Free The Seeker by Ann H. Gabhart

had put on in the last few years had aged him. He was barely past fifty, but he winded easily and preferred his easy chair to any sort of sporting activity. At least before Selena.
    Charlotte hadn’t seen him for several months, since he had been staying in Frankfort. With the country in such a state of turmoil, she had not thought his extended absence from Grayson odd. He had to keep abreast of legislative issues and work for his constituents. But it seemed this year there had been time for more pleasurable pursuits as well.
    He glanced up at the cloudless sky as if he hadn’t noticed whether the sun was even shining until she mentioned it. “So it is,” he said.
    The bright light in the garden made it easy to see how thin his hair was getting on the top, even though Ruben, his longtime valet, had carefully combed his remaining hair over the balding spot. Gray was creeping back from his temples and taking over his eyebrows. His moustache was almost completely gray. A light sheen of perspiration moistened his forehead even though the air was cool enough that Charlotte had considered going back inside for her shawl.
    “Are you feeling all right, Father?” Charlotte asked with a worried frown.
    “Now don’t you be worrying about me.” He patted her arm. “I’ve never been better.”
    “You look tired.”
    “Well, things were busy in Frankfort what with the current unrest in our country, and of course once I met Selena, things started hopping. Not much time for relaxation. Not that I’m complaining,” he said with a little laugh. “Most certainly not. Selena’s the best thing to happen to me in a long while. And to Grayson too, or I miss my guess.”
    Charlotte had no words to answer that, but her father didn’t need her words as he went on. “You can’t know how very glad I am that you and Selena are getting along so well. She thinks of you as a favored younger sister, you know.”
    “Does she?” Charlotte stared down at her book as she carefully marked her place with a ribbon before she closed it. “Not a daughter, then.”
    Her father laughed. “You can hardly expect that, since she’s only a few years older than you.”
    “That’s good anyway. I had a loving mother.” Charlotte looked up at him as if the next question just came out of thin air. “How old is Selena anyway?”
    He raised eyebrows that Ruben must have forgotten to comb that morning before he said, “I haven’t been a politician these many years not to know there are some questions a man dares not ask, and a woman’s age is one of those.”
    “What do you know about her?” Charlotte looked directly at her father. When the color rose in his cheeks, she wasn’t sure if it was due to anger or embarrassment.
    He frowned a little. “I know enough and I should think you know enough not to be disrespectful to your father.”
    “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sound disrespectful, Father.” She stared down at her book a moment. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. A story of impropriety. “I was merely curious about her. And her son, Landon. Have you met him?”
    “No, no, but I am anxious to have him here at Grayson. Selena planned to send him to Georgia to spend some time with relations there, but I’ve talked her out of that. He needs to be here with his mother. And me. He’s only six, but Selena says he’s smart as a tack.” Her father’s good humor returned as he looked up and off across the garden. “It will be good to have a boy running about the house.”
    “Georgia? I understood Selena was from Boston.”
    “That’s where she was living when her late husband made his tragic departure from life. Some sort of wasting sickness, she says. All very sad. But her extended family owns a plantation in Georgia. Very well-to-do, I surmise. That’s why she’s so capable of looking at Grayson and seeing where we might have been neglectful over the last few years in managing our people. A soft heart is fine in church