as furniture in Prospero’s sea cave. A moment later she pulled out a nine-foot-long silken rope with gilded shells, starfish, and sea horses dangling from it. “Yes! How do