Free Last Chance Beauty Queen by Hope Ramsay

you’ll do just fine.”
    He cleared his throat. “Um, can I ask you something?”
    “How do I know?”
    “Well, no, that’s not what I was going to ask. I was going to ask why you aren’t concerned about losing the factory.”
    She snickered like an old lady enjoying herself. “Oh, I reckon the factory will work its way out. My main concern in life is to make sure people find their soulmates.”
    “What? I’m sure my forebears were more interested in money than love.”
    “All the more reason you should listen to me.”
    She turned and started to rock again, pushing her glasses up to the top of her head and closing her eyes. “Sometimes I can just see how two people fit together. Folks around here say I’m a matchmaker, but that’s not really what I do. God makes the matches, but sometimes He clues me in.”
    “Really?”
    “You’re humoring me.”
    “Maybe a little.” He was skeptical of fortune-tellers. And of course, he was trying very hard to break out of the deBracy mold. He didn’t want to marry for money, as Granddad had done. He wanted to be a success on his own merits. Maybe if he could make a go of this factory, he could finally lay Granddad to rest.
    “You know,” the old woman said, “folks around here say that I’ve never missed with one of my predictions.”
    “Quite impressive, I must say.” And just a little bit depressing, given what she’d predicted for him.
    She continued to rock. “I see you aren’t convinced.”
    “Well, I haven’t ever heard of a matchmaker quite like you. But I will keep your advice in mind. Thank you,” he said very politely.
    But of course, he wasn’t going to take her advice seriously, even though he had a deep romantic streak and sometimes wanted to believe in fairies, and angels, and all things supernatural.
    But Miriam had simply parroted back his own history, which is exactly what charlatans and fortune-tellers did. The fact that her forecast was likely to come true meant nothing. All the family had ever expected of him was to marry well. And Lady Ashton had almost been handpicked for him. Victoria had been waiting for a long time. But it appeared as if her wait was about to come to an end.
    If he had to marry Victoria to save Woolham House and keep a roof over Petal and Petunia’s heads, he would do it. He knew his duty.
    He stood up. “It’s been a pleasure, Mrs. Randall, but tomorrow is going to be a busy day.”
    “Honey, you have no idea.”

CHAPTER
6
    T he next morning, after she’d confirmed the schedule for the day with Lord Woolham, Caroline donned one of her gray business suits, and drove down to the Allenberg County courthouse. She arrived just as the place opened its doors, and spent more than two hours poring over land records. By the time she had finished, she had a good idea of who owned what property and what they’d paid for it.
    Something fishy was going on in Last Chance, South Carolina, and it didn’t involve cane poles, night crawlers, or the Edisto River.
    Her morning’s research had turned up a big surprise: Jimmy didn’t own nearly as much land in Allenberg County as Caroline had thought. In fact, Dash Randall had been snapping up land faster than anyone, and he’d bought most of it from Jimmy over the last year. Dash had paid somewhat inflated prices for the land, too.
    But not nearly as inflated as the land adjacent to Golfing for God, which had been owned by Jimmy Marshall.Jimmy had made a killing on that real estate—selling the parcels for ten times their assessed value.
    Why would Hugh’s partner do a thing like that? Of course, it was common for land prices to rise on rumors of a big development. But as far as she knew, no one in Allenberg was aware of the factory proposal prior to the sale.
    And then there was the problem that the land Hugh’s partner had purchased had swamp on it. Not a lot of swamp, but just enough to make developing it expensive.
    Caroline knew a lot about wetland abatement issues.