All About Evangeline by Karen Lingefelt

Author:Karen Lingefelt
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Karen Lingefelt
Published: 2020-10-20T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

He never came back.

Perhaps he’d return tomorrow, but...

No. In all likelihood, he was never coming back.

On the other hand, maybe he never came back because by the time he left Evie’s house, it was already too late to start a journey north and they’d probably get no farther than the first tollbooth in Hertfordshire, but...

No. He had no intention of returning, even if it meant breaking his word to her and Lady Cranston. He was that disgusted by Evie’s shocking revelation.

Then again, maybe he left because Evie fled the scene. But that was because of Lady Cranston’s untimely appearance.

So why didn’t he follow Evie upstairs? It wasn’t as if he hadn’t already been up there. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t already been in her bedchamber. And it certainly wasn’t as if he’d never seen her—

Ah, but that was why he left and never came back.

That was why he wouldn’t come back tomorrow, or the day after that, or ever.

He would never finish what he started with her.

These were the thoughts scrambling around the inside of Evie’s head all night long, keeping her awake. In the meantime, her insides seemed to have rearranged themselves back into their proper places, for her heart still thudded in the center of her chest, and her stomach growled inches below it. She’d been too queasy to eat a bite of anything after Gareth left, but now that it was past midnight and the entire house, yea, all of London was quiet—everything was quiet, save for her stomach—she was suddenly hungry.

The worst had happened—he finally knew the truth. And she’d never see him again. Yet her heart continued to beat, her lungs still breathed air, and her stomach wouldn’t stop growling.

She couldn’t do anything about her beating heart and breathing lungs, but she knew what to do about her growling stomach.

She rose from her bed, still feeling wide awake, and groped her way down the back stairs to the deserted kitchen lit only by moonlight streaming through a high window. She opened a cupboard, cringing as it screamed on its hinges. Why couldn’t it merely creak as it did in broad daylight?

She found half a loaf of bread and set it on the trestle table, wondering if she should light a candle to find a knife. Of course, that would depend on her finding a candle and the means to light it. She seldom came down here, so she had no idea where things were kept. Finding the bread was only a matter of rare luck—that, and the yeasty smell emanating from the cupboard as she happened to creep by.

She picked up the loaf and studied it in the moonlight, contemplating, pondering, and concluding that no one was here to see her biting into it instead of cutting off a slice. Oh, they’d know in the morning that the bread had been eaten, but with any luck—and she’d already spent what little she had simply on finding the loaf so quickly—they’d assume it was the work of mice.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.