“That’s ridiculous,” Elinor retorted, but blushed. “He barely noticed me.”
“Why didn’t you talk to him?” Marianne asked. “And why were you so rude? He was only poking fun at his cow of a sister, he wasn’t insulting Norland –”
“Please don’t refer to Harriet as a ‘cow’ again, Marianne,” her mother admonished. “She’s your half-brother’s widow and as such, she deserves our sympathy, and our respect. But I do agree that her brother Edward is very nice. And quite nice looking.”
A few minutes later, Harriet and her brother returned downstairs.
“Would you like to see the back garden?” Edward inquired of his sister as he followed behind her. “The roses are in bloom, and there’s a terrace –”
“I’ve seen quite enough, thank you.” Harriet took out her car keys and dangled the Mercedes key fob from one finger as if to be sure they all saw it. “Your stepbrother Robert might be interested in living out here in the back of beyond; God knows, I am not.”
She turned to Mrs Holland and her daughters as they rose to follow her into the entrance hall, and inclined her head in a brief nod. “Thank you, and good day to you all.”
“Good day,” everyone but Marianne echoed.
Edward hesitated, obviously embarrassed by his sister’s abrupt departure. “Thank you, ladies, very much.” His gaze lingered, just for a moment, on Elinor. “I apologise for the intrusion and thank you for letting us have a quick look round.”
Then he, too, fled.
The minute the front door closed Marianne whirled on her mother. “‘Thank you, and good day to you all’? That’s all Harriet had to say, after taking away our home?”
“It belongs to her now,” Mrs Holland said. “There’s nothing we can do.” She looked, suddenly, very tired. “We’ll need to begin packing our things right away. Elinor, can you try and locate a reasonably priced removal van?”
Elinor nodded. “I’ll start making inquiries right away.”
“But – where will we go?” Marianne demanded. “Where will we live?”
“It’s all been arranged,” Mrs Holland said. “Come into the sitting room, girls, while we may still call it our own, and we’ll discuss it.”
Elinor and Marianne exchanged puzzled glances, but followed their mother into the small but comfortable sitting room and sat beside each other on the worn sofa.
“I’ve spoken with Lady Valentine,” Mrs Holland began as she settled herself in the armchair across from them. “She’s offered a very generous solution to our problem.”
Marianne rolled her eyes. Lady Violet Valentine was a writer of romance novels of the most revolting, flowery kind, and an acquaintance on their dead father’s side; he’d always spoken highly of her, and of her great kindness. But Marianne suspected it was the lady’s great wealth that had most impressed her father.
“There’s a house standing empty on her property in Northumberland,” their mother went on. “A cottage. The late baron often hosted hunts on the estate; the cottage was used as a guesthouse. It all belongs to Lady Valentine now.”
“Northumberland?” Marianne echoed. “But that’s practically in Scotland.”
Elinor shushed her. “Has Lady Valentine made the house available to us? That’s very kind.”
“She has, and it is,” Mrs Holland said, and nodded emphatically. “Very kind indeed. She’s agreed to let it out to us at such a low cost that she’s practically letting us live there for free. If not for her offer, I don’t know what we’d do. We’ll need to sell what we can, pack what we can’t, and prepare to move house very soon.”
“How soon?” Marianne asked.
“We have until the end of the month.”
“But…that’s barely three weeks.” She stood up and began to pace the confines of the room in outraged agitation. “How can we possibly pack, and move house, and leave our home behind, in such a ridiculously short amount of time?”
“It won’t be easy,” Elinor agreed, “but we’ll manage. I’ll organise a removal van, and call round to the shops in Litchfield to see if they’ll buy our furniture.”
“We can’t take our furniture along? But what’ll we sleep on, how will we eat our dinner or have tea with no table, and no silverware, no plates or cups –?”
“The house is already furnished,” Mrs Holland said with a trace of impatience. “As for the plates, of course we’ll pack those up and take them along. I suggest you go upstairs and begin sorting through your things.”
“How can you both be so calm? Life as we know it is ending and we’re losing our home.”
“And you’re being a drama queen,” Elinor said, and lifted her brow. “Again.”
“Better a drama queen than a rude cow. You were horrible to Edward just now, for no reason.”
Elinor regarded her in surprise. “I wasn’t. I barely know him. And I was perfectly polite.”
“You didn’t say more than two words to him…even though he looked at you like he was starving and you were the last Galaxy bar in the box.”
Elinor flushed. “He didn’t.”
“He did.” Marianne flung herself into a chair and sighed. “What I wouldn’t give to have a man look at me like that…”
“Never mind Edward Ferrars,” Mrs Holland said. “He’s neither here nor there. What matters is that thanks to Lady Valentine’s offer, we’ll have a decent place to live.”
Marianne snorted. “Right. If you consider a poky little cottage in Northumberland to be a decent place to live. The fireplace probably smokes and doesn’t half work, and we’ll freeze to death in the winter –”
“That’s enough, Mari.” Mrs Holland pressed her lips together. “I’ll hear no more complaints. We should all be grateful to her ladyship for offering us a home, no matter if it’s a distance away.”
Marianne pushed herself to her feet. “I’m not grateful. I refuse to be grateful for Lady Valentine’s charity. And I’ll never call Northumberland – or her cottage – home.”
So saying, she turned sharply on her heel and stalked out of the room.
Marianne hated to wait.
Other people could stand in queues, absently staring into space or fiddling with their mobiles; they could sit in waiting rooms or airline lounges without a word of complaint. But Marianne could not.
Which was why, as she waited on the front steps for Lady Valentine’s arrival, she switched on her mobile phone and opened the e-reader app. She’d downloaded His Lordship’s Touch, the new (and no doubt completely nauseating) book by Lady V last night out of curiosity. She sighed and began to read it now, expecting to be bored senseless inside of a few paragraphs.
But as she read the first chapter, her eyes widened and her brows rose skyward. Cripes – this wasn’t at all what she’d expected. Marianne blushed and hunched over her mobile, glad that no one, particularly not her mother or sister, could see the racy words as she devoured them.
“I want you,” Lord Selkirk growled as he tugged at the fastenings on Annabelle’s bodice. “I mean to make you mine.”