All for the Heiress Read Online Free PDF Page B

anyone was about, decided to head straight to the museum to beg for clothes.
    Her guilt was in full bloom at the historical gallery, which was comprised of items that had been moldering in the castle before Piper inherited and sorted it all. The curator, Padma, knew she worked at the castle and blithely handed everything over without a blink.
    “This is sturdy,” she said, emerging from a deep, air conditioned closet, her gorgeous, shiny black hair slightly pulled from its ponytail from the effort, but somehow looking as if she’d meant for it to go that way.
    Mellie never felt especially pretty on her best days, but being around the glamorous Padma made her feel like toast that had been dropped with its butter side down. She held up the rough, sheepy looking dress to herself and frowned.
    “Do you have anything, um, cuter?” she asked. “And perhaps softer? But still sturdy.”
    “Ah, is it for you?” Padma asked. She gave Mellie a long sweeping look before nodding and heading back into the closet. “Finally going to make a move on Archie?” She came back out with a finer, burgundy colored dress with a bit of lace around the neckline. “This will look nice with your lovely dark eyes. They’re blue, right?”
    Mellie nodded, her cheeks going hot at the mention of the head of the historical re-enactors who rented land on the property to live out the eighteenth century lifestyle. She used to have a little crush on Archebald Bancroft, but was mostly over it. He was quite a bit older than her, and had never treated her like anything more than a cousin, or perhaps loveable spaniel, no matter how enticing she’d tried to be.
    “No, it isn’t for Archie,” she said quickly. “Just going out there for the weekend with Shane.” She clamped her lips together at Padma’s face, like a hungry shark, and she’d just emptied a bucket of gossip chum all over the place.
    Padma grabbed her hand and gasped. “Shane? Shane Brodie? Mellie, when did this happen? Is it a secret?”
    Mellie narrowed her eyes. “It is not a secret, and nothing has happened. It’s just because we’re going at the same time. I’ve been meaning to go out there since they moved in. And so has Shane, so we’re just …” she trailed off, knowing she protested too much.
    “Okay, okay,” Padma said. “I won’t tell a soul.”
    “God, Padma.” She gave up and took the dress. She declined the underthings, wanting to be comfortable and not have a bunch of layers, but of course that just set Padma off again. “I’ll be wearing longjohns, dummy,” she said. “Get your mind out of the gutter.”
    “Hey, if I were a few years younger I might give him a go,” Padma said with a shrug.
    Mellie forced back the outrage she felt at Shane being treated like a piece of meat. Though, he’d probably be thrilled to know Padma even gave him a passing thought.
    She got a couple knives, an old timepiece she thought might come in handy since nothing battery powered could go back, and a kilt and shirt for Shane, then left before she got herself in deeper with her unwise mouth.
    Back at the castle, she kept her head down and hurried her huge pile of items to her room, cursing herself for not leaving it in the car as both Piper and Lachlan raised their eyebrows curiously.
    “What’s all that, then?” Lachlan asked at Piper’s obvious urging, when Mellie returned to start making dinner.
    “Oh? Sorry?” she asked, trying to look innocent. The looks they both gave her told her their imaginations were going to do worse damage and she used a lying technique she’d learned from the telly, to stick as close as possible to the truth. “Do you mean the clothes?” She shrugged. “Just Shane and I thought we might finally check out the historical camp.”
    They both stared at her, as she’d expected. Lachlan looked peeved.
    “That goatherd who tried to get close to my sister?” he asked, voice rising with each word.
    On the one hand, she felt flattered that