A Regency Christmas by Ava Stone & Jerrica Knight-Catania & Jane Charles & Catherine Gayle & Julie Johnstone & Aileen Fish

Author:Ava Stone & Jerrica Knight-Catania & Jane Charles & Catherine Gayle & Julie Johnstone & Aileen Fish
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2014-11-03T05:00:00+00:00

“You’ve done what?”

From one of the leather armchairs in Lord Upton Grey’s study, where he’d granted her a private audience with Percy once he’d bathed and become at least somewhat more sober, Freddie stared aghast at her brother. He stood by the hearth, even his defeated posture reflecting the broken man he’d become. Percy Bexley-Smythe, Marquess of Stalbridge, was virtually unrecognizable as the carefree and charming brother she’d known for the whole of her life.

It was gradually growing clearer to her that the redness in his eyes and his state of distraction weren’t due solely to inebriation, but also—and perhaps even primarily—due to panic.

“I didn’t know what else to do!” He dragged a shaking hand through his overlong hair, nearly ripping some of it free. “He wanted Edie. She’s only sixteen, for God’s sake. I couldn’t…”

The words stopped coming, and all he could do was shake his head dumbly at her.

“No, you couldn’t let him have Edie,” Freddie agreed. But Bexley Court? Their home. It was the only thing she thought she had left.

Where would she and Mama and Edie go? The Upton Greys had been more than gracious in inviting them to come to Padmore Glen for the Christmas holiday, but she couldn’t imagine they would be welcome for any longer than that.

“Just how much do you owe this Mr. Vernon?”

Her stomach clenched as the doors opened right as she asked her question. A maid came in carrying a tea service, but it was Lord Preston who Freddie’s eyes fell upon as he paced just outside the doorway. His gaze locked onto hers, piercing through her.

Bother and blast, she didn’t want him to know anything about anything. Yet now he knew money was involved, and he knew a name.

Once the maid scurried out again and the door closed behind her, Percy crossed over and sat down beside her. With an unsteady hand, he poured himself a cup of tea, nearly spilling it before Freddie took over the task for him.

“I don’t even know,” he said after he’d taken a few sips. When he looked up at her, it was with tears filling his eyes. Freddie couldn’t think of the last time she’d seen her brother cry. He couldn’t have been more than six or seven years old, still a lad in short pants. “Easily more than Bexley Court is worth.”

All Freddie could do was sit back in her chair and try to remember how to breathe.

“How could…how could you do this, Percy?”

Instead of answering, he just sat there looking wretched. She hadn’t really expected that he would answer. Even if he did, there was no response he could give that would change anything.

Almost instantly, her mind turned to calculating how much money she would need to be able to support herself, Mama, and Edie. She would have to find some sort of home they could pay for. The remaining servants would all have to find new employment, other than possibly one maid—paying even one maid’s wages would quickly become an extravagance.

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