Flirting with His Forbidden Lady--A Regency Family is Reunited Laura Martin (bill gates best books .TXT) 📖

‘With me?’

‘She’s furious with everyone. With the Ashburtons for arriving early, with you not being here to greet them when they arrived, with me for having the audacity to walk in the gardens when we might have guests arriving.’

Beth paused in her pacing, regarding her sister. It must hurt, this need of their mother’s to keep Annabelle hidden away, but the bitterness that should be there wasn’t always present.

‘You could join us, you know, for the party.’

Annabelle scoffed. ‘And incur Mother’s eternal wrath? No, thank you.’

‘She wouldn’t be able to do anything, not if you came down when all the guests were present.’

Annabelle looked at her with a mixture of sadness and pity and, as often happened, Beth felt like the younger sister. ‘I don’t want to come down, Beth. I don’t need to.’

Nodding, Beth knew she couldn’t push the matter. It was Annabelle’s choice, although she had been conditioned to feel ashamed of herself, of her appearance. Self-consciously Annabelle touched the deep scar on her face, letting her fingertips linger on the puckered skin.

‘The Misters Ashburton are very handsome,’ Annabelle said, moving behind Beth as she sat in front of the mirror to straighten her windswept hair. Expertly Annabelle pulled the pins loose as Beth began to run a brush through the tangled strands. They had never had a lady’s maid of their own, funds being too tight ever since they had reached adulthood, so instead had learned to dress each other’s hair and look after their own clothes.

‘They are.’

‘Very similar in appearance, but you say they are not twins.’

‘No. Two or three years separate them in age, I believe.’

‘Of course, they are easy to tell apart by their expressions and the way they carry themselves.’

‘You got close enough to see their expressions?’ Beth pulled at a particularly large knot with the brush, wincing as it tugged at her scalp.

‘I know every passageway and every nook in this house. I was able to observe them once I had been summoned in from the garden.’ Annabelle had not left the estate, not since the accident that had scarred her face. It meant she knew the house better than the servants, and the gardens were her own personal paradise.

‘Which one is the taller of the two, the one with the quick smile and the kind eyes?’

‘Josh... Joshua Ashburton, the younger brother.’ Beth didn’t meet her sister’s eye but knew she would have picked up on the high-pitched note in her voice. Normally she told Annabelle everything, confided all her secrets, her hopes and fears. They’d had long discussions about the trip to London and Beth’s impending marriage before she’d left Sussex, but, despite her sister pressing her since her return, she hadn’t told her much about the Ashburtons out of fear of letting something of what had happened with Josh slip.

Annabelle wouldn’t disapprove. It was more the opposite reaction she was afraid of: that her sister would encourage her to ruin the chance of saving the family for an ill-advised romance. Beth scoffed, the sound out of her mouth before she could stop it. Now she was dreaming. Josh Ashburton hadn’t offered her romance, just one kiss, and the information that he was leaving the country for good in a few short weeks.

‘So the one you’re meant to marry is the serious man, the one who carries himself as if he has a broom wedged down the back of his shirt?’

A smile cracked on Beth’s lips. Annabelle always had been good at getting to the essence of people quickly.

‘Yes. Leonard Ashburton. He’s very...sober in his manner.’

‘It’s a shame it’s not his brother.’ Annabelle’s words were said lightly, without any hidden meaning behind them, and Beth had to stop herself from reacting. Instead she focussed on jabbing the pins into her hair, handing the spares to Annabelle to secure the back. ‘Mother said to tell you to wear the yellow dress.’ Annabelle screwed up her nose. ‘I did say it was far too itchy to wear all afternoon, but she wasn’t interested in my opinion.’

They both turned to the wardrobe, Beth grimacing as she caught sight of the yellow dress. It had been a gift, passed down from a friend of her mother’s. It was beautiful, albeit not of the most current fashion. The top was a lovely pale yellow silk, edged with a delicate trim of lace. A gold ribbon pulled in a high waist and from that the heavy silk skirts flowed. It was designed to be worn with at least two petticoats and the material was not the most breathable for the summer months it was meant for. She couldn’t deny it looked spectacular on, but for some unfathomable reason it was almost unbearably itchy and Beth found she couldn’t sit still when she wore it, often fantasising about ripping the material from her body and throwing it from the cliffs.

‘She won’t be happy if you don’t wear it.’

‘She knows how uncomfortable it is.’ Beth silently wondered if it was her mother’s way of punishing her for not being present when Mr Ashburton arrived.

‘You could defy her.’

Biting her lip, Beth crossed to the wardrobe and ran her hand along the line of dresses hung in the small space. It wasn’t an extensive collection: she had three dresses for day-to-day wear, the yellow dress her mother liked so much, two evening dresses bought specially for her time in London and a thin, floaty white dress she had worn to the local balls as a debutante.

Deciding today was going to be torture enough, she selected her smartest day dress, made of dark blue cotton with a lighter blue sash around the middle. She had always thought it made her look elegant but understated, and it didn’t make her want to rip her skin off every time she wore it.

‘Good choice,’ Annabelle murmured as she helped Beth fasten the dress at the back.

‘Are you sure you won’t come with me? We could walk into the drawing room together.’

Annabelle shook her head and