Read Online Lord Cavendish Returns by Rebecca King - Free Book Online Page B

sound
as though he had just woken up. She wondered what he looked like
first thing in the morning. Where the thought came from heaven only
knew, but it was enough to make her gasp. Her cheeks immediately
flooded with colour at the scandalous nature of her musings and she
looked at him somewhat awkwardly.
    Harper
broke off and studied her. A twinge of wry amusement swept through
him. Although he had no idea what was going through her mind, he
was fairly certain that the pretty lady was just as shaken by their
first meeting as he was. It made him feel inordinately pleased with
the world and, rather than feel slightly caged as he usually did
when he attracted a lady’s interest, he was rather intrigued to
know how far the attraction he felt for this particular beauty
would go.
    Arrabella swallowed and fought the urge to groan aloud at the
amused look he gave her.
    Well, the arrogance of the man, she
thought rather waspishly. He knew that he was having an effect on
her, and was enjoying every single moment of her
discomfort.
    Determined not to let him see just how deeply she was
affected by his presence, she squared her shoulders and gave him an
almost defiant look. Manners demanded that she invite him back to
the vicarage so that she could take the details of the records he
needed to see, but she didn’t want him in her home. She knew
instinctively that the presence of the man beside her would linger
like an ephemeral spirit who refused to leave, and she didn’t want
to walk around her own home thinking about him whenever she found
herself alone.
    “ What year do you need to see?” She sighed and slowly began to
walk toward the church door instead. Some of the parish records
were still kept in the ante room under lock and key. If she was
lucky she could find the record he needed, give him the information
he was after, and send him on his way.
    “ I need a birth record from one and thirty years
ago.”
    This was
enough to make Arrabella lift her brows and stare at him for a
moment. He looked roughly one and thirty. Was the record
his?
    She
unlocked the huge wooden door and drew her shawl tighter around her
shoulders as she walked into the chilled interior of the huge stone
church. It never got warm inside the massive building but, whenever
Arrabella mentioned it to her father, he always reminded her that
it was God’s way of teaching the congregation that they should not
take the Lord’s favour for granted, and a little discomfort once or
twice a week was a small price to pay for the sins they undoubtedly
committed in between services. Arrabella was always left to wonder
whether frostbite was part and parcel of recompensing for sin, and
could only hope so because right now she was struggling not to
sniff inelegantly against the cold that had begun to bite her
nose.
    “ The records are usually kept in here but I don’t know if they
go back that far.”
    It was
on the tip of Harper’ tongue to tell her that one and thirty years
were not all that long ago but wisely kept his mouth
closed.
    Arrabella hurried across the ante room to the small, locked
cupboard that housed the main bible and the records. She knelt
before the cupboard and began to rifle through several large dusty
tomes which were located at the bottom, but they only went back
fifteen years.
    “ I need to ask my father where the older ones are.”
    “ Where do they usually go?” Harper asked quietly from his
position on the floor beside her.
    She had
removed the volumes, read the dates on the spines and he had placed
them on the floor beside them. It seemed a menial, yet intimate
thing to do and he tried to stretch the moment out a little longer
than was necessary. While they were seated, he carefully handed the
volumes back to her to return to the bureau.
    “ They may have been moved to the vicarage to stop mice getting
at them, or they may be in the cellar.”
    “ Cellar?”
    Arrabella pointed downward. “There is a cellar beneath the
church. Some say