Kiss Me, Annabel (Essex Sisters series Book 2) by Eloisa James

Author:Eloisa James [James, Eloisa]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2009-10-13T00:00:00+00:00

Seventeen

Annabel woke at dawn. There was something nagging at the back of her mind, an elusive thought. Ewan was breathing next to her, long slow breaths. He slept like a cat: as quiet and contained as he was while awake.

Light was stealing through curtains of their bedchamber. For a while Annabel watched sleepily as the rays crept across the polished mahogany of their bedchamber in the Queen’s Arms…the very best bedchamber. Ewan had laughed last night when he discovered that the chamber pot was made of bronze, decorated by delicate satyrs chasing about the rim. Annabel had blushed and looked away; there were some aspects to the intimacy of marriage that she wasn’t prepared for, such as Ewan even mentioning such an object in her presence.

The chamber pot was bronze. The desk was mahogany. These sheets were linen; well, they were Ewan’s own sheets, put on the bed fresh every night.

Her mouth fell open.

The truth was blindingly clear.

Ewan was rich.

Very rich. He had to be. Her husband rode in a coach with twelve outriders. He was no improvident, penniless Scot along the lines of her father. Everything she knew about Ewan told her that he would not waste his substance on luxuries, unless he had so much that such luxuries were insignificant.

For a moment she just blinked at the pearly morning light. Of course Ewan was a wealthy man. It spoke in every movement he made, in the gleam of his boots, in the casual way in which he trusted Mac to handle everything, in the beauty of his carriages. She’d been blinded by her own fear.

A surge of pure joy washed over her, followed immediately by shame. But she shook the shame away. Just because she married a man who believed in God didn’t mean that she had to start worrying about her soul right and left. It was perfectly sensible to wish to marry a rich man. She’d never thought it greedy while in England, and she wasn’t going to turn into a Puritan just because she married one.

At that moment, Ewan woke up, in the same silent, contained way in which he did everything, moving straight from sleep to wakefulness.

“Tell me about your home,” she demanded.

“And good morning to you,” he said, giving her his lazy smile.

“Your home?” she asked again, batting away a hand that stretched over the bolster and seemed to have improper ideas in mind.

He gave up and rolled over, stretching. “It’s an old pile of stones that’s been the family seat for ages. Luckily for all of us, my great-grandfather was a bad-tempered fellow who stayed put when Prince Charles summoned the clans. Apparently he said that he didn’t give a damn who was on the throne, and a Hanoverian would be as witless as a Stuart.”

“It’s a castle, isn’t it?” Annabel said, knowing the truth.

“Of course,” Ewan said, yawning. “If you wish to make some changes, I’d be happy. No one’s touched the furniture since my mother died, and that’s over twenty years ago now.

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