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The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 8a

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 8a

Gerard had been helpless. Too helpless to do anything for her.

He had wanted to shout at them all to stop laughing at her, or perhaps go to her, take her hand, and pull her from the dining room. But anything of the sort would only embarrass her further.

He saw the pain in her eyes, and he saw the mask of calm settle over her face. He had never fully realized it was a mask until that moment.

There was a great deal about her that he didn’t know. That he hadn’t cared to know.

He wanted to know all those things now.

Perhaps not at this exact moment. First he had to walk again, properly, without this cursed cane. He wanted to be whole again, and independent, and regain some measure of self-respect.

Also at this exact moment, he had to somehow escape the two chattering women on either side of him before his ears bled.

He sat at the edge of the ballroom as couples swirled to the strains of a country dance. Garlands of greenery draped the walls in graceful arcs, lending the scent of the woodlands to the room, while servants moved about with cups of wassail or punch or wine. Everyone in the county who had been invited had come for the Belmoores’ annual Christmas ball.

However, the two women sitting next to him affected to have no interest in dancing. Miss Church-Pratton was charming, but he noticed that the conversation invariably circled round to herself or something related to herself. Miss Barnes was not so self-centred—she asked him question upon question about his life and interests and thought everything he did was wonderful.

Gerard felt trapped in more ways than one. He used to love dancing. He hadn’t been terribly good at it, but he had enjoyed it. He enjoyed watching it much, much less.

His knee ached as if to remind him, You’re landlocked, my boy.

“Such a crush,” Miss Church-Pratton said. “I am sure Felicity is thrilled at the attendance, but I prefer a smaller, more select party, myself.”

“Did you attend any balls, Captain Foremont?” Miss Barnes asked. “I am sure you must have been quite popular.”

He thought of his men, shirtless, dancing a jig on the upper deck. “Quite a few balls, I daresay.”

He looked up suddenly and saw Miranda across the room. She was not looking at him, but appeared to be searching the ballroom for someone. When she saw him, she smiled slightly, then her gaze slid to the two ladies with him.

And he knew in that instant that he would not be feeling this way if Miranda were sitting next to him instead.

Then someone walked into his line of sight and he could see her no longer.

“I much prefer sitting here with you, Captain Foremont,” Miss Church-Pratton said. “The young country folk whom Felicity was forced to invite are so exuberant when they dance. The men quite crush one’s dress.”

“I am sure you would never do so, Captain,” Miss Barnes said.

He thought of excusing himself on the grounds that he saw his mother signaling to him, but for the small problem that his mother was not in the ballroom and the fear that the two women would insist upon accompanying him to her.

Rescue came in the unlikely person of Lady Wynwood.

“Miss Barnes,” Lady Wynwood said, “your mother may need your assistance in the drawing room. She is partnered with Mrs. Seager at Whist and is so frustrated that she looks as though she might wring her neck.”

“Oh, goodness.” Miss Barnes hurried off to prevent her parent from committing murder.

Lady Wynwood settled into her vacated seat. “Miss Church-Pratton, Captain Foremont, lovely ball is it not? It puts me in mind of one I attended during my come-out in London. I was thrilled to be asked to dance by the most handsome boy in the room—Lord Kellerton, before he lost all his lovely golden hair and contracted the pox from his mistress.”

Gerard choked, and Miss Church-Pratton looked scandalized. Lady Wynwood was up to some sort of trick.

“I had enhanced my décolletage with some, er, strategically tucked muslin. We were engaged in a lively country dance, when a piece of muslin became untucked. You can imagine my consternation, Miss Church-Pratton. How to explain the unevenness of one’s bosom?”

Lady Wynwood stopped and looked expectantly at Miss Church-Pratton, obviously waiting for a response. The young lady actually gulped and said weakly, “Indeed.”

Gerard was forced to look away, his face flaming, unsure if he would perish from embarrassment or break a rib from holding in his laughter. He saw Miranda again. She was still looking for someone, her gloved hand fingering the paste stones at her throat that made her eyes glow like real emeralds. Compared to the more richly dressed women, she looked fresh and unspoiled, and more lovely.

But then Felicity appeared, her mouth pinched. She gripped Miranda by the elbow and dragged her out of the ballroom.

Gerard tensed, and realized he had been about to rise to go after her, rudely leaving Lady Wynwood and Miss Church-Pratton. Something about Miranda made him want to throw off all the conventions of polite society.

***
Next blog post: Chapter 8b

Order The Spinster's Christmas:

Kindle
iBooks
Kobo
Nook (coming soon)

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The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 7b

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 7b

The servants began to serve the food, and Miranda was hard pressed to keep Paul, seated on her other side, from taking an entire leg of pheasant onto his plate. There was also roast beef, venison, goose, pork, pigeons, chicken, and fish. Miranda forced Paul to take some vegetables, which was much less difficult than it might have been had there not been so many to choose from, including carrots, lettuces, parsnips, celery, leeks, and cabbage.

Paul attacked his plate like a savage. Miranda considered admonishing him, but then decided that surely bad table manners were excused at Christmastide. Instead, she turned to her great-aunt. “Did Mrs. Seager’s son and his family come up from London?” She did not wish to open with the question she most wanted answered, and hoped to distract her aunt with her favourite topic—her neighbors’ affairs.

“No, not this year, for they are promised to his wife’s family. Mrs. Seager was feeling quite low when last I heard from her. And her nephew is in the navy, apparently fighting off a horde of mosquitoes in India, so her family gathering is small this year.”

Aunt Lavinia rambled on, not only about Mrs. Seager’s family, but also about the Drews, the Barnes, and the Wilsons as her mind wandered down its twisting trail of news.

During a lull in the conversation, Miranda asked, “Aunt, would any of your friends perhaps have need of a companion or governess?” She would prefer to accompany Ellie to the Foremont home, but she must still continue to search for a paid position that would enable her to escape Felicity, or the Beattys.

Her aunt’s eyebrows rose as her fork halted halfway to her mouth. “Good to see some pluck in you after all, my dear.”

Miranda smiled. “You will not mention this to Cecil?”

“Good gracious, why should I do that? I try to avoid speaking to the blockhead as often as possible. And his termagant of a wife is just as bad.”

“I do wish to find a position as soon as may be, perhaps even before Twelfth Night.”

“I know of nothing at the moment, my dear, but I shall speak to my friends about it when I visit them. You should have written to me earlier.”

“I feared Cecil would intercept your reply.”

“Ah, yes, the nosy man still goes through all the post, does he? He’s just like his father.”

Except that Cecil’s mother had been a soft woman, indolent but not unkind. Felicity had run roughshod over her mother-in-law.

“Have you spoken to the rector’s new wife?” Aunt Lavinia asked. “Mrs. Barnes wrote to tell me all about her. Mrs. Peterson apparently married to disoblige her well-connected family, at least until her husband’s older brother unexpectedly became heir presumptive to an earldom. She may have friends in need of a companion or governess.”

“I believe she is attending the ball tonight.” Miranda need only attend to the children after dinner before she could return downstairs to the ball.

Miranda had not attended the ball last Christmas, during her first year with Cecil after her parents died. Felicity’s youngest son had developed a putrid sore throat and so Miranda had nursed him throughout Christmas Day. He had complained bitterly at missing the Christmas pudding.

“Speaking of Mrs. Barnes, her great-nephew is now a lieutenant in the army,” Aunt Lavinia said. “She just heard from him in a letter. He was foolish enough to be bitten by a dog. She is quite concerned, for she wrote to me, ‘Lavinia, you never know about these foreign dogs. They may carry exotic diseases.’ And I must say, I do believe she is correct.”

Finally, the servants removed the dinner dishes and the candles were extinguished. The children began squirming in their seats and whispering to each other.

With dramatic flair, the butler entered the dining room bearing the large, mounded Christmas pudding on a platter, aflame with a blazing blue light, with flickers of scarlet and orange. Miranda could smell the burning brandy, which also carried the scent of citrus peel and sugar. The adults applauded while the children cheered. Carefully, the butler set the pudding on the table.

The enormity of the pudding ensured that everyone had a generous portion. As happened every year, there were cries of delight and dismay as people found on their plates the trinkets that had been stirred into the pudding. This year, Felicity was delighted to find the silver shilling, signifying wealth, while Lady Wynwood found the button for a lucky life and one of Aunt Augusta’s younger sons was disgusted by the ring he found, which predicted marriage. Perhaps most appropriately, Gerard received the miniature anchor, meaning safe harbor found.

Paul eyed Miranda’s plate, which had a larger portion of pudding than his own, so she traded with him. And then her fork hit something hard, and she pulled out the silver thimble.

She stared at it. Although she knew it was only a game, just a silly tradition, she wanted to burst into tears—she, who tried never to show her emotions, to simply present a mask of calm to all the world, as if the barbs and stings did not bother her in the least. This barb was perhaps one of the worst, and yet it was entirely accidental.

One of the children crowed, “Miranda’s got the thimble!”

There was a single heartbeat of surprised, uncomfortable silence around the table. Then Miss Church-Pratton giggled.

Felicity quickly hissed at her, and she was silenced, but her laughter caused some of the children to mimic her. Sniggers and whispers erupted, and while one or two adults hushed their children, they responded slowly to the reprimands.

Miranda’s face flamed like the brandy-soaked pudding. Yet why should she be embarrassed? She was a spinster, as the thimble signified, and it was no secret that such was her fate. Her own parents had not been able to induce a man to offer for her when she had had a dowry, before the crops had failed and her father mortgaged the farm.

But a clawed hand gripped her heart, squeezing and digging into it. She closed her eyes, focused on her breathing, tried once more to reclaim the equanimity that was the only comfort she now had.

She opened her eyes. She picked up the thimble with fingers that shook only a little and wiped it with her napkin. She said the first thing that came to mind. “How fortuitous. I had need of a new thimble.”

A different type of laughter rippled along the table, with perhaps some relief that the moment had passed.

She did not know why, but she dared to look down the table at Gerard. He was staring at her, his eyes thunderous, concerned.

Miranda held his gaze, then gave a small smile. The lines along his brow relaxed, although he did not smile back.

“Good show, my girl.” Aunt Lavinia patted her hand. “The thimble is not only for spinsterhood. It also is for thrift, a woman who saves.”

She gave a short bark of laughter, which might have had a hint of hysteria in it. “I have no money to save, Aunt Lavinia. And no household to save it for.”

“It is not always money. Women save many things.”

A small hand crept into hers from her other side. She turned to meet Paul’s fierce look.

“When I am old enough, I shall marry you, Cousin Miranda,” he said. “Then they shall see they ought not to have laughed.”

“You darling boy.” She kissed the top of his head and wrapped her arm around him briefly.

Then she bent low to whisper in his ear. “Let’s play Snapdragon near Miss Church-Pratton’s skirt.”

***
Next blog post: Chapter 8a

Order The Spinster's Christmas:

Kindle
iBooks
Kobo
Nook (coming soon)

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The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 7a

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 7a

December 25th

“You look pretty,” Ellie said to Miranda.

“Thank you.” She stood in front of the small mirror on the wall of Miss Teel’s room, pinning her dark hair. She had made several narrow braids and coiled them in a simple pattern that looked like a more complex one, at first glance.

Miss Teel had already dressed and was helping some of the older schoolgirls with their toilettes, since the entire family were to dine together again tonight before the ball. Miranda normally took very little heed of her own dress, but tonight she wanted to look … different. Even though she knew there was no reason for it.

Not that she had much choice in what to wear. When she had been living with her parents, they had attended parties and dances, but Miranda had not always accompanied them—the crowded rooms made her feel as though she couldn’t breathe, and her conversation became even more insipid than usual. So her wardrobe even then had been small. Now, she had but two evening gowns, the dark blue one she had worn last night and this one.

It was her favourite. She had altered it herself from a gown her mother had no longer wanted, a pale green silk with the fuller cut that had recently fallen out of fashion. Miranda had trimmed it with emerald green ribbon, and then embroidered the fabric in a delicate pattern of gold leaves. It was old, and it did not fit her quite as well as she would have liked, but she was pleased at how the embroidery looked and took pleasure in the feminine way the skirt swished about her ankles.

“I must take this from you now, you scamp.” She removed the necklace from around Ellie’s neck, which she had been allowed to wear while Miranda finished dressing. It had been set with real emeralds when her mother first owned it, but their finances had forced her to sell the gems and replace them with paste. The paste stones were rather unnaturally colored and fitted badly into their settings, but Miranda liked they way they matched her eyes.

She tried to tell herself yet again that she ought not to try to impress anyone. Gerard’s opinion of her appearance shouldn’t interest her in the least, because she would never consider opening herself to someone else. No one had ever understood her, and there was too much about her that could never come to light.

She would always be who she was, she would always be how she was. So it would always be just herself.

“Shall we collect the other children and go downstairs?” she asked Ellie. The little girl jumped off the low cot on which Miranda had been temporarily sleeping while the house was so full of guests and servants.

The other nursery-maids were herding children out of the other bedrooms in the nursery wing, and Miranda helped wipe hands and faces with a damp cloth, retie sashes that had gone askew, and find a couple of lost shoes. Then they all went down to the drawing room.

Even though she was surrounded by excited children and all the family gathered for dinner, she looked up and met Gerard’s eyes as soon as she entered the room. His injury had caused him to lose some weight, but he still stood tall and proud, exuding a vitality that made all other men look weak and sickly. His dark evening coat set off his wide shoulders, and his snowy cravat was simply tied with modest shirt points, which revealed the strong line of his jaw.

He smiled at her, which made her blush and look away. Then she was embarrassed to have responded in so missish a fashion.

There was a cry as two boys began to argue over who would get the largest piece of roast beef at dinner, and she turned her attention to her charges.

She dissuaded some of the children from starting a game of jack-straws, since they were to dine soon, and directly on time, the butler opened the drawing room doors to announce that dinner was served. While the other guests proceeded into the dining room, Miranda kept a watchful eye on Paul, who delighted in playing with the greenery over the fireplace and had already caused an entire bough to tumble to the floor this morning after church.

She was one of the last to be seated, and she saw an opportunity. Her Great-Aunt Lavinia had arrived only this morning, and the elderly woman had traded seats with someone—most likely offending Felicity’s sense of propriety—and was near to the children’s chairs. Miranda traded seats with Paul in order to sit next to her great-aunt.

“Hello, Aunt Lavinia.”

“Oh! Catherine—no, Miranda, isn’t it? You look just like your mother,” Aunt Lavinia shouted. She was not the oldest person at table, but she probably had the worst sense of hearing. However, she could read lips, so Miranda made an effort to face her when speaking.

“Have you been enjoying yourself, Aunt?”

“Most certainly, dear. So many friends have returned to the neighbourhood for Christmas, so in the next few days, I shall call upon them.”

And, knowing her aunt, gossiping and collecting news. She was sister to Miranda’s grandfather and had married Sir Justin Skinnerton, whose estate bordered the Belmoore lands. A lifelong resident of the area, she was close to all the local families.

Cecil harrumphed enough that silence slowly filtered down the long table until all eyes were upon him. Then he gave a most respectful prayer, giving thanks for the food, for the Christ child, for the past harvest, for the harvest to come, for everyone’s good health, for everyone’s continued good health, and he might have continued if Paul had not whispered loudly, “When can we eat?”

Cecil cleared his throat and concluded his prayer, then stood. It signaled the servants to scurry about and serve steaming cups of wassail to all the company, including a special version using apple cider instead of ale for the children. Extra servants had been hired for the ball after dinner, so it only took a minute or two before everyone had a cup to raise.

“A toast to family and friends,” Cecil said solemnly.

The company replied, “Family and friends!” and drank.

Miranda savoured the flavour of the sweet wassail, a secret recipe passed down to each of the baronets’ wives in the Belmoore family. Felicity had made the wassail every year since Cecil’s mother had died, and Miranda admitted Felicity had a knack for it. She perhaps used less ale and more sherry, which brought out the flavours of the roasted apples, nutmeg, and ginger.

***
Next blog post: Chapter 7b

Order The Spinster's Christmas:

Kindle
iBooks
Kobo
Nook (coming soon)

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The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 6c

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 6c

The doors opened and the butler entered with a mound of raisins in a large shallow bowl. A footman lit a taper from the fire and set the brandy-soaked fruit ablaze.

Oooh rose from the children as the blue flame blazed in the darkness, turning the butler’s staid face rather sinister. As he placed the bowl upon a low table in the centre of the room, it was the adults who led the traditional song:

Here comes the flaming bowl,
Don’t he mean to take his toll,
Snip! Snap! Dragon!
Take care you don’t take too much,
Be not greedy in your clutch,
Snip! Snap! Dragon!

Then adults and children alike gathered round for a game of Snapdragon, with each person reaching in to snatch a flaming raisin and eat it without being burned. Servants hovered nearby, ready to douse any inadvertent fires set by dropped raisins.

In the darkness, Gerard contrived to sneak away from Miss Church-Pratton and move about the dark room, straining to see each of the people in shadow. Then he saw Miranda, seated by the window with a bundle in her arms. As he approached, he saw that Ellie was asleep on her lap.

“You will not allow her to play Snapdragon?” he asked.

“Most certainly not,” she retorted.

“I seem to recall that we played at a fairly young age.”

“And at that tender age, you burned both your sleeve and your eyebrows, do you recall?”

He laughed. “I had forgotten.”

She looked at the blue light in the centre of the room, which flickered as people moved in front of it. “I like the light. It is mysterious and lovely. But I admit I like it better from a distance.” She turned her face toward him, and even in the darkness he could see the gleam of her smile.

He answered with one of his own, and he reached out to touch her cheek because it seemed the most natural and necessary thing for him to do. As in the carriage when he had touched her hand, he wanted to be connected to her in a powerful way that he could not understand.

Her skin trembled beneath his fingers, and then she turned her face away.

He suddenly felt awkward and large. He clasped his hands in front of him, then behind him, then he shifted his feet, except that he put too much weight on his injured knee. He winced.

“Does it hurt you?” she asked.

He didn’t know how she could have known, in the dark. “It is stiff.”

“I shall send the poultice to you after I put Ellie to bed.” She made as if to rise, but he remembered why he had sought her out.

“Stay. I have a question to ask you.” He didn’t need to, but he put a hand on her shoulder—again, that desire to touch her. He left it there for a moment, even after she had settled back into the chair, Ellie still fast asleep in her arms.

“Have you thought more about the woman?”

“Yes.” As usual, she surprised him. “I have wondered if perhaps the attack was not by chance. But …”

When she did not continue, he said, “You are very insightful. I should like to hear your thoughts. Can you think of anyone who would wish to harm you?”

She hesitated longer than he would have expected, but then said, “No. I have no family and no fortune. I had one season in London and have spent the rest of my life in the country, first with my parents and then with Cecil.”

“But we cannot dismiss the possibility simply because we cannot think of a good motivation. You must be careful.”

She looked up at him again, and although he couldn’t see her eyes, something made him feel rather fevered. He added, “After all, Ellie is often with you. I am concerned for both of you, of course. It was only by chance that she was nearer to me in the forest, and that you were farther away from the rest of the party.”

“Of course.” Her voice sounded hollow. She rose to her feet, carrying Ellie. “If you will excuse me, I must be awake early to help Felicity with the preparations for the ball tomorrow.” The Christmas Day ball had been a tradition at Wintrell Hall much like the kissing bough.

He didn’t want her to leave him. “It sounds as though Felicity has invited all the county.”

“There are more guests this year than last year. We have hired twice the usual number of local people to help tomorrow.” She suddenly stiffened.

“What is it?” He moved closer to her.

Miranda turned, and they stood close to one another, face to face, Ellie’s sleeping form between them. He could smell lavender and lemon, soothing and yet also tart, like her.

“The villagers all know me,” she said in a low voice. “None of them would have attacked me because they all know I am a poor relation and have nothing of value. So it must have been someone newly come to the village.”

“I could make inquiries, determine whether anyone has arrived recently.”

“They will hardly speak to you, especially if it is someone who knows the woman who attacked me. Can you send your valet?”

“I am sharing my father’s man, and the local residents know him well because of my father’s longtime friendship with Mr. Belmoore.”

“Is there another servant? A stranger? Someone the woman would not know is connected to the Belmoores.”

“There is no other servant here with us who would be suitable, but …” He suddenly knew who he could use. “I will think of something.”

She smiled calmly, not needling him for more information or pouting that he would not confide in her. “Good night, Gerard.”

“Good night, Miranda.”

He watched her leave, still carrying Ellie, and then he left the drawing room through another door. He knocked on the door to the library, then opened it to an empty room.

Seating himself at Cecil’s desk, he took out a quill and paper and proceeded to write.

***
Next blog post: Chapter 7a

Order The Spinster's Christmas:

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iBooks
Kobo
Nook (coming soon)

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The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 6b

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 6b

He determined not to summon Dr. Morgan if his knee grew worse, and to do all he could to prevent the man from coming near Miranda or Ellie. “How is Ellie?”

“She woke several hours ago, and while she is quieter than usual, she seems to be well. I left her playing jack-straws with her cousins.”

“I am glad.” He had never felt so alarmed as when he had looked at Ellie and seen blood on her face. Although the sight of Miranda on the ground had made his heart stop in his chest.

“No, to the other right,” his mother told the servant.

“The kissing bough looks nice,” Gerard said, immediately regretting how inane that sounded. Earlier, Felicity had grown impatient with Miranda because she was not draping the greenery in the dining room as quickly as she wished, and so she had assigned to her the task of creating the kissing bough. Miranda had twined the mistletoe upon the wire frames with scarlet ribbons and roses made from twisted red paper. Stars cut from gold paper peeked out from under the dark green leaves and pearly white berries.

“Thank you,” Miranda said. Miss Church-Pratton would have laughed and teased him, but Miranda accepted his words without judgment on how foolish he sounded. “Your knee is paining you?” She stated it calmly, already knowing the answer.

“No, I am—”

“There is a poultice I can make for you that will soothe it. I shall give it to your man later.”

He wanted to say that he was well and in no need of any poultices, but Miranda was known for her skill in the stillroom. If it would indeed ease the pain, he ought not to indulge his pride and act like a muttonhead. Say thank you, Gerard. “Er … thank you, Miranda.”

“You are welcome.”

No fussing. No censure. Just a poultice for his knee. Miranda put him at ease like no one else had cared to do.

He caught his mother looking at them both, but the expression on her face was difficult to interpret. Some alarm—Gerard had not forgotten the embarrassing insinuation that Miranda would attempt to ensnare him just as Miss Church-Pratton seemed to be doing—but also some confusion, perhaps a thread of guilt. No, he must be mistaken about that. His mother looked away again.

“Why would that woman attack you when there were so many people nearby?” he asked.

“I had wandered away from all of you,” she said.

“We were fortunate that Ellie had lost sight of you and become alarmed. I went to look for you, and none too soon.”

“It is also fortunate that I had nothing for her to steal.”

“Now it is time to test it.” It was his father, just come into the drawing room and admiring the kissing bough, which the servant had finally hung to his mother’s specifications.

His father snatched his mother’s hand and yanked her under the kissing bough. She gave a surprised yelp, then a delighted gurgle. He kissed her firmly on the lips, then reached up to remove one of the berries. When all the berries were gone, there would be no more stolen kisses.

Cecil looked scandalised but resigned, for there had always been a kissing bough at Wintrell Hall for as long as the Belmoores had celebrated Christmas there.

“It’s almost time!” came a call from outside the drawing room. They all trooped to the doorway to the dining room, where Cecil held a large wax candle that had been decorated with gilt paper round its base.

Children came down the stairs to gather with the adults, and Cecil looked with pride at the assembly. He did enjoy theatrics when it made him look important.

“It is sunset, and now we will light the Yule candle,” he intoned. He led the way into the dining room, which had been magnificently decorated and set for the Christmas Eve feast. To accommodate all the guests, including the children, chairs had been shoved close to each other around the long table.

The guests stopped at the door while Cecil bore the candle to a special glass candle holder in the centre of the table. A servant approached with a lit taper, and with great solemnity, Cecil lit the candle.

“Happy Christmas,” he said, as though at a funeral.

In contrast, everyone responded with a rousing, “Happy Christmas!”

“May we be blessed by the light of the Yule candle,” Cecil said.

It did indeed look beautiful on the table. It was large enough that it would burn until dawn Christmas morning. Cecil would extinguish the flame just before the entire household left for church.

Everyone filed around the table with many smiles and appreciative sniffs at the feast to come. They all stood behind their chairs, waiting for everyone to find their places, and then at Cecil’s signal, they all sat to table at the same time. It had always been so. As a child, Gerard had been told it was to prevent bad luck.

He again found himself seated next to Miss Church-Pratton. Everyone was squeezed rather tightly together, but she seemed to rub her arm against his shoulder much more than Liliana, one of Mrs. Hathaway’s daughters still in the schoolroom, on his other side.

The meal was generous, with roast goose, boar’s head, venison, chicken, and turkey. There were more vegetable dishes than he could see from his seat, including potatoes, parsnips, Brussels sprouts, and carrots, as well as stuffing. The meal tomorrow night would be even more lavish.

Also according to tradition, everyone rose from the table at the same time. No after-dinner port and cigars for the gentlemen—everyone gathered in the drawing room. The tension of anticipation filled the room as the servants doused the candles, and then came a moment of breathless silence.

***
Next blog post: Chapter 6c

Order The Spinster's Christmas:

Kindle
iBooks
Kobo
Nook (coming soon)

Don't want to miss a post? Subscribe to my blog via email:

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The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 6a

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 6a

Gerard pulled his mouth wide in what he hoped looked like a smile and passed Miss Church-Pratton a fir branch.

“Oh, Captain Foremont, are you certain your leg is not paining you?” She gave him a soulful look that brought out the blue of her eyes.

“I am perfectly well, Miss Church-Pratton.” Gerard ignored the ache in his knee.

“I do appreciate your help but I would not wish to cause you further injury.”

He tried to stretch his leg without drawing attention to the action. He seemed to be mostly recovered from the events of this morning in the woods. He moved a little more slowly and he could not climb the ladder to decorate the chandelier, but he was perfectly able to collect greenery and deliver it to the women who arranged it around the house. Unfortunately, Miss Church-Pratton seemed to call upon him quite incessantly for more greens.

“For I must tell you, Captain Foremont,” Miss Church-Pratton said as she wrapped ribbon around a fir bough and strand of ivy, “I was alarmed when I saw you limping so dreadfully as you came into the house.”

He would rather not be reminded of that riotous scene, complete with schoolboys chasing each other around the entrance hall, yelling at the tops of their lungs, and Mrs. Augusta Hathaway shrieking about gypsies attacking children in the woods. Ellie’s cries had turned to sniffles by the time they arrived at the house, but the noise had caused her to start crying again. Gerard had tried to speak to Miranda but hadn’t been able to get close to her.

“It must have been terrible for you.”

Miss Church-Pratton’s fussing over Gerard annoyed him, but he tried to tell himself that she was simply concerned.

“Now, if I had known you would be going greenery hunting rather than with the men hauling in the Yule log, I would have gone with all of you,” Miss Church-Pratton said.

Gerard had been secretly relieved that she had not joined the greenery party this morning. He had suspected that she had no wish to be in the company of all the children.

“Perhaps I could have protected you from that madwoman.” She smiled, dimpling up at him.

Considering the horrible violence that Ellie had been forced to witness, Gerard found Miss Church-Pratton’s comment inappropriate. He looked down at her coldly. “You no longer appear to need assistance, Miss Church-Pratton. I shall help my mother.” He gave her the tiniest of bows, then crossed the room to where his mother was directing a servant on a ladder in hanging the kissing bough directly over the open doorway into the drawing room.

His mother eyed the expression on his face with wariness and a splash of irritation. “I do wish you would stop focusing on your injury quite so much, Gerard. You may not be aware of it, but it casts a pall over the company, which is not very considerate of you.”

He did not feel he deserved his mother’s censure, but she had seen him through the blackest of moods over the past several months, and he knew it had put a strain on her temper. And the truth was that he did indeed feel frustrated with himself, not a novel emotion by any means. He had not been able to chase the lone woman because he had been unable to rise quickly to his feet, and he would not have been able to hobble after her in any event.

Added to his frustration was a strong dose of guilt. He had been horrified that Ellie had been injured simply because she had been standing too close when the woman had swung the branch at him.

“No, to the right,” his mother said to the servant, who obediently moved the kissing bough to his right. “No, the other right.” She indicated her own right side. “Miranda, is it centred?”

Miranda had been tying greens into a long garland to drape over the bannister, but she rose to stand in front of the open doorway, her head tilted to the side. “Perhaps a little to the right …”

Miranda appeared to be her usual calm self, although paler. A half hour after returning to the house, Gerard had climbed the stairs to see Ellie in the nursery, and Miranda had been there after finally coaxing the little girl to sleep. Miranda had not looked as though her nerves were frayed or that she were likely to take to her bed, which was what Gerard’s mother had done for an hour after he returned. Miranda had insisted that the blow to her head had merely caused her a slight headache.

She had changed her dress, as had they all, for dinner. Her dark blue gown made her skin even whiter, her hair glossy like a raven’s feathers. When he first saw her, she looked so lovely that he hadn’t been able to speak for a moment. Luckily, she hadn’t been looking at him, and then all the guests had begun the task of decorating the house with the greenery.

“Are you well?” he asked her.

“A slight headache.”

He could see the pain in the lines across her forehead, alongside her mouth and eyes. He would have wanted to look at the base of her neck, hidden by the folds of her shawl, if it had not been so improper for him to do so. “Has the doctor seen you?”

“No, but one of the maids has seen to my injury.”

“One of the maids? Cecil did not call for Dr. Morgan for you or for Ellie?”

“Betty, the maid, is very skilled in healing,” she said in a calm voice that alleviated his outrage. “Her mother is the local midwife, and the tenants call upon her when they cannot summon Dr. Morgan. I admit that I would trust Betty more than Dr. Morgan, since he often comes to the house smelling of wine.”

He determined not to summon Dr. Morgan if his knee grew worse, and to do all he could to prevent the man from coming near Miranda or Ellie. “How is Ellie?”

***
Next blog post: Chapter 6b

Order The Spinster's Christmas:

Kindle
iBooks
Kobo
Nook (coming soon)

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The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 5b

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 5b

Pain exploded throughout her skull. She didn’t remember falling to the ground, but she became aware of dead leaves under her cheek, the overpowering scent of mildew and dirt. Her limbs felt chained to the ground.

Something blocked the dim light, and she saw the edge of a dark cloak dragging in the wet leaves. Hands ran over her body as though searching for something. She tried to roll over, but the attacker was leaning hard against her back.

Then she felt, through the ground, the heavier tread of boots, the lighter touch of a cane. No. She had to warn Gerard. He had Ellie with him.

The steps stopped. “Miranda!” he shouted.

The hands touching her froze.

He hastened toward her at the same time her attacker moved away. Miranda rolled over.

There was a blur, a swirl of skirts, and then a heavy branch swung though the air at Gerard’s head. He ducked, but the action made him stagger against his cane.

“Gerard!” she gasped. Miranda was behind the attacker and saw nothing but a dark cloak.

Then she saw Ellie standing a few feet away from Gerard. The girl had frozen, her face aghast. Fir boughs slowly rained down upon the ground.

Gerard’s expression looked more shocked than injured. But then the woman swung the branch again and hit his hip. He grimaced and fell to his knee, losing his cane.

But this time, the branch clipped Ellie on the head, and the little girl crumpled.

“Ellie!” Strength surged through her, and Miranda scrabbled through the leaves and bushes on her hands and knees.

The woman aimed a third blow at Gerard’s head, but he was able to grab the branch in both hands. The two of them struggled.

It seemed an age before Miranda reached Ellie’s form on the ground. The little girl was screaming. She gathered her into her arms and tried to drag her away from Gerard and the woman, turning her back to them to protect Ellie.

Grunting, frantic movements in the undergrowth. Then the woman cried out, her voice sounding as if she were being flung away.

Miranda turned her head to look and saw a heap of wool fabric several feet away from Gerard. He had taken the heavy branch the woman had used. He tried to rise to his feet, but his knee buckled and he fell again.

The woman scrambled up and darted away into the trees.

“Stop!” he shouted. Miranda heard the razor edge of frustration in his voice as he rose unsteadily, leaning for support on the branch that he still held.

Miranda used her scarf to dab at Ellie’s forehead, which was smeared with blood. The branch had cut her, but it did not appear to be deep, and Ellie’s cries were wrenching sobs of terror rather than pain.

Gerard retrieved his cane and hobbled toward them. “Who was that?”

“I don’t know,” Miranda said.

“Did you see her face?”

“No.”

“Are you injured? Is Ellie hurt?”

At that moment, Cousin Laura ran toward them. “What happened? Good gracious, is that blood?”

Aunt Augusta followed close behind with some of the other children. “What happened?”

“A woman attacked Miranda,” Gerard said. “When I came upon her, she appeared to be looking for valuables in Miranda’s cloak. When I tried to stop her, the woman accidentally hit Ellie.”

“Poor dear.” Cousin Laura drew near, but Ellie buried her face deeper into Miranda’s shoulder, her crying muffled.

“Let us take the children back to the house,” Laura said. “We should have enough greenery by now. Who would attack you?”

“Was it a gypsy?” Aunt Augusta asked. “I hadn’t heard of any gypsies in the area.”

“I don’t know.” Miranda started to shake her head, but the movement made pain cloud her vision.

“Miranda, you’re injured,” Gerard said.

“I am well. We must take Ellie away from here.”

They all turned back toward the house. Cousin Laura and Miranda’s aunts counted children and went to collect any stragglers while Miranda carried Ellie tightly against her.

Gerard was walking more slowly, leaning more heavily on his cane. She watched him, and had a drowning feeling in her lungs. Suddenly her plan to somehow erase her feelings for him no longer seemed so simple.

When the woman attacked him, and she’d seen Gerard go down, she’d known deep in her heart that she couldn’t bear to lose him.

***
Next blog post: Chapter 6a

Order The Spinster's Christmas:

Kindle
iBooks
Kobo
Nook (coming soon)

Don't want to miss a post? Subscribe to my blog via email:

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Submit my heart to God

I’ve over at the ChristiansRead blog with something “close to my heart,” so to speak. :)

"I’ve been discipling a young woman at church who used to be in my youth group, so I’ve seen her grow up, to an extent. She’s very busy with graduate school right now, but there’s a young man she’s met with whom she’s gotten closer.

It’s always hard for me to give advice or encouragement to young women when it comes to their love lives. Everyone’s experience with romantic relationships is different depending on each person’s personality, family background, and life experience."

Click here to read more

The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 5a

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 5a

Miranda welcomed the distraction of picking Christmas greens to decorate the house. Everyone was in a merry mood, no one paying attention to her, and she could calm herself.

She had thought Gerard would not expend much effort for her request to his mother, and had expected that path to be closed to her. His actions in enlisting the help of Cousin Laura had not only surprised her, but had caused hope to blossom in her chest.

She ought not to hope. It always led to disappointment.

And yet what else could she do when two people were suddenly championing her? She was unaccustomed to such consideration, for her parents’ treatment of her had taught her to avoid depending upon others.

Therefore, it had been particularly difficult for her to ask Aunt Augusta for help, only to be accused her of ingratitude for Cecil’s benevolence. After such criticism, Miranda had nearly not approached Laura with the same request. But then Laura had been so concerned, and Gerard had surprised her with his persistence in helping her.

Would they succeed in convincing his mother? And yet, she was afraid to hope.

She took a deep breath, letting the quiet of the forest soothe her. The trees had the feel of age and patience, perseverance through storms and overzealous woodchoppers. She imagined she could hear the trees whispering to each other even now, rustling in arboreal gossip over the excited chatter of women and children gathering greenery.

How the paths of her life had shifted only a scant hour or two ago. Everything seemed too wonderful to possibly be more than a dream that would melt away—staying with Ellie and the Foremonts, and then with Cousin Laura. Escaping the Beattys. No longer needing to withstand Felicity’s impatience and determination to put Miranda in her proper place as a humble, grateful dependent.

Would her circumstances truly be different after Twelfth Night? It was hard to imagine how they would be, because she had felt for a long time that she was slowly disappearing, like a ghost fading away into mist. She didn’t know if she could be happy. She couldn’t remember the last time she had been.

“Randa.” Ellie broke into her thoughts. She had been following Miranda and holding the fir boughs that she cut.

“Yes, darling?”

“Paul said he will get the biggest branch.”

“Oh, did he? We shall see if we can best him.”

Ellie grinned, and it was Miranda’s cousin Edward who smiled at her in the shape of her mouth, the crinkling of her eyes. But she had her mother’s blue eyes and golden-brown hair, fine as cornsilk.

Miranda had done this every Christmas Eve with her Belmoore relatives—the women and children picking mistletoe, ivy, and fir boughs while the men and farmhands went out to collect the massive Yule log, which would burn in the oversized medieval fireplace in the great entry hall until the end of Twelfth Night.

Gerard came up beside her, but spoke to Ellie, whose arms were so full of fir boughs that they trailed down behind her. “Take care, Ellie, or you will trip over your green dress.”

She looked at the dripping fir, then giggled and twirled in a circle, making the branches fly out around her, and a few flung off through the undergrowth.

“You’ll lose everything we’ve collected,” Miranda said with a smile.

“I’ll go get them. Come, Ellie.” Gerard went off the path, making a dramatic effort as he swung his cane at the scraggly bushes, pretending to get lost as he searched for the missing firs.

The last time Miranda had gathered greenery with Gerard had been sixteen years ago, the Christmas before he went to sea. He would have been with the men and the Yule log if his knee had allowed him to keep up, or allowed him to ride a horse without pain. He joked with Ellie and with the other children, but every so often, the distant sound of a man’s voice in the woods made him look up, and a harshness would settle over his face like a mask.

Or perhaps his cheerfulness was the mask.

She admitted that some of the fear—no, probably most of the fear she felt was how, if she went to the Foremonts’ home, she would be so close to Gerard for the first time in years. Yes, fear that she wouldn’t be able to hide her feelings from him, or even worse, from his parents.

She was used to hiding. She’d had to hide who she was, it seemed, all her life—from her own parents, from most of her family. People seemed to constantly remind her that she could never be quite the same as the rest of society. That she was different.

Her father had been disappointed that she wasn’t charming, that she was too quiet and uninteresting. Her mother had been upset that she’d been hopeless at catching a husband during her season. Felicity disliked her so much that she was eager to foist her off rather than keeping an unpaid servant.

And aside from all that, there was the one secret no one could know, the one sin she could never rub out.

She had no wish to open herself to anyone, and certainly not handsome, confident Gerard. He would find her lacking, as so many other people in her life had done, and if she loved him, his disappointment or rejection would flay her alive.

So she had to somehow crush her feelings for him. Burn them out of her heart.

Not all the trees had lost their leaves, and combined with the fitful winter sun, the dimness made it seem even colder. Gerard and Ellie had wandered away from Miranda, and she determined to keep herself apart from him. Ellie needed to become used to Gerard, who was a stranger to her.

Miranda tramped through the undergrowth, distancing herself from the other women and children, deeper into the silence and darkness of the forest. Even their voices became muffled by the tree trunks and low-hanging branches.

Behind her, leaves rustled, then a stick snapped. And then something heavy collided with the base of her neck.

***
Next blog post: Chapter 5b

Order The Spinster's Christmas:

Kindle
iBooks
Kobo
Nook (coming soon)

Don't want to miss a post? Subscribe to my blog via email:

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The Spinster's Christmas - Chapter 4b

I’m blogging the revised version of my Regency romance, The Spinster's Christmas , so you all get a chance to read it. After I post it all, I’ll take it down from my blog, so be sure to read it while it’s being posted. It is the first book in my Lady Wynwood series.

A Regency romantic mystery

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Start reading here.

***
Chapter 4b

A chill raced up Laura’s spine, and it was not from the winter wind. But perhaps she was mistaken. “I did not know you were close to Felicity’s cousin,” she said lightly. “How long will you be visiting?”

There was an awkward pause. “I will not be visiting. After Twelfth Night, Felicity is sending me to help as their nursery-maid.”

Laura stopped walking and grasped Miranda’s elbow. “She cannot hire her own nursery-maid? Or beg the help of one of her relations?”

Miranda would not look at Laura. “She has difficulty retaining her staff.”

Laura knew why, although she was not certain if Miranda did, also. Laura had no wish to frighten her, but she could not allow her to walk into that house with warning. “You cannot go,” Laura croaked.

Miranda’s cheeks had become as grey as the sky. She hesitated, then whispered, “Are the rumors true?”

“Oh, my dear girl. I must tell Felicity—”

“She did not believe me.”

Of course Felicity would not, that wretched, selfish woman.

Laura had never known Miranda well because her father had not been one of Laura’s favourite cousins. Charles Belmoore had been a scowl on two legs, and his wife had had the perpetual expression of someone smelling fish gone bad.

But she could not allow Felicity to do this to Miranda. Laura had been forced to endure her horrific marriage to her late husband, but it had given her the means and independence to do what was right.

“If only I could take you home with me,” Laura said. “But I am promised to my aunt in Northumbria after Twelfth Night, and my townhouse in London is being renovated while I am away. Perhaps I may write to my aunt …”

“Lady Wynwood, Miranda,” said a strong male voice, “good morning to you both.”

Laura would normally welcome Gerard’s company, had Miranda’s plight not been so troubling. Because of Mr. Foremont’s close friendship with Laura’s cousin Edward, she had known Gerard since he was in leading strings. She was surprised to see the grave lines in his forehead as he looked at Miranda.

However, he turned to her with a smile. “It is good to see you, my lady. I had not time for more than a quick hello last evening.”

“You are looking remarkably well.” He was, for although he walked slowly and carefully with his cane on the wet, brittle grass, it was a marked improvement from only a month ago when she had seen him briefly in London. He had been in town with his parents to visit his doctor, and he had been using crutches rather than a cane.

“Thank you.” He glanced away briefly, and she thought she saw the same bitter frustration behind his eyes that she’d seen a month ago.

Perhaps he was not as improved as she had thought.

“My father and I have spoken to Cecil and Mr. Belmoore,” Gerard said. “It is decided that Ellie is to come home with us.”

“That’s wonderful,” Laura said.

“I must thank you again for your suggestion to my mother. The anticipation of having Ellie in her care has made her quite cheerful.” His eyes slid to Miranda, then he said to Laura, “I wish to beg another favour from you, my lady. Would you perhaps exert your influence over my mother to allow Miranda to accompany Ellie to Foremont Court for a few months?”

Laura gasped. “That is a very good idea.”

He blinked. “It is? Er … that is, just so.”

Miranda was looking at him with surprise. “Gerard, your mother …”

“We have nearly a fortnight to convince her,” he said, more to Miranda than to Laura. “I am certain that with Lady Wynwood’s help, we may do so.”

“Of course I will help you,” Laura said. She could think of no better way to prevent Miranda from being sent to the Beattys.

Color had returned to Miranda’s cheeks. “Would you, Cousin Laura?”

“My dear.” Laura stopped to take Miranda’s hands in hers. “Of course I will. And it will only be for a few weeks, perhaps a few months. After I help my aunt organize the repair of her cottage, I insist that you come to stay with me in my townhouse in London.”

“Do you need a companion?”

“Not particularly,” Laura said cheerfully, “and I suspect you would be a poor one. You do not scurry nervously. And I have seen your embroidery—it is atrocious, so you would not be able to untangle your employer’s silks.”

A smile tugged at Miranda’s lips.

“If you will be able to stay with the Foremonts until I come to retrieve you, then you will join me in London as my guest. You may stay as long as you like, or I can find a position for you if you desire it. I only regret I cannot have you with me immediately, but my aunt’s cottage has only one useable bedroom. In fact, I shall be sleeping on the sofa for part of the time, and there is no inn within a comfortable distance.”

Miranda squeezed Laura’s hands tightly, but the girl said nothing, her eyes large and luminous.

“You quite exhaust me with your exuberance,” Laura said.

“I am confident we shall prevail, Miranda,” Gerard said. “You will be happy at Foremont Court before long.”

It was just a flicker of a glance that Miranda sent to Gerard before she looked away, but the certainty struck Laura like a blow. Miranda was in love with Gerard. It might be a girlhood infatuation, but the feelings were there, waiting to mature into true, deep affection.

Laura was no matchmaker, but a part of her wished for happiness for Miranda and Gerard, each of whom was lonely in their own way. She must convince Mary Foremont to allow Miranda to travel back to their home with them and with Ellie, but would she only be encouraging a situation that would result in heartbreak for Miranda?

Or would two hearts somehow find each other across the gulf of Miranda’s protective shell and Gerard’s bitterness?

***
Next blog post: Chapter 5a

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