Wentworth Hall Read Online Free PDF Page A

fresh start with new people. Lila resolved to assert herself, make her presence known.
    Picking up her pace, Lila caught up to her mother and sister. “Isn’t it exciting?” she said.
    Her mother glanced over her shoulder and nodded. Maggie, as usual, didn’t even acknowledge Lila’s presence.
    “It is indeed,” Lady Darlington agreed. “I was just telling your sister that she should make every effort to get to know Teddy Fitzhugh. She’s ready for marriage and the longer she waits the dimmer her prospects will become.”
    “Marriage?” Lila gasped. Teddy Fitzhugh wasn’t even in the door yet and they were already plotting to marry him to Maggie. “Surely you can’t be serious.”
    “Have no doubt, I am most serious,” Lady Darlington said.
    “I saw him from my window. He’s not terrible-looking,” Maggie said, her voice flat with the new, put-on maturity she’d acquired over the last year. It was so affected it made Lila want to scream. Only one year earlier they’d tickled, poked, and teased each other, racing down the halls of the manor laughing like lunatics. But now, since her return, Lila hardly recognized her sister. It was as if Maggie had had her heart surgically removed while in France. The change in Maggie was mystifying and depressing—and insufferable.
    “I’d say he was rather handsome,” Lila grumbled.
    Maggie shrugged as if already bored.
    Lila fought the urge to choke her sister as they hurried down the staircase. At the bottom of the stairs, Percival was admitting the twins. “Welcome! Welcome!” Lady Darlington exclaimed, hurrying into the foyer, her arms outstretched in an embracing gesture of charm and warmth. “Welcome to Wentworth Hall. We’re so delighted you’re both here.”
    Teddy Fitzhugh reached back and lifted something from atop one of his suitcases. Turning forward, he offered Lady Darlington a lavishly abundant bouquet of mixed-color roses. “We are so grateful for your kindness to us, Lady Darlington,” he said as he presented them.
    “Most grateful,” Jessica Fitzhugh echoed with less sincere warmth than her brother.
    Lila hoped her face didn’t reveal how overwhelmed she felt by the mere sight of Teddy. She had never seen any man like him. For one thing, he was tan. Set against his sun-lightened hair and eyes it spoke to her of outdoor adventure and highlighted his pearly teeth in a way that gave his smile a thrillingly dangerous charm.
    “Thank you. They’re exquisite,” Lady Darlington gushed over the roses.
    Lila opened her mouth to agree with her mother but closed it again when Lady Darlington added, “Aren’t they stunning, Maggie?”
    “Beautiful,” Maggie concurred without much enthusiasm.
    “Yes, beautiful,” Teddy Fitzhugh murmured. Lila followed the direction of his gaze and immediately realized it was fixed on Maggie. It was as if he could see nothing else.
    For Lila, it was a kick in the gut.
    It took only two days for Lila to conclude that there was absolutely no hope of distracting Teddy Fitzhugh from his fascination with Maggie. Teddy was polite to Lila, of course. During dinner he responded to her questions about South Africa. He encouraged her to play the piano for them at tea. But Lila knew this attention was out of courtesy, not genuine interest. When Lila’s older sister was in the room he did nothing but hang on her every word, laughing uproariously at her every pale witticism, scowling with concern whenever she voiced the mildest of complaints. To borrow an expression she’d heard Nora use: Hewas hooked. There was nothing Lila could think of that could possibly make him notice her. Unless, of course, she had an ally.
    It couldn’t be just any ally, either. It had to be someone who knew him well and whom he trusted completely. Lila came up with a plan.
    Jessica Fitzhugh was, in her own way, as strikingly attractive as her brother. She too had the light tan her brother sported, laid over with a spray of freckles across her