Miss Grantham's One True Sin (The Regency Matchmaker Series Book 2) by Melynda Beth Andrews Read Free Book Online Page B

fields and woods are so delightfully fragrant this time of year."
    True sipped his tea thoughtfully as the ladies had a comfortable coze. He gathered theirs was a warm yet brief acquaintance. It seemed the two had met when Mrs. Robertson's great-niece had attended the boarding school where Marianna taught, and they'd struck up an immediate friendship. True could see why: independent and stubborn, Ophelia Robertson and Marianna Grantham were both bold as brass and twice as cold.
    Casually, they informed him the Robertsons were to remain at Trowbridge Manor the entire month, whereupon a steady stream of heavy thumps and muffled curses commenced in echoes down the halls as the servants hauled the Robertsons’ baggage was hauled upstairs. Mrs. Robertson, it seemed, did not travel lightly, and his servants were annoyed. They cursed and swore louder and louder as the minutes dragged on, and Marianna's speech faltered with each of their epithets. The language did not bother True. His sailors raised cursing to an art form, and he was able to ignore it, but he could see that Marianna was not immune. Perversely, he chose not to put a stop to it and simply pretended not to notice.
    A few minutes later, something fell with a sudden crash: a heavy trunk perhaps, for a particularly long and colorful string of words reached the parlor. Marianna flinched upon the yellow damask sofa and turned to True. "My lord, I simply must ask you to—"
    "Oh, my!" Mrs. Robertson cried. "Marianna! Is that a mouse?" She pointed, and, as Marianna's head swiveled in that direction, the old lady executed a quick, furtive movement and then said, "No, I am mistaken." She clutched at Marianna's wrist and patted her own chest. "But I may still swoon. Do be a lamb and fetch my vinaigrette from my reticule upstairs."
    "Which chamber is yours?" Marianna asked.
    "Just follow the baggage and ask the servants. Hurry, my dear!"
    Marianna left in a rush.
    True scoffed and shook his head at Mrs. Robertson. "Your reticule is under your skirt, Madam, where you just tucked it,"
    Ophelia turned to him. "With each of your servants' coarse epithets, that gel's spine grew straighter. I feared it might snap. Your servants' manners need correction, Trowbridge. Immediately."
    True rubbed his neck tiredly. "Madam, there is jolly little at Trowbridge that does not need correction. If it is not my servants' manners, it is my stables." Or my nieces , he thought wryly. "Everything needs my attention."
    "Oh ... and now you've had to add a wayward heiress to the list. Poor boy," she added without a shred of real sympathy. "If you take my advice, Trowbridge, you'll move that gel to the top of your priority list. Marianna was reared carefully. She is used to a great plenty where attention is concerned."
    "I gather she is used to a great plenty where everything is concerned," True remarked. "She was quite unabashed at telling me how wealthy her parents are."
    "Indeed," Ophelia agreed.
    "I gather all they lack is a bloodline."
    "Of that” —Ophelia threw him a significant look—"I am not so very certain."
    True regarded her obliquely. "What do you mean?"
    "Only that you might ask yourself what else they might lack and if there is not some reason her parents did not accompany her to London."
    True nodded. "Think you it has something to do with the fact that they sent their daughter equipped with color rather than drab?"
    "You mean the rubies and emeralds?"
    True nodded. "Instead of pearls—or diamonds at the outside. It is still considered improper for the newest misses to wear color, is it not?"
    She nodded. "The new crop of misses always wear white muslin and pearls, you know that Trowbridge. Colored gems and anything but the palest muslin are quite beyond the pale."
    "I thought so. Then there can be only one conclusion: the elder Granthams are not, shall I say, quite as polished, as our Marianna."
    Ophelia shrugged. "Perhaps. They were both born and reared on English soil, but I gather