The Rake of Hollowhurst Castle

Oh, how she’d like to snap some smart retort back at him, to claim her position in local society was too secure to need his approval or interference. Inwardly seething, she managed to give him a sickly smile in recognition that he was a guest under her roof, and her uncle had taught her that obliged her to at least try to be hospitable. Somehow she managed to contain the flood of protest longing for release into what she hoped were a few pithy sentences he wouldn’t be able to argue with.

‘You’re not my brother and I’m not obliged to explain myself to you, Sir Charles. I absolve you from any promise you made him and beg you won’t give me another thought. I have many plans for the future, but none of them are any concern of yours. You’ll have most of your staff back by nightfall, so I suggest you put your own house in order and leave me to manage mine.’

‘You’re the sister of a good friend as well as my cousin Tom Varleigh’s sister-in-law, so do you honestly think I’ll stand by and watch you ruin yourself in the eyes of your own kind when I’ve any power to stop you, ma’am?’

She’d been wavering until he added that ‘ma’am’—such a world of impatience and frustration as it contained, and such an awful promise of what she might become: a mere ma’am, a superannuated spinster with too much money and too little sense to find herself a husband. Now she was no longer the mistress of Hollowhurst, would she be seen by local society as another annoying female with no male to guide and centre her, a dangerous woman contained by their disapproval and then, when the years passed and she’d become a quiz, maybe their laughter? Roxanne shuddered and did her best to hide her misgivings from the abominable man.

‘I’m very pleased to say you possess no power over me, Sir Charles,’ she informed him haughtily and enjoyed the frustration in his eyes.

‘Mrs Lavender has arrived, Miss Roxanne,’ Mereson intoned from the doorway, which called an abrupt halt to their argument and made it annoyingly plain she’d already listened to him and found herself a chaperone.

‘Stella!’ Roxanne gasped and ran out into the hall to welcome her visitor, genuinely pleased to see her, but also glad Stella’s arrival gave her the excuse to ignore the wretched man for a few precious moments. Her letter asking Tom Varleigh’s sister to lend her countenance, if she could tolerate the task, had met with a very ready response, considering it must have got to Varleigh only hours before Stella set out.

‘Oh, Roxanne, how lovely to see you again, and if you’re quite sure I won’t be in the way, I’d really love to stay,’ Mrs Stella Lavender greeted her.

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