Three Nights by Debra Mullins

Author:Debra Mullins
Language: ron
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

The next morning, the baggage from Cornwall arrived.

Aveline knelt before her embroidery trunk and regarded the contents. Despite the distraction of the previous night's ball, the trunk, and the letter from Mrs. Baines that accompanied it, reminded her all too well of her complicated situation.

According to her letter, the housekeeper had successfully sold some of the completed pieces and accumulated enough money to keep the household going for the next month. Her father was well, and she wasn't to worry.

She tossed the letter on a nearby table. How could she not worry? Her father was ill, she was married to a man who hated him, and she had been forced by circumstance to creep about like a thief to provide money for her parent's living expenses because her husband wished him dead. Such a situation promoted worry.

Aveline took a skein of royal blue thread from the trunk and toyed with one frayed end. She would sell the remaining pieces as needed. At least the leeway of a month would give her enough time to create more, and she could do so in plain sight of everyone, even Lucien. Who would suspect her motives, when embroidery was so well accepted as a gentle lady's pastime?

But she hated the deception.

With a frustrated huff, she tossed the thread back into the trunk. Pretense was not her nature, and all this secretive planning left her tense as a harp string. Why must she be caught in the middle of Lucien's argument with her father?

After meeting Lucien's family last night and hearing some of his background, she understood a little better why he didn't seem to understand relationships. He'd expected her to accept his decision about her father without a murmur and to join him in his bed, leaving everything behind. He couldn't understand her ongoing loyalty to her father, or her reluctance to trust him with her heart. Couldn't comprehend how she managed to resist him even though the attraction between the two of them continued to burn hot.

He'd obviously never truly been part of a family. He'd never had anyone care about him. How could he possibly understand the bonds of family love?

Bonds that sustained a person through the worst of times. Bonds that held fast when everything else collapsed around one.

Bonds that could be trusted and understood.

There had been plenty of times when she'd been certain her world was about to collapse around her. She had dealt over and again with the sometimes devastating results of her father's incessant gambling. Many nights she had wondered if he'd finally managed to gamble them into poverty, but each time she'd managed to find a way to triumph over the adversity. Somehow, she'd fixed it.

She'd fix this, too. Somehow.

She sorted through the colorful materials in her trunk, pondering her next project, when her fingers encountered a folded paper jammed into the bottom corner of the trunk. Frowning, she picked it up and unfolded it.

Congratulations on your happy event. Please do not—

She gasped and dropped the paper as if it burned her.

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