Bound By Their Secret Passion. Diane Gaston

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СКАЧАТЬ to what everyone believes, I did not marry him to make myself a wealthy widow.’

      All she wanted was enough to purchase a little cottage somewhere and to live quietly. A place where scandal would never touch her again. That had been all she asked of Tinmore. Enough for her to live comfortably in some quiet village somewhere and never, ever, be under the thumb of a husband again.

      ‘Well, I think Tinmore owes you a great deal,’ Genna huffed.

      ‘He already gave us a great deal,’ she responded.

      They’d had beautiful places to live, plenty of food, social connections and the prettiest gowns money could buy, but now she needed no more than a little cottage where she could plant flowers in a garden and not be waited on hand and foot by a brigade of servants. One or two maids to help in the house and a man to do the heavy things would be lovely, but, even so, she could do with less.

      They took their seats. This drawing room was the same room where the coroner and Squire Hedges had interviewed her and Dell. There were two men, the solicitor and his partner, both attended by Mr Filkins, who’d made certain the proper people had been invited. The room was filled with the servants who had been in Tinmore’s employ the longest, Dixon, Wicky, the housekeeper, Lorene’s lady’s maid, and a smattering of others, including the estate manager and others important to the running of the estate. Lord Tinmore’s heir was not present, having declined to make the trip.

      ‘Shall we begin,’ the solicitor intoned, unfurling the document.

      The room fell silent and he began to read.

      Lorene fancied she could hear Tinmore’s voice in the words and it disturbed her mostly because she had no feelings about it. She could not say she missed him. She could not even say she’d been fond of him.

      The most she could say was she was glad she no longer had to listen to his voice.

      She glanced around the room at the portraits of his ancestors on the walls. In them, though, she saw Tinmore’s features. His brow here. A nose there. His eyes. His disapproving mouth.

      She forced her gaze to the window. The snow had melted and the landscape bore the bleakness of winter and none of its beauty.

      The solicitor’s voice broke through. ‘...And to my widow, née Lorene Summerfield, the town house on Brook Street in Mayfair and an income of twelve thousand pounds a year...’

      Genna gasped.

      Lorene shook her head. Surely she had misheard.

      The solicitor went on to specify certain carriages and horses that were to be hers, as well as some pieces of furniture and the gilt pianoforte that had been one of Tinmore’s more extravagant gifts.

      She murmured, ‘It cannot be so.’

      She’d not even known he owned a town house on Brook Street. While in London they’d stayed at the town house on Curzon Street, which she knew to be entailed.

      The solicitor continued with a long list of other bequests to persons present and others who would need to be informed. When all the bequests had been spoken, he rolled up the will again and indicated that they were free to leave.

      The servants and others milled around briefly talking among themselves. They seemed pleased, as well they should, because Tinmore had generously provided for them.

      Finally they filed out of the room and Lorene walked up to the solicitor. ‘Did I hear you correctly?’

      He unrolled the will and reread the words pertaining to her.

      She still could not believe it. ‘How much income?’

      ‘Twelve thousand.’ The man rolled up the document again. ‘Quite the generous man, was he not?’

      Lorene nodded and turned away.

      She’d wanted to be comfortable, but now she would not be comfortable after all.

      She’d be wealthy.

      Rossdale and Glenville also approached the solicitors and she withdrew to let them gather all the petty details of how and when she was to receive this fortune and the deed to the town house she did not want.

      Tess took her arm and sat her back down on the sofa between Genna and herself.

      ‘This is marvellous.’ Genna took her hand. ‘You will want for nothing!’

      Tess looked at her with concern. ‘Why are you so shocked? Surely you expected a decent inheritance?’

      ‘I—I did not,’ she said.

      ‘Humph!’ Genna made a face. ‘He probably did it so the beau monde would call him generous.’

      Tess shot Genna a quelling glance. ‘No matter the reason, he was very generous.’ Tess looked thoughtful. ‘Although I suppose it is less than if he’d given you dower.’

      Dower would have given her a third of the value of Tinmore’s property for her lifetime, but she’d signed away her rights to dower when she married Tinmore in exchange for his providing for her siblings.

      ‘I did not expect this.’ Lorene pressed her fingers to her temple.

      Tess took her other hand and squeezed it. ‘Now you can come to town and live in a lovely town house and always be near me.’ Tess and her husband spent most of the year in London.

      But living in Mayfair was an appalling thought for Lorene. To be in town, among the beau monde, as Genna called them, the very people who whispered behind her back and remarked how she was just like her mother, who was scandal personified. She could hear them now, boasting how they knew all along she was after Tinmore’s fortune.

      Genna hugged her. ‘This must be a huge relief to you. Now you will have no worries at all. You may do as you please. Everyone knows that widows are the most fortunate of women. You can make your own decisions. Control your own money. No husband will dictate to you.’

      Tess gave her younger sister a horrified look. ‘Genna! How can you say such a thing when you are so newly married?’

      Genna laughed. ‘I was not talking of me. Goodness knows, Ross is the best husband a woman could desire.’ A dreamy look crossed her face, but fled again, replaced by a pragmatic one. ‘I was speaking of other men.’

      ‘Not Marc,’ protested Tess.

      ‘Of course not!’ Genna appeared affronted. ‘Your husband is nearly as wonderful as mine.’

      Tess smiled and absently touched her abdomen. ‘Yes, Marc is wonderful.’

      Lorene regarded them and her heart swelled with fondness. That deep core of contentment inside her would never leave her. Her sisters and brother had found what she had most wanted for them and what she once dreamed of for herself.

      Love and marriage.

      And Lorene was convinced that her decision to marry Tinmore had led to their happy outcomes, even if none of it had happened as she’d thought. She gazed from Tess to Genna and was glad she’d made the sacrifice to give up her own СКАЧАТЬ