Let Me Be The One Read Online Free PDF

boldly and stayed her ground. She only wished there was something she could do about the color in her cheeks.
    "I am not offended by your interest," she said coolly. "Merely made suspicious by it. I am politely referred to as 'firmly on the shelf' since I marked my twenty-sixth year in April. I am regarded as a bluestocking because I continued to read and show an aptitude for studies after I left the schoolroom. While it is well known that a handsome settlement will accompany me into marriage, it is also well known that I have no wish to turn over the handling of my fortune. It has not escaped your notice that I am ungainly—some would say crippled. I am not the sort of companion one chooses for life, but rather for rounding out the numbers at a dinner party. And finally, if all of that were not enough to dissuade would-be suitors, my father is the Earl of Rosemont, a difficult and contentious individual in the best of circumstances. It stretches my imagination to think of the man who would embrace him as a father-in-law."
    Northam said nothing for a moment. He regarded her set face, the challenge in the almond-shaped eyes. He noticed that they were almost the same color as her hair, and like her hair, they were flecked with gold. "Indeed," he said dryly. "Then I count myself as much relieved that my interest in you is not in the nature of leg-shackling. I do not believe I would want the most disagreeable Earl of Rosemont as a member of the family."
    Some gremlin thought prompted Elizabeth to point out, "He certainly would not want you."
    Northam took no offense; rather he was amused. "It is just as well."
    "Nor would I," she added firmly.
    His amusement deepened, but he was careful not to reveal it. He was also more than a little intrigued. It was clear to him that when Elizabeth Penrose mistook his interest and attention as an overture to pursuit, she was not flattered by it. Panicked was the word that came to mind. "Then we are agreed. We would not suit."
    "No, indeed."
    "It is good, then, that the colonel had no expectations in that regard. I am not of a mind to disappoint him."
    "The colonel?" Elizabeth felt her breath catch. "You know Blackwood?"
    "I do. He was my commander in India."
    "How is he?" she asked softly.
    "Well. He inquires the same about you."
    Suddenly Elizabeth understood. "He asked you to look after me."
    "Something like that. He has not heard from you for months. It is my understanding this is unusual."
    "I have been remiss in my correspondence."
    "No doubt you have little time for you own. Attending to the baroness's affairs must occupy your energies."
    Elizabeth did not think she mistook the note of censure in his tone. "What is your relationship to Blackwood?"
    "As I said, he was my commander in India."
    "That is a connection. Not a relationship." There was some relationship, she thought, that would lead Northam to believe he had the privilege of taking her to task.
    "You have never served under him. In the military it is possible for one to be very much like the other. When the colonel leads, others are inspired to follow. I was merely one of many. And when he asks a favor of me, even in his retirement, it does not occur to refuse."
    Elizabeth nodded. She understood perfectly the loyalty and admiration the colonel inspired. Before the wasting illness that left him without the use of his legs, Blackwood stood firm for a promotion that would have put him squarely in Wellington's boots. It might have been Blackwood in command at Waterloo. When Elizabeth had pointed this out to the colonel, he laughed without any tinge of regret " God forbid, m'girl," he had said. "Boney might have got the best of me, and then where would we be? Speaking French, I tell you. That would be the way of it, and not at all to the king's liking. Wellington's brilliant. Always was."
    "Colonel Blackwood is my mother's cousin," said Elizabeth. "After she died he fancied himself my guardian. That did not endear him to my father,