Rexanne Becnel by The Heartbreaker Read Free Book Online Page A

than someone’s laundress or kitchen drudge—although being governess to Izzy, trying to teach her and mold her into a proper young lady, sounded like a horrendous undertaking.
    Then again, her mother hadn’t exactly been easy to take care of. Maybe she should take the position.
    “You’re getting ahead of yourself,” she said out loud.
    “What?” Helen asked as she dangled a bit of rope in front of Bruno. He leaped and snapped to get it, without much success. But it was a game he and Helen played endlessly, and it made Phoebe smile.
    “Bruno is getting bigger already,” she said, changing the subject.
    “Not as big as his other brothers and sisters. Martin let him play with them today.”
    “Bruno may not be the biggest of the lot, but I’m sure he’s the smartest. Aren’t you?”
    Helen grinned, leaping along like the happiest child in the world. “Yes, he’s the smartest puppy of them all!”
    They skipped and danced the rest of the way home, pushed by the wind and barely beating the onset of a fierce spring storm. Only the next morning when Phoebe went out to milk the goats did she discover the three-legged milking stool gone.
    “Izzy!” she exclaimed under her breath. She fumed the whole while she milked the goats on her knees. Not only had the girl not returned the other items, she’d stolen yet again.
    They managed the chores in record time, and the morning shadows were still long as Phoebe stormed toward Farley Park, Helen hurrying to keep up. It was less than three miles, yet until two days ago Phoebe had not taken this route in many years. There’d been no reason to do so. Her meager acreage bordered the Farley properties, but the forest kept the Farley retainers away from her cottage on windswept Plummy Head.
    Somewhere in that forest, well hidden, no doubt, were her pilfered possessions. But why would Izzy choose such oddments to steal? A blanket and a dog she could understand, and perhaps even the basket. But the bench and stool and bucket were household items. Of what use could they be to a child—
    She sucked in a sudden breath. Of course! Izzy made no secret of her disdain for her father and how he’d stolen her away from her old life. Could the child be trying to set up a household of her own, a secret hideaway where she could live—or thought she could live—all on her own?
    The idea was so touchingly sad that it doused every bit of Phoebe’s fury. What an unhappy little girl. Nonetheless, Phoebe could not allow such thieving to go on. It wasn’t good for Izzy, and besides, Phoebe needed her things back. She used them every day.
    She glanced around her as they went on. What sort of place would a little girl like Izzy choose as her hideaway? Somewhere well hidden. And near water. Perhaps along the rocky little beck that ran eventually into the river. Or perhaps near Wildfen Pond.
    Wherever, Phoebe vowed that before the day was out she would reclaim her goods, with or without Izzy’s assistance.
    The grand house at the center of Farley Park looked still and peaceful as Phoebe and Helen crested the hill. The rare March sunshine glinted off the triple row of windows that faced the eastern horizon, and a handful of horses grazed a sloping meadow to the west. A pair of swallows circled overhead, but Phoebe saw no people anywhere. No one in the walled garden, no one in the kitchen plot. Beyond the house, even the stables appeared deserted. If not for the single plume of smoke rising from the kitchen, Phoebe could have believed the house empty—or at least still asleep.
    But as they neared the forecourt, she heard a shout, followed by a crash—pottery smashing upon stone, she would guess. Directly after that came the high-pitched wail of a baby.
    They were definitely not asleep at Farley Park.
    Feeling as if she were eavesdropping, Phoebe hesitated. Front door or back?
    Front, she told herself. She was an aggrieved party come on important business—at least it was important to her.