Free To Wed The Widow by Megan Bryce Page A

was a four-day ride away but it tugged at her.
    The dogs could run around, she could take long walks. And perhaps dispel this gloom that was beginning to weigh on her.
    “We’ll go tomorrow. Out of the city for a fortnight and you can catch as many rabbits as you like.”
    He wagged his tail at her, and at rabbits, and Elinor nodded.
    A fortnight was all she could spend away from the Season, was all she could stand in the country. But it might do her some good, might be enough of a change so she could come back to town with a better plan than a Scotsman.
    She rose, all the dogs stretching and following her out of the room, to tell the housekeeper they would be leaving tomorrow for the country.
    The rest of the day would be panicked packing; the staff rushing about, no room quiet or empty or boring or lifeless.
    The cold she couldn’t get rid of.
    But she could fill those long hours that tempted her into talking to herself. Or to an imaginary Sinclair.
    The long hours that tempted her into chasing down the flesh-and-blood Sinclair and throwing away her plans and her dreams for one night of warmth. . .
    Perhaps a week. Or a month.
    A year, if she was lucky.
    But she wasn’t, and she knew no matter how warmly his love burned her, he would leave her.
    They all did.

    Sinclair stood opposite Elinor’s townhouse and chided himself. Just what was he doing here, bothering her, bothering himself?
    This was a bad idea. But he’d come here to show her his new purchase, to see the fire light up her eyes. To see that smile slowly pull her lips up, to hear the laughter she couldn’t stop.
    A voice at his shoulder said, “She is not at home.”
    Sinclair looked the man up and down, and then remembered.
    “The brother?”
    Alan Rusbridge nodded his head and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “She’s run off to the country.”
    Sinclair blinked and pointed to the house. “Lady Haywood?”
    When her brother nodded again, Sinclair could only think to say, “Why?”
    Why go to the country in the middle of the Season when you were hunting a husband?
    Unless you’d found that husband and were gone to his country home. Perhaps to meet an ailing mother?
    Perhaps to have an easier time sneaking around at night, to start that family she so desperately wanted.
    Surely he would have heard if she’d attached herself to someone. Surely.
    Rusbridge shrugged. “Why does any woman do anything? To make as much trouble for the men in her life as possible.”
    Sinclair turned to face the man. “Are you in her life, Rusbridge? And why would her going to the country trouble you?”
    Rusbridge turned to face Sinclair, the belligerent set to the man’s chin making Sinclair want to introduce his fist to it.
    “Are you in her life, Sinclair?”
    Yes. No.
    Why did her going to the country trouble him so?
    Sinclair’s greatcoat pocket wiggled and he stuck his fingers inside to tickle and to be playfully bit.
    “I am not, and I rather thought you weren’t either. It is a mystery why two men not in Lady Haywood’s life are standing outside wishing they were in.”
    “All this should have been mine.”
    Sinclair looked at the house. “This?”
    Rusbridge swung his arms wide. “Everything. This home, these servants. Her country estate.” He snarled, “Her jewels. Her freedom .”
    Sinclair said mildly, “Her dogs?”
    “ Everything . Everything that was once mine, she stole. What was mine by right, by birth. Damn women, taking what wasn’t theirs. Sisters!”
    “I don’t know anything about sisters. Now brothers, those I could do away with.”
    Rusbridge sneered. “You are just like her. Taking what is your elder brother’s. Did your parents love you more? Did your mother cuddle you on her lap while pushing her firstborn away? Did your father pet and love you when he yelled and smacked around his son ?”
    Unhinged. The man was obviously unhinged. His breath bellowed and his fists clenched.
    Sinclair shuffled a little distance