Heart of Glass by Jill Marie Landis Read Free Book Online Page B

Colin pictured her fine traveling getup and new boots again. She certainly didn’t look as if she wanted for anything. A bookish, spectacle-wearing spinster and the pampered heiress of a wealthy banker, she had probably never heard the word
no
in her life. She wouldn’t be comfortable very long in the house, not in the condition it was in the last time he’d seen it.
    He hadn’t been able to manage the stairs, but he knew enough from hobbling around a few of the empty rooms on the first floor that the place had been stripped of everything of value. A few pieces of furniture, mostly broken, were amid the debris. Leaves had blown in through open doors and shattered windows. Water damage stained the plaster ceilings. He hadn’t spent five minutes inside before he walked out and gave the house up as one more loss.
    Eugenie nodded toward the tray. “There’s pork and rice just the way you like it. I’ll come back to collect the tray.” When she paused, folded her hands at her waist, and turned to him without smiling, he knew he was in for a lecture.
    “You know,” she began, “the roof leaks. Lots of glass is broken out of the windows. Rain water was rottin’ the sills. Miss Kate’s only having the men do what needs to be done most to keep the weather from bringing the place down.”
    She’s doing what I should have done
.
    “Send her over here, Eugenie.”
    “Miss Kate?”
    “Of course
Miss Kate
. I certainly don’t want to chat with her nanny unless that would do more good.”
    “She’s busy right now. Maybe tomorrow she’ll—”
    “
Now
, Eugenie. Not tomorrow. Not even later today.” Colin took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a second. When he opened them again he spoke slowly and distinctly. “I want to see that woman right now.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    She was irked, but she held her silence as she walked to the door.
    “I mean it, Eugenie.”
    The door closed behind her but not before Colin heard her mumble, “I hear you.”
    Colin gritted his teeth, steeled himself against the pain, and managed to pull himself to a sitting position against a bank of pillows. He ran his palm over his beard, then shoved his hair back out of his eyes. A soup stain from last night’s dinner was on his shirtfront, but it was too late to ask Eugenie for a fresh shirt now.
What do I care what Miss Keene thinks?
    Fine mess you are, Colin
.
    He imagined his mother’s voice, heard the tinkle of her girlish laughter. In Marie Delany’s eyes he could do no wrong. If she wereto have seen him like this before the war she would have rolled her eyes and ordered one of the house maids to fill a tub full of lavender-scented water and bring him clean clothes.
    As he waited for Kate to appear, lethargy mingled with traces of his last dose of laudanum and lulled him into a doze. He was awakened by a knock and discovered the sun was much lower. Kate Keene had taken her sweet time in answering his summons.
    Another quick, impatient knock followed the first before Colin hollered, “Come in.”
    Kate appeared with a rosy blush on her cheeks. Her hair was wrapped in a loose knot atop her head. She wore a pale-blue gown covered by an overly large apron.
    Styles had changed since before the war, so much so that even a man could notice. Back then women wore hooped cages beneath their skirts that belled out to completely hide the female form from the waist down. Seeing Kate’s shapely figure affirmed that Colin certainly didn’t miss those contraptions.
    The pockets of her apron bulged with what appeared to be papers and cards. Before he could utter a word, she went back outside and then came back in toting a bucket, rags, and a mop.
    “Why are you in that getup?” he demanded.
    “Getup?”
    “You look like a servant.” He pinned her with his gaze, letting his eyes roam over her from head to toe, and was pleased when she blushed.
    “I’ve been cleaning.” Kate set down the bucket. “Eugenie said you wanted to see me.”
    He