Ana María and the Fox by Liana De la Rosa

Author:Liana De la Rosa [De la Rosa, Liana]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2023-04-04T00:00:00+00:00

12

The terraced gardens at Tyrell Manor stretched out before him, the lush expanse of lawn bisected by topiaries, boxed hedges, and limestone steps leading to gravel walking paths that extended into the distant Devonshire countryside.

Gideon was a bit awed by the grandeur of Tyrell Manor. Not that he had expected anything less from the ancestral estate of the Tyrell earldom. Much like the man who wore the title, the landscape seemed to have been carved from the hillside, as if even the soil and bedrock could not withstand the unrelenting power of something so implacable.

Yet for all its perfect right angles, colorful flower beds, and expertly trimmed hedges, the landscape was sterile. Beautiful but not warm. His grandmother had once said that the plantation where she was born, the one where she toiled, was the most strikingly beautiful but accursed place on earth. Gideon had never understood what she meant. But something about the earl’s home left his spine ridged and his teeth on edge.

He glanced up at the manor house, his gaze skimming over the sash windows and ornate balusters. He felt as if eyes were watching his every move, and he figured they probably were. Anytime he visited grand English estates, it wasn’t just the guests and servants who tracked him with covert stares. For he saw the dark shadows lurking in the brightly lit ballrooms. The veneer of gentility that failed to mask the tainted history imprinted on the foundation. The stares were in the bricks and stones and mortar that comprised the manor itself. The blood of their makers, whose flesh was bought and sold to support such idyllic country houses, called to him. To the burning flame inside his heart that his grandmother protected and carried, and passed on to him.

Gideon was still surprised Lord Tyrell had extended an invitation for him to attend the house party. He had almost expected the earl to turn up his nose at the idea of hosting at his ancestral home the son of a biracial woman and a papist Scot. He’d learned from a footman that the manor had been rebuilt in the late 1690s, when the original structure was destroyed by fire. Gideon was relieved he’d managed to hide the hitch in his breath with a well-timed cough.

Allowing his eyes to touch on the grassy steppes and perfectly manicured flower beds, Gideon released a long sigh. Regardless of what the earl or his lofty guests thought of him, he deserved to be here. Tyrell would not have extended an invitation to him if it weren’t true.

Clasping his hands together behind his waist, Gideon pivoted about and returned to the pleasant warmth of the manor. Expelling a sigh to find the entry empty, he proceeded up the staircase and to his room, where he sank onto a brocaded chair at the small escritoire in the corner, pulling out the newest version of his talking points. Gideon had reviewed them extensively, having memorized them word for word, but he was determined to be prepared for any question Earl Tyrell had for him.

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