The Accidental Bride Read Online Free PDF

people. King Charles must be compelled to enact the reforms that Parliament had laid before him. Sooner than do that, the king had gone to war with his people. And even those who, like Cato, were reluctant to take up arms against their sovereign had met his challenge.
    The king’s cause was all but lost, in Cato’s informed opinion. The Parliamentarians had reformed their armies under Oliver Cromwell, and the New Model Army, disciplined and well paid unlike its royalist opponents, was sweeping victoriously through the country.
    Which brought Cato back to Brian Morse.
    In these dangerous times it would take very little—a skirmish, a stray musket ball, a sweeping sword cut, a fall fromhis horse—to leave Brian Morse as head of the Granville clan. So, Cato would marry Phoebe. She was at hand and he was in a hurry. For all practical purposes the alliance could not be bettered.
    At eighteen the girl was still young enough to be influenced by her husband. He would be able to control any skittish tendencies.
    He pursed his lips, considering Phoebe with cool dispassion. She had a robust air, a sturdy figure with generous hips. A good childbearing figure. Much stronger, much less fragile seeming than her sister. She looked like a woman who would bear sons.
    No, she would make him a good wife. He would make sure of it. Cato went to the door, his carrying candle throwing a soft light ahead of him.
    P hoebe was awakened at first light by Olivia’s hand on
her shoulder. “Phoebe, why are your clothes all over the floor?”
    “Wh . . . what?” Phoebe struggled onto an elbow. She blinked blearily at Olivia. She felt horrible, as if she hadn’t slept a wink. “What’s the time? It’s the middle of the night!” she protested. It certainly felt like the middle of the night.
    “No, it’s not. It’s nearly six o’clock,” Olivia stated. Her black eyes were sharply appraising in the pale oval of her face. She took a deep breath, concentrating on controlling the stammer that had plagued her from childhood.
    “Your clothes. They’re in the middle of the floor. They weren’t when we went to b-bed.”
    “I couldn’t sleep, so I went for a walk,” Phoebe said.
    “Out of the house!” Olivia stared in patent disbelief.
    Phoebe shook her head. “No . . . I was going to but then it seemed too cold and dark, so I came back to bed again.” Which was not exactly a lie, she thought.
    Olivia was not convinced. “You’re fibbing,” she declared.
    Phoebe flopped back on the pillows again. Her eyes felt gritty, filled with sand, and she rubbed them with the heels of her palms.
    Olivia sat up, hugging her knees to her narrow chest. She frowned fiercely, her thick dark brows meeting over the bridge of the long Granville nose. “I suppose you really don’t wish to marry my father,” she said matter-of-factly.
    If only it were that simple! But Phoebe couldn’t see how to explain the complexities of her present dilemma to Cato’s daughter. “I don’t wish to get married at all. You know that,” she replied. “We agreed we wouldn’t ever marry . . . that day in the boathouse, with Portia.”
    “I know, b-but that was a long time ago,” Olivia said. “Things change. Look at Portia. Would you ever have believed Portia, of all of us, would have married?”
    “Portia’s a law unto herself,” Phoebe said. “She married because she chose to. I’m being made to.”
    Olivia contemplated this melancholy truth. “I know,” she said simply. “B-but at least it means we’ll always be able to live together.”
    “Until you get married,” Phoebe pointed out.
    “I’m not going to,” Olivia stated flatly.
    “That’s what we all said,” Phoebe reminded her again. “If it can happen to Portia and me, what makes you think you’ll be able to hold out?”
    Olivia’s fine mouth took an obstinate turn. Her pale cheeks became a little flushed. “No one will be able to force me to marry!” she said with low-voiced