Priceless by Christina Dodd Read Free Book Online Page B

mother saw him first. “Abel! Come and visit with us.”
    Cautious, suspecting a trick, he limped into the room and sat down on the far side of Bronwyn’s settee. “It’s Adam,” he corrected pleasantly.
    “So it is.” His mother chuckled like the traitor she had proved to be. “So it is. We’re just working on the clothing for the Boulton boy. His parents died of the typhus lastyear, if you’ll recall, and I’ve arranged to have him apprenticed to a candlemaker.”
    “Is he old enough?” Adam asked, his hands placed precisely on the amber knob of his cane.
    “He’s ten, and the people who have taken him are kind.” She placed a stitch with precision. “I make sure of that. Did you need something?”
    “No, I…missed Bronwyn in the drawing room and feared she might have lost herself in the corridors.”
    “Not at all,” Bronwyn said. “Mab invited me to visit her, and I was honored to comply.”
    Incredulous, Adam said, “You call her Mab?”
    Bronwyn glanced at him, at her hostess. “Isn’t that right?”
    Adam’s eyes narrowed. “Of course, but she only allows—”
    “My beloved relatives to call me ‘Mab,’” his mother interrupted. “And as my daughter-in-law, you’re welcome.” Her rebuke stripped him of his indignation. “That’s why I requested that you call me by my first name.”
    She invested the phrase with significance, she spaced each word individually, and he registered her meaning. For some reason Mab had decided to extend her protection to his intended. He would seek her reasons later; for now he must play host to his guests. He stood and bowed. “If you’re ensconced so cozily, then, I will leave you and attend to my business.”
    Mab waved a hand in dismissal. “A sound idea, son. After all, you’ll be starting a family soon. You’ll need to be on sound financial footing.”
    Adam glanced at the girl who would be his bride and shuddered. It did his vanity no good that she looked at him with equal horror.
    Bronwyn still stared at the doorway after Adam had vanished.
    He had his mother’s eyes. But while his mother’s gavecomfort with their warmth, the man’s eyes were anything but comforting. Disturbing, yes, and intense—vividly gray, with long, black, curly lashes that emphasized the lazy droop of his lids.
    “You don’t like him,” his mother observed.
    “Not a bit,” she answered absently, then swung her appalled gaze on Mab.
    Mab didn’t appear perturbed. She sat on the mammoth chair designed for her contours and sewed a pair of boy’s pants. She seemed so placid, so peaceful, a large, amiable queen in her home. Only her hands betrayed the lie. They wielded the needle faster than Bronwyn’s eye could follow.
    Wishing she could swallow her words, Bronwyn stammered, “That is, Lord Adam is an unknown quantity to me, and I’m unable to declare whether I like him or not. He’s a kind man, I’m sure.”
    Mab’s gaze stabbed her. “Kind? He’s the kind of man who can make a woman feel stupid and ugly.”
    Bronwyn gaped at her, then decided, In for a penny, in for a pound . “And unwanted,” she said defiantly.
    “Surely unwanted. However, if you continue to keep silent, keep house, keep out of the way, he’ll soon learn to tolerate you.”
    Picking up the shirt Mab had given her, Bronwyn nodded and stabbed the material with her needle. “That’s the best I can expect from marriage.”
    Quiet reigned, but Bronwyn realized she had distressed the big lady with the sweet face.
    “You hold yourself so cheaply?”
    “Not myself. But men want beauty, wit, a gracious way with the harp. Nothing more.”
    Mab sighed. “You’re a parrot, repeating your lessons.”
    “Mab”—odd how Bronwyn felt so at home with the name—“your son offered for me because he believed I was like my sisters.”
    “And how are they?”
    “Beautiful and empty-headed.” Bronwyn nibbled herthumbnail. “To marry into the Edana family guarantees a man will have a wife