Already His (The Caversham Chronicles - Book Two) Read Online Free PDF Page A

that was us, and it’s best left that way.” She began to pull pins from the dress, removing all the rosettes as her imagination began to wander. “I knew Attila was perfect for Michael when I started him under saddle. And I was right, for Michael loves that horse.” She smiled as she pulled pins from a ribbon and tossed it onto the table. “To this day, the man has no idea I was the one who trained him.”
    They were silent a moment as Elise continued removing adornments from the unfinished dress. Their eyes met in the mirror, and Beverly asked, “What are you doing?”
    “I’ve been fretting over this for the last hour.” Elise pointed at the pile of rosettes and the ribbon from the hem she’d just pulled. “There is far too much frippery on this dress. It isn’t what I normally wear, so why pretend I like it?” Their eyes met in the mirror again. “I need a dress that reflects me . The old me and the new me. Who I have always been, and who I am today.”
    Beverly’s eyes grew wide with excitement. She smiled and nodded. “More important than a just a dress, what you need is to come up with a plan for making him take notice of you. Though nothing like you did when you were fifteen. That little act nearly got you killed and it was over a year before Michael returned to Haldenwood.”
    “I did not nearly get killed. I was barely scratched. And I never would have fallen off that trellis if it wasn’t rotted to begin with.” Elise remembered all too well how fabulous Michael looked when stripped to the waist, baring that magnificently muscled chest and back of his. She had stared, mouth agape at the beauty of him. As she felt the vines ripping away from the stone, and the remnants of the ancient trellis crumbling beneath her, her friend screamed, alerting him to her presence as she dangled from his balcony. He’d come running to the rail and looked down just in time to see her land flat on her back in the freshly weeded flower beds below.
    “Perhaps it was a little embarrassing for him, but I was duly punished.... after father ascertained I was indeed well and truly alive.” Elise closed her eyes and sighed. “I remember thinking I’d died and gone to heaven.” Meeting her friend’s blue-eyed stare, she added, “That was before I fell!”
    Beverly threw her arms up and flopped back on the mattress. “You’ve been falling for him since you were ten. One day I’m afraid you might fall too far and get hurt.” Her friend turned a worried expression to her and said, “you must, I implore you, endeavor to restrain yourself. The consequences are too severe for us now.”
    “I shall, I promise, but I need your help devising some way to make him notice the new grown-up me, and not remember the irritating little brat I was.” Elise clasped her hands together in a praying fashion and brought them to her breast. “I so desperately want him to realize that I have waited for him all these years, and I am already his.”
    “What we need is a plan,” Beverly said.
    “Yes, you’ve said that.” Elise stared at her short, mousy-brown hair in the mirror, now wishing her hair were longer, her face prettier, her features more feminine, and her nearly non-existent bosom, more full and lush. Anything so he would see her as a beautiful, desirable woman. Michael was so perfect in her eyes that he deserved a charming, ladylike wife. Granted, she could do nothing about her actual looks, but what about her clothes? Could her clothing help portray her in a more desirable light? A tighter fit to the bodice? A dropped waist perhaps?
    But more important than her looks and clothing, she understood it was her behavior that must be tempered. To that end, she vowed to continue to work on that part of her personality. It often felt like a sisyphian task she undertook, with the hope that one day Michael might think her worthy.
    After several minutes of complete silence while both girls contemplated the problem, Beverly leaped