Winterset Read Free Page B

much better to have someone living there. Winterset is far too fine a house to stand empty so long.”
    “Oh, yes, it is beautiful,” Mrs. Burroughs hastened to agree, adding somewhat hesitantly, “Although it is a trifle odd, don’t you think?” She looked toward Anna apologetically. “I do not mean any offense, my dear. I know it is your ancestors’ house….”
    Anna gave her a reassuring smile. “Please. Do not fear it will offend me. Everyone knows that the Lord de Winter who built it was, well, a trifle whimsical.”
    “Exactly.” The vicar’s wife nodded, pleased at Anna’s understanding.
    “It would be wonderful if someone would live in it,” Mrs. Bennett agreed, her eyes shining at the prospect. “Think of the parties…the balls…. Do you remember that ball Lord Moreland gave when he lived here before? Such a grand turnout.”
    “Oh, yes, indeed,” Mrs. Burroughs agreed.
    Anna said nothing, letting the conversational tide move on without her. She remembered the ball very well. Too well. The memories of it had haunted her for years.
    She had looked her best. She had been aware of that. Her hair had been piled on top of her head in one of the intricate styles that her maid Penny was always trying to persuade her to wear, and she had worn a vivid deep blue gown that turned her eyes midnight blue. Her eyes had sparkled; her cheeks had been flushed with excitement. And she had glowed as if lit from within, her emotions turning her attractiveness into beauty.
    The Winterset ballroom had positively glittered with lights, and the scent of gardenias had perfumed the air. Anna, knowing that she had told Reed once that gardenias were her favorite flowers, was aware, with a happiness so great she felt as if she were about to burst, that Reed had ordered them as a gift to her. His eyes as he smiled down at her had confirmed that knowledge.
    It had been the most wonderful night of her life. She had danced only twice with Reed, the limit that propriety would allow, but those moments in his arms had been heavenly. She would never forget his face as he smiled down at her, his gray eyes warm and tender, the slash of dark eyebrows above them, the planes and hollows of his face as familiar and dear to her as if she had known him always, rather than only one month. The music, the other people, even the words they spoke, had been immaterial; the only important thing had been the way it felt to have his arm around her, her hand in his.
    Later, after the midnight supper, he had taken her hand and slipped out onto the terrace with her, evading the countless prying eyes inside. They had strolled down the steps to the garden. The evening had been cool, but the chill had felt pleasant after the heat of the ballroom. As they walked, his hand had clasped hers, and Anna’s pulse had begun to hammer in her throat. He had stopped and turned to face her, and she had looked up at him, knowing what was coming next, wanting it with every fiber of her being.
    Then he had bent and kissed her, and she had felt as if something exploded within her. Longing, hunger, a dancing, gibbering joy such as she had never experienced, all surged inside her, tangling and tumbling and racing through every inch of her. She had clung to him, lost to everything but Reed and the pleasure of his lips. And she had known at that moment that she had found the only man in the world for her, the love that would last her lifetime.
    Even now, just thinking about it sent a shaft of pain through her chest so swift and hard that she almost gasped. Anna closed her eyes briefly, willing down the anguish that welled up in her all over again. Giving up Reed Moreland had been the hardest thing that she had ever done in her life. It had taken her three long years to reach the point of—well, not happiness, exactly, but at least contentment with her life.
    It seemed the cruelest of jokes that Reed should decide to reappear in her life now. She dreaded the thought of what