Harlequin Historical June 2020--Box Set 2 of 2 by Louise Allen

Author:Louise Allen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2020-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Marianne carefully avoided him for the rest of the day and one or two after that. It was not until his stone masons and carpenters began work on the chapel a couple of days later that she confronted Alaric over their mission.

‘You and Yelverton were so worried about your father making the journey to the next village and back to marry him to Miss Grantham I thought they might as well be wed here instead. The chapel is only a few hundred yards away, so there is no need to worry about carriages and delays if the marriage takes place here.’

‘How do you know the chapel is still consecrated?’

‘Because I asked your brother and he asked the local vicar.’

‘You would.’

‘I did and the reverend gentleman is happy to oblige the local lord of the manor so your father can perform the ceremony.’

‘Smug and managing,’ she said. ‘I have to admire you for it,’ she added, ‘although I am surprised Darius and Fliss are meekly agreeing to all your plans.’

‘Apparently true love means doing almost anything for your beloved.’

‘Does it indeed? I doubt it will ever do so for you, my lord.’

‘So do I,’ he said with a pinch of real sadness under his cynical smile. He doubted he could ever be undefended enough to love beyond reason.

‘And I am far too busy supervising all the maids and handymen now flocking about the house getting in each other’s way to stop here and argue with you any longer,’ she informed him and marched back to her housekeeping duties.

* * *

‘Avoiding me again?’ Lord Stratford asked softly from behind her a week after their bewildering conversation in the garden.

Marianne was surveying the now empty and—as clean as it could be got with mops and brooms and scrubbing brushes—grand dining room. ‘How do you manage to creep up on people like that when you still have to walk with a stick, my lord?’

‘I suppose stealth comes naturally to me and if I had not, you would have left before I could get here.’

She almost smiled—no, she nearly laughed and that was worse. ‘I am a very busy woman,’ she told him severely instead and wished she had managed to escape him yet again. He made her feel on edge yet almost excited when he watched her with that wary warmth in his clear blue eyes. A shiver of awareness always seemed to slip down her spine as soon as she heard his voice in the distance and made her tingle all over until she managed to find a task that demanded all her attention. She had to keep on reminding herself he only wanted her for her supposed skills as a companion and that kiss in the garden was an impulse he regretted just as much as she did. ‘Was there something you wanted, my lord?’ she asked.

‘Common sense,’ he told her.

‘You know I cannot supply that.’

‘No,’ he said with a stern look. ‘You have none to spare. You are working too hard to lay claim to any of your own, never mind giving some away.

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