Free Weather Witch by Shannon Delany Page B

It seemed to Rowen she loved Lord Astraea even more for what was certainly only the abbreviated list of quirks he had observed or been told of by Jordan.
    Lady Astraea was not the type to fall under another man’s spell.
    And Jordan had never manifested powers—or even shown the slightest affinity with the weather—until tonight.
    None of it made any sense.
    Catrina’s hand once more found his and with a growl Rowen shook her off and vaulted across the distance to Lady Astraea.
    Wide-eyed, she stumbled back, but Rowen caught her sleeve and, closing his eyes (and trying to equally close his ears against the screeching of his mother), pulled the disowned Lady Astraea into his arms.
    He said exactly what she needed to hear—a lie.
    “It will be all right,” he assured as she snuffled into his shirt.
    “Rowen Albertus Burchette!” his mother shrieked, and he jerked upright, hearing his middle name invoked in public.
    The clomping of her heels across the glossy marble tiles only gave him a moment’s warning before her hands caught his arm and she tried to wrench it away from Jordan’s mother.
    Rowen stood his ground, tucking his head closer to Lady Astraea’s and whispering the lie again.
    “This is unseemly!” his mother declared, grasping Lady Astraea’s arm instead.
    Lady Astraea yelped, but hid in the shelter of Rowen’s arms with more determination.
    Rowen’s mother snapped her fan shut and began smacking the whimpering Lady Astraea about the head and shoulders.
    Rowen bellowed, whisking Lady Astraea to safety behind him as his mother rained slaps of her fan all across his shoulders and chest.
    Lady Burchette was relentless. “You. Will. Obey. Your. Mother!” she howled. “Now!”
    Rowen leaned down to look his mother in the eye, rebellion still seething deep inside him.
    She flicked his nose with the fan and stood balanced on tiptoe to be nose-to-chin with her greatly taller son. “You will obey me.”
    “I will—”
    “Or you will lose more than this supposed family. You will be disowned by your own.”
    “Now Millie…” Rowen’s father began but she turned his direction so fast he swallowed the rest of his words and grew so pale it seemed he might in a moment vomit them back up.
    She swung back to Rowen, focusing the full force of her glittering gaze on him. “Now, young man. We are leaving.”
    Rowen looked to his father, but cowed, he was already walking toward the door. He looked round the foyer, but everywhere eyes turned away from him. Catrina waved him in her direction, looking as kind as she ever had.
    She mouthed the words, “Come now.”
    “Rowen!” his mother bellowed.
    He blinked, swallowed, and straightened, releasing Lady Astraea. “Yes, Mother.”
    Chloe snatched Lady Astraea into her arms. “So that’s why you carry such a large handbag,” she said to Lady Burchette, “you have to fit two pairs of balls in there along with your rouge.”
    Lady Burchette gasped and whisked her fan open to better behave as a proper lady should at such talk. Then she snapped it shut again and jabbed Rowen in the gut. “Move.”
    He did, raising his chin as proudly as a young man could when being ordered about by his mother.
    “Rowen Albertus,” Chloe chided. “Love, you need to grow a pair. No one would bother having you without them—no matter your rank.”
    Lady Burchette gasped again, poking both her husband and son as she hurried them toward the doors. “I would watch my tongue, were I you,” she warned Chloe. “I only need to say a few words and you’ll never find work again.”
    Chloe balled her hands into fists and set them on her hips. “Your threats mean nothing, Burchette. We all know what happens next. Threats and words—kind or unkind—truth or lies—will not shift the path of the juggernaut now rolling.”
    Lionel, the Astraea butler, yanked the door open and cleared his throat. “The door,” he said pointedly to the Burchettes. “As it seems you are having