With This Ring by Amanda Quick Read Free Book Online Page B

matters of love. I believe that the current earl was married when he was nineteen.”
    “So young?” Beatrice asked, surprised.
    “They say she was the woman of his dreams. A paragon of a wife and a loving mother. He gave his heart to her and she gave him his heir and a spare. But only a few short years later she died of a lung infection.”
    “How sad.”
    “It is said that Monkcrest was heartbroken. Vowed never to remarry. The Mad Monks love only once in a lifetime, you see.”
    “And having gotten himself two sons, there was no pressing need for him to wed again, was there?” Beatrice said dryly.
    Winifred looked thoughtful. “Actually, his story is very much like your own, my dear. A tragedy of great love found and then lost much too soon.”
    Beatrice was well aware that her own brief marriage had been elevated to the status of a minor legend within her family.
    She pushed aside the memory of Winifred’s gossip and glanced at Leo. He shifted his position slightly against the pillar. The small movement stretched the fabric of his coat across his broad shoulders. Beatrice wished that she was not quite so conscious of the way the well-cut garment emphasized the sleek, strong line of his physique.
    It should not matter to her that the front of his linen shirt was unruffled or that he tied his cravat in a strict, stern style rather than in one of the elaborate chin-high arrangements so popular in Town. But it did.
    He obviously did not concern himself overmuch with fashion, but his cool, supremely self-confident style would have been the envy of many. There was a dark, brooding quality in him that put Beatrice in mind of one of the heroes of her own novels.
    She stifled a groan. This was ridiculous. It was only her writer’s imagination that caused her to envision deep, stirring depths in this man. She must keep her common sense and her wits about her.
    She leaned forward to cradle a brilliant golden orchid in her palm. “You have a most impressive collection of plants, my lord.”
    “Thank you.” Leo propped one shoulder against a wooden post. “My grandfather built this greenhouse. He was consumed by an interest in the science of gardening.’
    “I have never seen orchids of this particular color.” “They were a gift from an acquaintance of mine who spent many years in the Far East. He brought them back from an island called Vanzagara.”
    “Gardening is obviously one of your many interests, too, my lord.’ Beatrice paused to admire a bed of huge, strangely marked chrysanthemums.
    “I have maintained the greenhouse because it contains many curiosities. But gardening does not fascinate me the way it did my grandfather.-
    “Did your father also conduct experiments in here?” “Very likely, when he was young. But I am told that as he grew older, his interests concentrated on the study of mechanic,al matters. His old laboratory is filled with clocks and gauges and instruments.”
    Beatrice moved on to a bed of cacti. -You did not follow in your father’s footsteps.-
    “No. My father was lost at sea together with my mother when I was four years old. I do not remember either of them clearly. My grandfather raised me.”
    “I see.” She glanced quickly at him, chagrined by her own tactlessness. “I had not realized.-
    “Of course not. Do not concern yourself.”
    She moved slowly down the aisle, pausing occasionally to scrutinize a specimen. “May I ask what led you to your study of ancient legends and antiquities?”
    “I was intrigued by such things from my earliest years. Grandfather once said that a taste for the arcane is in the Monkcrest blood.”
    Beatrice bent her head to inhale the fragrance of an unusual purple orchid. “Perhaps your scholarly interest fn legends and the like arose because you yourself are a product of legend.-
    He straightened away from the post with an irritated movement and started down the aisle that paralleled the one in which she stood. “You are an intelligent