Since the Surrender Read Online Free PDF

very public hanging.
    “She was accused of absconding with an expensive bracelet, fashioned of carnelian and onyx set into—” Another impatient noise from the captain. She inhaled her irritation. “She fastened it about her wrist in the jeweler’s shop, and stepped forward to admire it in the sunlight in the shop doorway, and then she took a few steps outside into the sunlight—just for a moment, mind you—to get a closer look, as it was dimly lit inside the shop, you see. The shopkeeper saw the incident rather differently, and a certain amount of…unpleasantness…ensued. She meant no harm.”
    “Ah.”
    And what a disbelieving syllable that was.
    Still, it didn’t contain a shred of judgment.
    Rosalind said nothing, because the disbelief wasn’t entirely unwarranted, and she was an essentially frank person. Apart from the fact that they were both very pretty, her sisters did her no credit, and no one knew this better than he did, unless it was Colonel March, who had taken them on when he married her, because she had made it a condition of their marriage. It was a risk on her part to insist upon it, and could only have been blind infatuation on the colonel’s part that he’d agreed to it. But the colonel, who could marry as he pleased and was financially quite comfortable and no stranger to risk, had seen her and been smitten and took them all away. They’d grown up with the specter of destitution, of want, hovering always. She knew Lucy’s probably futile social ambition made her more reckless than she ought to have been, and she knew precisely why that bracelet had called to Lucy. That, and the fact that she was a trifle feathery in the brain. She would greatly have preferred that the bracelet not called Lucy out of the door of the shop, but that was neither here nor there at the moment. She would have very much preferred to have an uncontroversial sister, but she loved both of them indiscriminately, and she’d never once failed to take care of them. Since her husband’s death, they were her only family.
    She wouldn’t fail Lucy now. Still…
    Loss. The prospect of it blew a cold breath on the back of her neck. If she entertained the possibility of it for longer than a few seconds, it would weaken her, and she needed her strength. She fought the urge to rub her chilled palms down her pelisse, and then she did. She never, never, never lost without a fight. All her life she’d always done precisely what she’d needed to do.
    “And why did you contact me, Mrs. March?” Another brisk question. This is where all the nerve and strength she’d earned in intervening years since they’d met was required.
    “Because I think William Kinkade might know something about what became of her.”
    His face closed so abruptly she actually felt a jarring sensation in her teeth. As though she’d dashed her head against something unyielding.
    unyielding.
    She’d expected this. She’d forgotten, however, just how delightful it felt.
    Kinkade had served with Chase, and had been as close to him as her husband.
    “I am certain he would speak to you about the matter, should you be so kind as to ask him about it.”
    His face remained as immovable as the statue of William III in St. James’s Square. Eyes inscrutable.
    “He’s deuced difficult to see,” she continued, her voice considerably calmer than her stomach, which interestingly, suddenly seemed to contain spinning windmill blades. “I’ve requested to speak to him through letters to his office but I received an official reply stating he knew nothing at all concerning the whereabouts of Miss Lucy Locke. I attempted to meet with him at his offices—I appeared there one day. I was told he was unavailable. I have not yet been to his home, which would be a somewhat desperate measure, I grant you, but it would be the next step I take in my attempt to contact him. I have not yet been to the hulks, but why would they take her there? It has been a week. She is gone.