Valentine Read Online Free

impression.
    “Fell in?” Clarissa persisted. “How?”
    Theo sighed. Her sister never let go until she was satisfied. “I was leaning over, trying to tickle a trout, and I lost my balance.” She stepped through the open doors into the drawing room.
    “Theo!” Emily squeaked. “You’re dripping all over the carpet.”
    “Oh, sorry.” She looked down at the puddle forming at her feet.
    “Theo, dear, I’m not going to ask how you come to be in that condition,” her mother said, laying down her embroidery.“But I think it would be best if you were to go out again and come in through the side door. This carpet is not ours to ruin.”
    “Of course … it belongs to a Gilbraith now. I was forgetting. Forgive me.” Theo turned on her heel and marched out again.
    Lady Belmont sighed. There was no point ignoring the facts. They were going to have to get used to it eventually—and the sooner they were reconciled, the happier they would be. But she was under no illusions about Theo, who was going to have the most difficulty. The house and the land were in her blood. A most powerful spiritual legacy from both father and grandfather to the girl child they’d adored.

“A MESSENGER CAME
from the village, my lady.”
    “Oh, thank you, Foster.” Lady Belmont smiled absently at the butler as she took the envelope from the silver tray. She didn’t recognize the hard black script and frowned, having expected a message from one of their neighbors—an invitation to some quiet function, probably. The late earl’s dictates on mourning were known to everyone, but the countryside, nevertheless, knew she would accept only discreet invitations.
    “Ask Cook to come for the day’s menus in half an hour, would you, Foster?” Elinor took the message into the small parlor where she dealt with household matters and her own correspondence. She broke the wafer with a slim paper knife and unfolded the single sheet.
    Lord Stoneridge would do himself the honor of calling upon Lady Belmont this afternoon. If it was inconvenient, perhaps her ladyship would suggest an alternative time. His lordship could be reached at the Hare and Hounds.
    Well, it had to come sooner or later. Elinor folded the sheet again, unaware of her restless fingers repeatedly pressingthe crease. The move to the dower house wouldn’t take more than a day or two … they would have plenty of help. She would go down to the house this morning and walk through the rooms again. They were furnished pleasantly enough, but she would need to decide where to place her own personal pieces that she’d brought with her to Stoneridge Manor on her wedding day….
    Elinor blinked rapidly and stiffened her shoulders. The sense of loss was always with her—the futile anger that she’d had so little married life, that Kit’s life had been snatched from him so violently and so early … too, too early! That French monster bore the blood of half a generation on his hands.
    “Mama, we’re walking to the vicarage. Do you have any messages for Mrs. Haversham?” Emily came in, looking fresh and elegant in a walking dress of crisp cambric, a chip-straw bonnet on her glowing brown curls, jean half boots on her narrow feet.
    “I asked Cook for the calves’-foot jelly you promised Mrs. Haversham,” Clarissa put in, peeping over her taller sister’s shoulders. Her eyes sharpened suddenly as she saw her mother’s face.
    “What is it, Mama? Has something upset you?”
    Elinor smiled and shook her head. Clarissa was the most sensitive of her daughters, quick to feel and respond to her mother’s moods.
    “Nothing really, but I’m afraid we must be prepared for a difficult interview this-afternoon. Lord Stoneridge is to call.”
    “Oh, why can’t he leave us alone!” Clarissa wailed. “Why does he have to come and call? He could just say he wanted to move in and we could move out … and we’d never have to see each other.”
    “Don’t talk nonsense, Clarissa,” Elinor rebuked