Free The Rake of Hollowhurst Castle by Elizabeth Beacon Page A

badly,’ Stella replied, with a delighted chuckle as she sighted Sir Charles lounging in the drawing-room doorway. ‘How d’you do, Don Carlos?’ she greeted her cousin and hugged him as impulsively and affectionately as she just had Roxanne.
    Standing back to watch them exchange cousinly and not particularly respectful greetings, Roxanne wondered about this new Charles Afforde. With his cousin he was affable and charming; there was none of that knife-edge of rakish impudence or insufferable superiority she disliked so much marring his manner with this woman he evidently loved and respected.
    This Sir Charles seemed infinitely more dangerous than the one who’d been inciting her to fury so very recently, and she wondered wistfully what it would be like to be at the heart of his family rather than reluctantly hovering on the edge of it, doing her best not to long for a loving friendship between them. Well, perhaps a little bit more than friendship, if the truth be known—a dash of danger, perhaps a spark of the fire he’d lit in her with that incendiary kiss the first day he came back to Hollowhurst?
    Transformed by such caring, his potent caress ofmouth on startled mouth in that romantic autumn twilight might easily have seduced her into falling in love with him all over again, at the very moment he’d taken her once-safe world and blown it apart as efficiently as if he’d landed a broadside on it from his old flagship. It was just as well that he showed no sign of either loving or respecting her as he plainly did Stella then, wasn’t it? If her heart was to stay safe and well armoured against him, she could do with all the help she could get from his arrogant determination to get his own way and the memory of just what disillusion awaited any female stupid enough to dream impossible dreams about Captain Charles Afforde, R.N., of course.
    â€˜And you, Mrs Star?’ he asked his cousin now, with a frown of gentle concern as he saw and probably felt the loss of weight from an already slender frame and pushed Stella a little further away to note her shadowed eyes. ‘You’re not as well as you’d like us all to think, are you, my dear one?’ he quizzed her gently, and Roxanne blinked back a tear in sympathy with the one Stella surreptitiously wiped away, then did her best to turn into a smile.
    â€˜I shall be now I’m away from Mama’s attempts to marry me off to every unattached gentleman she knows under the age of seventy and Great-Aunt Letty’s perpetual gossip,’ she said with heartfelt relief.

Chapter Six
    A t last Roxanne felt the promise of easing into her new life and her new home, as seeing how much Stella wanted to be useful made her feel better about needing her help. Used to coping alone, Roxanne finally admitted to herself that she needed Stella’s lively company and good advice on making her new place in the world. Perhaps being needed would help Stella adjust to life as a widow of limited means if she felt she had a place and a purpose.
    She’d dreaded engaging a duenna until Joanna’s last letter told her how unhappy her sister-in-law seemed. If Stella agreed to join her, much about her current situation that seemed out of kilter would be tolerable after all, she’d decided, as she made the invitation to join her at Mulberry House. She might even enjoy socialising with her neighbours and attending assemblies in the local towns with such lively company. She took a second look at Stella’s fine-drawn features and too-slender frame anddecided even such mild dissipation must wait until they were both a little better prepared to enjoy it.
    â€˜I hardly dared hope you’d come so soon,’ she informed her new chaperone as she ushered her into the drawing room and urged her closer to the fire.
    â€˜Wild horses wouldn’t have kept me away, but I really ought to change,’ Stella demurred, with a doubtful