Some Enchanted Evening Read Online Free PDF Page B

whole and never, ever let her out.
    "Now you have another awful man after you," Amy said.
    "Is he awful?" Hepburn didn't seem awful. In a way, that was almost worse.
    "They're all awful." Amy caught Clarice by the lapels of her jacket and lowered her voice to an intense whisper. "What are you going to do about him?"
    "I don't know. I don't know." Clarice whispered too. "I thought from your letter he was older. Much older. He sounded so grim."
    "He is grim." With a glance at the door Amy said, "They claim Hepburn is a fair man, but he quarreled with his father and the old earl bought him a commission and forced him to go to war. Six years later his father died. Lord Hepburn sold his commission and came back, but the townsfolk whisper that he's changed."
    "Changed how?"
    "He used to be a young man, devil-may-care, enjoying a fight, drinking the night away, always laughing. Now . . . now he's as you saw. The people in the town admire him — but when they speak of him, there's an edge of fear in their voices."
    Yes. It was that Clarice had sensed. He was a man of privilege, and yet he hid secrets in his soul. Secrets that made them alike.
    She didn't want to recognize him and his mysteries.
    As if she read Clarice's thoughts, Amy said, "Be careful."
    Clarice spoke too quickly. "Why?"
    "He won't stay in the manor with the family."
    "Really?" That floored Clarice. She would have said he made much of his home and his place there. "Where does he stay?"
    "In one of the cottages on the estate. He comes in for breakfast and he seems natural, but they say he walks the estate and the district at night like a man haunted, and he disappears for days at a time." Amy lowered her voice as if her own tale made her uneasy. "They say the war turned him a little mad."
    "Oh, pshaw. Surely not mad!"
    "Yes. Mad. And dangerous. Did you see the way he watched you?" Amy whispered.
    With a fair imitation of insouciance, Clarice shrugged. "They all watch me."
    "Not like that. He's too . . . he's confident." Amy observed Clarice with a wisdom beyond her years. A wisdom won from hard years on the road and too much innocence betrayed. "He wants — and he gets what he wants."
    Clarice knew what Amy meant. After all, hadn't he kissed her hand almost before she knew his name? But just because he had soft lips and a lover's swift tongue was no reason to admit her wariness. Amy had already expressed her uneasiness about the job, and if she knew of Clarice's anxieties, she would push for them to leave. Clarice had lost too much on their last job; having to abandon the town in a hurry had made it impossible to collect the money due them.
    At times like this, when disaster loomed on every side, Clarice could scarcely recall when she had lived in a palace, when she had been pampered and cared for, when all she knew of the world was what Grandmamma told her. Right now, Clarice wished nothing so much as to return to the palace in Beaumontagne and be that spoiled princess once more.
    Foolishness. In the last five years, Clarice had learned well what wishes were worth. So she said, "It's best to be forewarned, so — tell me everything you know about the mad and dangerous Lord Hepburn."
     
    BEAUMONTAGNE
    Eleven years before
     
    Dowager Queen Claudia tapped her cane along the gleaming white marble floor in the throne room in the royal palace in Beaumontagne, and like a sleek, old, domineering greyhound, she barked at her granddaughters, "Chin up! Shoulders back!"
    Fifteen-year-old Crown Prince Rainger of Richarte stood at attention on the dais, observing as she inspected the three princesses.
    He knew his turn would come.
    Resentfully, he considered the old lady. She commanded the grand chamber with her presence. Gaunt and mean, she had a whip for a tongue and blue eyes that could see a man's sins before he'd committed them. Rainger knew, because she was also his godmother, and she exploited that honor and took him to task whenever she thought fit.
    She paced back and