Sweet Surrender by Cheryl Holt Read Free Book Online

Milton, and even though she shouldn’t have expected a good ending, she felt utterly betrayed.
    She was sad and drained and still mourning—Georgina’s death, the loss of their home, their fleeing Cornwall and all that was familiar.  She just wanted to scurry away, to huddle in a ball and lick her wounds, and she couldn’t bear having him watch.  He was too astute, his probing eyes not missing a single detail.
    "Thank you for asking us to attend you," she courteously said, nearly choking on her manners, "but we shouldn’t have visited without an invitation.  I’m sorry to have bothered you."
    "I wasn’t bothered.  I was merely taken by surprise."
    "I understand, and I apologize for imposing.  You won’t hear from us again.  I swear it."
    She would have huffed off to join the children, but a carriage rattled into view, approaching from the direction of the Abbey.  He pointed to it.
    "I arranged for a groomsman to fetch you so you wouldn’t have to walk."
    He stared her down, his steely gaze confirming that he wasn’t about to let her leave.  Not until they’d hashed out every despicable, poignant fact.
    She could have refused, could have argued and shouted and stamped her feet, but she truly imagined he might pick her up and toss her in the vehicle against her will. 
    Her shoulders sagged with defeat.  "We’ll come to the Abbey."
    "A wise decision," he pompously retorted.
    "I’ll show you my documents and provide you with all the pertinent information.  Then we’ll be on our way."
    "We’ll see about that."
    "Yes, we will."
    She went to the bend in the road and gestured to Michael and Eleanor. 
    "What’s happening?" Eleanor called.
    "We’re going to Milton Abbey for a bit," Grace explained. 
    "Really, Grace?" Michael said.
    "Yes.  Mr. Scott has brought a coach."
    Michael grinned from ear to ear.
     
    DC
     
     
    "You’re claiming my brother was Michael’s father?"
    "I’m not claiming anything about your brother.  I’m telling you that Michael’s father was Edward Scott and that his family lived at Milton Abbey.  How many of your male relatives are named Edward?"
    "In the past eighty years or so, there has been no Edward Scott except my brother."
    "He must be the one then."
    Jackson glared at Grace, wishing he could intimidate her, but she was immune to threats or displays of temper.  She calmly observed him, looking bedraggled and weary, as if she’d like to snuggle down on the sofa and take a nap.
    They were in the main receiving parlor, with Miss Bennett seated on a chair while he paced back and forth.
    Her sister and Michael had been whisked off by servants, with instructions to feed them and prepare rooms for the night. 
    He and Miss Bennett were alone, and he kept firing the same questions at her, but to his great frustration and alarm, she kept supplying the same answers.
    Edward had been a handsome and charming young man.  True.  He’d hailed from Milton Abbey, his father was deceased, and he had a difficult relationship with his mother Beatrice.  True.  He was a businessman who toured the countryside, seeing to his family’s factories.  Not true.
    He had fallen in love and wed Georgina.  Apparently true.  Miss Bennett had the marriage certificate, and Jackson knew Edward’s signature as well as his own.  Edward had signed the blasted thing.
    Then, evidently swamped by guilt, he’d feigned his death.  According to Duncan, Edward had set up a complicated accounting morass that furnished Georgina with a house and allowance. 
    Jackson would never admit that he was responsible for the stipend ending and Miss Bennett being evicted.  His first act as estate executor had been to review the books.  A clerk had mentioned the odd, secretive payments in Cornwall, the ownership of a mysterious house. 
    Jackson had ordered the residence shuttered and sold, the stipend stopped.
    What a mess!  How was he to unravel it?
    She pointed to a portrait that hung over the