Read Online The Sum of All Kisses by Julia Quinn - Free Book Online Page B

asked.
    “No, the one I’ve just thought of this afternoon.” Harriet pointed the feather end of her quill toward Sarah. “With the heroine who is not too pink or green.”
    “He shot your cousin,” Sarah snapped, whipping around to face her younger sister. “Does no one remember that?”
    “It was such a long time ago,” Harriet said.
    “And I think he’s sorry,” Frances declared.
    “Frances, you are eleven,” Sarah said sharply. “You are hardly able to judge a man’s character.”
    Frances’s eyes slitted. “I can judge yours .”
    Sarah looked from sister to sister, then back at Honoria. Did no one realize what an awful person Lord Hugh was? Forget for the moment (as if one could) that he had nearly destroyed their family. He was horrid. One had only to speak with him for two minutes before—
    “He does often seem uncomfortable at gatherings,” Honoria admitted, breaking into Sarah’s inner rant, “but that is all the more reason for us to go out of our way to make him feel welcome. I—” Honoria cut herself off, looked about the room, took in Harriet, Elizabeth, and Frances, all watching her with great and unconcealed interest, and said, “Excuse me, please.” She took Sarah’s arm and steered her out of the drawing room, down the hall, and into another drawing room.
    “Am I to be Hugh Prentice’s nanny?” Sarah demanded once Honoria had closed the door.
    “Of course not. But I am asking you to make sure that he feels a part of the festivities. Perhaps this evening, in the drawing room before supper,” Honoria suggested.
    Sarah groaned.
    “He’s likely to be off in a corner, standing by himself.”
    “Perhaps he likes it that way.”
    “You’re so good at talking to people,” Honoria said. “You always know what to say.”
    “Not to him.”
    “You don’t even know him,” Honoria said. “How terrible could it be?”
    “Of course I’ve met him. I don’t think there is anyone left in London I haven’t met.” Sarah considered this, then muttered, “Pathetic though that seems.”
    “I didn’t say you hadn’t met him, I said you do not know him,” Honoria corrected. “There is quite a difference.”
    “Very well,” Sarah said, somewhat grudgingly. “If you wish to split hairs.”
    Honoria just tilted her head, forcing Sarah to keep talking.
    “I don’t know him,” Sarah said, “but what I’ve met of him, I don’t particularly like. I have tried to be amiable during these last few months.”
    Honoria gave her a most disbelieving look.
    “I have!” Sarah protested. “I wouldn’t say I’ve tried very hard, but I must tell you, Honoria, the man is not a sparkling conversationalist.”
    Now Honoria looked as if she might laugh, which only fueled Sarah’s irritation.
    “I have tried to speak with him,” Sarah ground out, “because that is what people do at social functions. But he never replies how he ought.”
    “How he ought?” Honoria echoed.
    “He makes me uncomfortable,” Sarah said with a sniff. “And I’m fairly certain he does not like me.”
    “Don’t be silly,” Honoria said. “Everyone likes you.”
    “No,” Sarah said, quite frankly, “everyone likes you . I, on the other hand, lack your kind and pure heart.”
    “What are you talking about?”
    “Merely that while you look for the best in everyone, I take a more cynical view of the world. And I . . .” She paused. How to say it? “There are people in this world who find me quite annoying.”
    “That’s not true,” Honoria said. But it was an automatic reply. Sarah was quite sure that given more time to consider the statement, Honoria would realize that it was quite true.
    Although she would have said the same thing anyway. Honoria was marvelously loyal that way.
    “It is true,” Sarah said, “and it does not bother me. Well, not very much, anyway. It certainly does not bother me about Lord Hugh, given that I return the sentiment in spades.”
    Honoria took a moment to wade