Lord Ruthven's Bride Read Online Free PDF

Annabelle as a threat: he suspects you are onto him. You would have been better off not to have shown yourself when he discovered Annabelle in his study.”
    James had considered that. And didn’t like the possibility he’d made such a disastrous blunder. But he had feared Harley would push her from the balcony as he had his last victim.
    * * *
    “This is highly improper,” Lena glanced at the mansion behind them as they entered the vine-covered walkway.
    Annabelle continued forward. “Stop fretting. It’s not as if we are the first ladies to stroll Mrs. Morgan’s gardens. The weather is glorious. Much warmer than normal for March. A perfect day for a walk.”
    “But we are not just admiring the gardens. We have abandoned our hostess during lunch.”
    “Lunch is finished,” Annabelle said. “The ladies are playing cards.”
    “I should never have allowed you to talk me into this. We should return to the house.”
    “Nonsense,” Annabelle replied. “We have come too far to turn back now.”
    They stepped from the covered walkway. Annabelle slipped her arm through Lena’s arm and kept a sedate pace until they rounded a large cluster of bushes taller than themselves.
    “I am certain the spot is near that oak.” She released Lena and hurried the thirty feet to the tree. “Yes,” she cried at sight of newly dug earth the size of a large book at the base of the trunk. “This is the place.”
    Annabelle scanned the ground for something to use for digging. A large branch lay a few feet to the right. She picked it up and began digging, but the branch was unwieldy and moved the dirt in tiny bits. She spied a flat rock half the size of her hand sticking up from the ground several feet from the tree and dropped the branch. Lena reached her as she squatted beside the rock and began working it free.
    “I have never seen this side of you,” Lena said. “It is disturbing.”
    Annabelle broke the rock free and laughed as she rose. “I didn’t quite realize this side of myself existed, either.” She returned to the spot where the dirt had been dug, then pulled up her skirt and knelt.
    “Annabelle, your dress,” Lena admonished.
    “Never fear,” Annabelle scooped dirt with the rock, “the dirt is dry here. And I purposely wore velvet so that the fabric wouldn’t wrinkle.”
    After only a moment’s digging the rock clinked against metal. She looked up at Lena, whose eyes had gone wide.
    Lena shifted her gaze to Annabelle’s face. “Well, are you going to finish or not?”
    Annabelle grinned. “Indeed I am.” She quickly uncovered a four-inch by four-inch tin box. She pulled the box from the hole and opened it.
    “Jewelry,” Lena said.
    Annabelle fingered the ivory broach, emerald comb, silver chain, gold band, pearl ring and gold locket. She lowered herself onto her rump and pulled from beneath the jewelry a folded paper. A newspaper, she realized, and set the box on her lap then unfolded the paper. There were four pieces. Obituaries cut from the Times dated from between a year and a month ago.
    “Obituaries and jewelry,” Lena said. “How strange.”
    “Strange, indeed,” Annabelle agreed. 
    “I don’t care for this, Annabelle.”
    Annabelle had to admit that she didn’t care for it either.
    “You are certain it was Lord Harley you saw bury the box?” Lena asked.
    “Positive.” Annabelle read through the second page, the third, and scanned the fourth, but could make no sense of why Lord Harley had kept the pages or what they had to do with the jewelry.
    “Perhaps we had better go,” Lena said. “We are sure to be missed.”
    Annabelle refolded the clippings. “Yes.” She placed the newspapers beneath the jewelry as she’d found it, then closed the lid and placed it back in the hole.
    “Annabelle,” Lena said.
    “Yes, yes,” Annabelle said. “I am hurrying.”
    Lena patted her hard on the shoulder.
    She looked up. “Really, Lena.”
    Lena stared at something in the direction of the