Celeste Bradley - [Heiress Brides 02] Read Online Free PDF Page B

them aside in order to contemplate her own image in the gilt-framed mirror there. How could he have done it? In what mad
world was it all right for men to arrange the lives of the women around them without any thought to consent or even a decent, bloody warning?
    She closed her eyes.
    I hate her, Papa! She’s cruel and wicked and I hate her!
    Her father’s weary, vaguely shamed face wavered in her memory. She’s not cruel. She simply wants you to learn to be a real lady, like her. You can do it, Dee. Simply … try not to make her angry.
    Had he known by then? Had he finally realized what he’d brought into their peaceful loving home?
    What did that matter now? There was no point in carrying on about the past. Her father was long gone, leaving her with Tessa, which she was not sure she could ever quite forgive him for.
    She sighed. He’d thought he was doing her good. He’d wanted her to fulfill her destiny to win the Pickering Trust, so he’d done his best to choose a new mother who would be able to teach her what she needed to know. He had been dazzled by Tessa’s youth and beauty and somehow hadn’t heard a word about her viperish personality—although that was surely why such a well-connected young lady had gone thus far unwed.
    Tessa had killed Papa. That fact was carved in cold stone in Deirdre’s heart. Her stepmother hadn’t taken a knife to Papa or hidden poison in his port, but she might as well have. It was Tessa and her luxurious needs and wants that had drained Papa’s wealth like a lovely, black-haired, green-eyed parasite.
    Papa had been bemused by Tessa’s décolletage or some such thing, for by the time he’d realized the direction
his finances had taken, it was far too late. He’d aged overnight, a shrunken old man sucked dry by the evil worm of Lady Tessa’s greed.
    Then he was gone, his broken heart stopped in midquarrel with his unrepentant bride, his strength too sapped by ruin and despair to survive it.
    Without the presence of her kindhearted husband to restrain her, Tessa was then able to unleash her full viciousness on young Deirdre and the staff of Woolton.
    Good-bye, Tessa.
    Hello, Brookhaven.
    Deirdre opened her eyes to slide her gaze across the room to where another doorway was discreetly set into the painted paneling. Her ladyship’s room came with his lordship’s room right next door.
    She stood and swiftly crossed the room, turning the key in the lock with quick decision. No freedom? Then no wedding night either. As she stood there, a tap came on her door. She pulled the large key from the lock and dropped it into her bodice. “Yes?”
    Patricia entered. Deirdre had envied her cousin Phoebe the pretty maidservant, for Patricia had a talent for hair and an absolute genius for trimming bonnets.
    It turned out she had a kind nature, too, for she only put the tray down with a quiet smile. “Will you be needing anything else, my lady?”
    Oh yes, she’d forgotten. She was the Marchioness of Brookhaven—rich in all things except command over her own being.
    “No tea just now, Patricia.” The smell of food or drink would only make her stomach roil while she was this upset. “Perhaps … perhaps a hot bath later?” She
ached to wash this day from her … and to take off this damned beautiful wedding gown, but right now she had to think.
    Patricia merely curtsyed, picked up the tray and left the room, leaving Deirdre with several seconds to spare before the twitching fury began again.
    If the worst happened—if Brookhaven continued his tyrannical behavior—if it turned out that she had made the mistake of her life—
    She could simply leave.
    No .
    Actually, yes.
    You don’t want to leave him. You’re angry.
    Oh, “angry” didn’t even come close.
    If you leave him, then how will he ever come to love you back?
    Her spine stiffened. She would not stay if she was not loved and she would not beg for that love, not from anyone.
    If you stay, you can make him love