Free The Masked Heart (Sweet Deception Regency #2) by Karla Darcy

Blaine asked.
    "Well, yes." Fleur dropped her eyes to her lap and pleated the muslin of her skirt. "But Puff says I cannot accept any invitations since I am not out yet."
    "Puff was merely following my instructions, my dear. Until now I did not feel you were old enough." She raised a hand as Fleur started to interrupt. "However I can see that I may have been wrong. Depending on the kind of invitation, perhaps you might be able to accept as long as Puff is included as your chaperone."
    "But, Blaine, the trouble is that we never receive any invitations!" Fleur cried.
    As tears threatened again, Blaine patted the girl briskly. "Come, Fleur. Don't turn into a watering pot. Tell me what all this nonsense is about."
    "It is not nonsense," she answered, her lip jutting out as anger replaced her tears. "When Aunt Haydie first arrived, she refused all invitations since we were in mourning and she had little need to socialize. After she died, in order to keep up the fiction that I still had a proper guardian, we turned everyone away, saying her health was too precarious for visitors. And now the entire county is convinced that there is some dreadful secret that we are trying to hide by our seclusion."
    "What kind of secret?" Blaine asked in concern.
    "For four years, no one has seen Aunt Haydie. And now it appears that the wildest rumors have been circulating." Fleur raised her eyes to her sister and Blaine could see the girl was clearly agitated. "So you see, no one will ever invite me anywhere since everyone thinks that Aunt Haydie has gone out of her head and is locked away to keep the secret safe."
    "Great Heavenly Day!" Blaine was stunned by the shock of her sister's words. Knowing the country people as well as she did it amazed her that she had never considered this bizarre possibility.
    Their ability to pull off the Great Deception had been possible by the very fact that no one in the neighborhood was acquainted with Aunt Haydie. Although she had impersonated her aunt for the benefit of the family solicitor, it had never occurred to her to continue the fiction for the benefit of the neighborhood. She could understand that the very invisibility of Lady Yates had contributed to wild conjectures about the family.
    No wonder Fleur was on the edge of rebellion. Isolated from the Wiltshire society by her sister's orders and ugly rumor, she had some right to her feelings of ill usage. The headache that had been building increased and Blaine raised her hands to her throbbing temples.
    "Let me think about all of this, Fleur, and we'll talk tomorrow. It's late and very difficult for me to think. I do not wish to be unfair to you. Between us, sweetheart, we should be able to find a way out of this coil."
    Although Fleur's face immediately brightened, Blaine was far from certain that she would find a solution to their problem. She retired to her room and tossed and turned much of the night but by morning she was little closer to a solution. Dressing quickly, she arrived at the doorway of the breakfast room just as Val skipped down the stairs.
    "Oh Blaine!" The boy hesitated uncertain how to greet her, then as she opened her arms, he ran across the marble floor to throw his arms around her waist. "I'm glad you're home at last," he said, extricating himself from her embrace.
    "So am I, brat," Blaine said, ruffling his hair as she passed into the breakfast room. "And I'm starving."
    Mrs. Ames, who doubled as cook and housekeeper, had been waiting for Blaine's arrival and fussed over her as she eyed the service of a freckle-faced maid. "It's glad I am that you've finally come home. With the looks of you, I can see we'll have to fatten you up before we send you back to that heathen city."
    "I am only permitted to gorge myself this morning, in honor of my return," Blaine mumbled around a mouth full of steak and kidney pie. "I'll burst all the seams in my gowns and then I'll have Tate ranting and raving."
    "You can spend the day in the saddle," Val