Educating Caroline Read Online Free PDF

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    But of course, of course she did not want to see Hurst dead. Not after what he’d done for Tommy. Maimed, possibly, but never, ever dead.
    But evidently, Hurst Devenmore Slater, tenth Marquis of Winchilsea, would live to see his wedding day— though the identity of his future bride was still somewhat in question—since presently, Caroline heard Braden Granville say, in a mild voice, “But I see I was mistaken.”
    Caroline lifted her face from her lap. Lady Jacquelyn, then, hearing their voices in the hall, must have found some other way out of the room. What a stroke of luck for them all!
    “Quite,” Hurst said, in a voice that was much too selfcongratulatory. “You were quite mistaken, Granville. My dear.” Hurst was drawing her up from the steps again. “Shall we go downstairs, and join your mother?”
    Caroline felt as if there were sand in her mouth. Why, Hurst was speaking to her as if nothing—nothing at all— had occurred. She would have thought that a man who intended to break off his engagement wouldn’t refer to his fiancée as darling or my dear. And he oughtn’t, she thought, to put his hand on the small of her back. That was a bit forward, for someone who only moments before had . . .
    She didn’t want to think about that.
    Then she happened to glance at Braden Granville, who’d come out of the sitting room, and was drawing the door of it closed behind him. Oh, of course. That was it. Hurst didn’t want to cause a scene in front of anyone. Particularly, she supposed, in front of his lover’s fiancé. He was going to wait, she supposed, until they were alone. Then he’d explain why it was that she was no longer the future Lady Winchilsea.
    “Certainly,” she said. She looked again at Braden Granville and felt, seemingly from out of nowhere, a queer little spurt of emotion. What, she wondered, was that? Not pity, surely—though it was quite true that if Braden Granville cared for Lady Jacquelyn anywhere near as much as Caroline supposed she ought to have cared for Hurst, he was going to be very hurt when he found out the truth about the lying, scheming devil spawned whore to whom he had pledged himself.
    But she didn’t believe he cared for Lady Jacquelyn. Not the way he’d spoken about her and her “little game.”
    No, it wasn’t pity Caroline had felt when she’d glanced at Braden Granville just then. But what, then? Caroline’s heart was a tender one, it was true, but she did not normally feel warmly toward ruthless businessmen and heartless Lotharios.
    “Good evening, Mr. Granville,” she said, stifling the inexplicable emotion, and extending her hand toward him. “And thank you for your kindness.”
    Braden Granville looked down at her gloved hand with some surprise. Caroline had apparently startled him, and from some very dark thoughts, if the look on his face was any indication. But he roused himself and took hold of her hand, bringing it rather distractedly toward the general vicinity of his lips without actually touching it with them.
    “Good evening,” he said, not looking at either of them. And then he turned, and disappeared down the hall.
    As soon as he was out of earshot, Hurst snorted disgustedly, and said, “Cheeky blighter!”
    Caroline glanced up at her fiancé. This, too, was not the sort of behavior she might have expected from a man about to liberate himself from the bonds of matrimony.
    “What did you say?” she asked, certain she had not heard him aright.
    “The gall of him, mentioning your corset like that! Not that I’d have expected anything better mannered from such an upstart. You know, there’s a place for men like him. Do you know what it’s called? America.”
    “Oh,” Caroline murmured. “Really, Hurst.”
    “I’m quite serious, Carrie. I tell you, I don’t like it, this new habit of inviting every Tom, Dick, and Harry in London to what used to be thoroughly exclusive, private parties. I mean, I know the fellow’s filthy rich, but