His Mistress by Morning Read Online Free PDF

Charlotte that her answer was twofold.
    “Where am I?” she asked cautiously.
    “Your room, of course.” Quince gathered up the pile of clothes and headed toward a door Charlotte hadn’t noticed as yet. She flung it open and disappeared inside.
    Curiosity assailed Charlotte—as to how this room could be hers, and where this Quince was going—so she followed, only to find herself in the most glorious closet she’d ever seen. Suddenly the hundred other questions she wanted to ask vanished.
    Sunshine streamed in from the narrow windows high above them. Two walls were lined with racks of gowns—and not just ordinary gowns, simple muslin things that respectable girls wore, but gowns of brocade, of velvet, ofrich, iridescent sarcenet that enticed one to come closer, if only to touch them.
    To touch the wearer.
    Quince seemed singularly unimpressed by this lavish collection and instead was methodically putting everything in its place.
    She pulled open a drawer and tossed inside a pair of silk stockings. For an instant Charlotte could see other intimate items—in vibrant colors and rich with fancy lace. Whatever sort of lady spent so much money on her undergarments?
    Quince snapped the drawer shut with a thump, and the noise was enough to wake Charlotte out of her distracted reverie. “You’d best be quick about it,” Quince told her as she left the dressing room, Charlotte trailing along after. “I’ve other tasks to attend to this morning and can’t spend it dawdling about your room.”
    Charlotte shook her head. “This isn’t my room.”
    Quince snorted. Loudly. The sort of noise a fishwife would make if you offended her by offering too little for her wares. “Of course it is your room.”
    “But Finella would never allow—”
    “What has she got to say about it when this is your house.”
    My house? “I haven’t a house.”
    Quince was already over at the mantel rearranging the flowers in a vase. “You do now.”
    “A house? This is nonsense. How can I have a house?”
    “It was a gift.”
    “From whom?”
    Pausing in her labors, Quince bit her lip and considered the question for a moment. “That’s always been a matterof debate. Some say it was the Duke of Chesterton, while most think it was the old Earl Boxley, trying to steal you away. Since they are both dead now, I suppose you’re the only one who can settle that debate.”
    The Duke of Chesterton? Earl Boxley? “How could I receive a house from men I’ve never met?” Ridiculous notions both. That is until that odd whirring noise started to buzz in her head again, as it had the day before, and the room started to spin.
    Quince must have seen her distress, for she took her by the arm and led her to a chair by the window. “Easy there, my dear girl. ’Tis a lot to take in on the first day. But you need to understand that some aspects of your life have changed.”
    “This isn’t my house,” Charlotte insisted, feeling childish for continuing the point.
    “Now, there, don’t fret over it. Of course it is your house,” Quince told her, patting her hand with a practiced air. “And this is your room, and this is your life. Exactly what you wished for.”
    Wished for.
    The buzzing returned, and a jumble of images competed across her thoughts like the tangled jumble of traffic that had clogged the street the day before in front of the Marlowes’ town house.
    Flowers for the lady, milord?
    Sebastian striding down the street.
    The saucy Mrs. Fornett in her smart carriage.
    Quince sat down beside her, catching up her hand and patting it reassuringly. It wasn’t the lady’s kindly gesture that struck Charlotte as odd, but the way she smelled. Like a bouquet of posies.
    “You!” Charlotte whispered, as she made the connection. “You were selling flowers yesterday in Berkeley Square.”
    Quince nodded, smiling at her, encouraging her to think harder.
    Aunt Ursula’s ring grew warm, tightening around her finger, while the buzzing in her ears