Rules of Attraction by Christina Dodd

Author:Christina Dodd
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

16

Hannah drove the pony cart through the cool April sunshine up the road toward Burroughs Hall. She had dressed in her best day costume: a chestnut-colored satin gown with full, tiered and embroidered skirt, a black-velvet jacket and her matching chestnut bonnet with ruched ribbon trim. Her black-leather gloves were steady on the reins, and to the onlooker, she knew she appeared to be calm. A calm belied by the number of times she had changed her clothing that morning, and by her heart, which insisted on thumping in a disturbing and unsteady beat.

But as the pony moved steadily toward the black-metal fencing that surrounded her grandparents' estate, Hannah practiced speaking the unspeakable. Sir and madam, I don't know if you are aware of my existence, but I'm the daughter of Miss Carola Tomlinson and your son, Henry.

Or— Mr. and Mrs. Burroughs, twenty-eight years ago, your son Henry loved my mother, Miss Carola Tomlinson, and I am the result.

Or— No doubt you've dreaded this day…

That was it, really. If her grandparents knew of her impending birth and had still sent her mother away without a shred of mercy, then they would not now want her in their lives. And even if they did, would she want them? Could she forgive them the misery of her early life and the sorrow of her mother's early death? Mama had been only thirty-one when she died. Hannah was almost that now, and to think of death when she felt herself to be just reaching the peak of power, knowledge and strength— that would a bitterness beyond hope.

The main gate stood open, the house visible through the trees. Somewhere in the vicinity of her heart, a pressure built. A breathlessness and an ache of dread. And just before Hannah would have entered, would have taken that final, irrevocable step to fulfill her dream, she pulled the reins to the left and swung onto the side of the road. Stopping the pony, she climbed out of the cart onto the grass, damp with the previous day's showers. Holding the reins in her hands, she stepped forward until her face was pressed between the metal bars.

She stared at the brick house, built in the Palladian style of the last century, mellow with ivy and crisp with white trim. It wasn't too large, perhaps twenty rooms, the home of a well-to-do country family. The scythed lawns and mature trees framed the building, and like trim on a package, blooming roses climbed on arbors around the grounds. Burroughs Hall was beautiful, every orphan child's fantasy.

Hannah couldn't bring herself to drive forward, climb the stairs and lift the knocker. Her fingers tightened on the cool bars. Her parents had met there. They had fallen in love there. She had probably been conceived in one of those rooms close against the roof. But she didn't belong. How could she? Her grandparents had driven her off before she had first seen day's light.

The front door opened, and Hannah tensed. Who would it be? A man in an old-fashioned blue-satin livery and a powdered wig stepped onto the portico.

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