Read Online What a Lady Needs for Christmas by Grace Burrowes - Free Book Online

don’t wear velvet cloaks that cost more than my grandda’s entire harvest of wool would have brought in a good year.”
    Hector was a master of the casual observation.
    I see you haven’t made notes on these reports yet.
    How interesting, that you’re now in correspondence with the very English earl who damned near tried to shoot you on your own grouse moor.
    Margaret appears a wee bit wroth with you.
    “And yet, Lady Joan had no way to travel home to see her family, dirty weather was closing in, and Margs seemed in need of some company,” Dante observed with equal casualness. “They’re getting on well enough.”
    Hector paused before climbing into the second parlor car—the one with the decanters, but lamentably lacking in that marzi-whatever confection.
    “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen Margaret try to catch a snowflake on her tongue.”
    Another observation. Down the platform, Lady Joan, Margaret, and the children were holding hands in a circle, everybody’s face turned skyward, while some sort of silly game got under way and a queer sensation tugged at Dante’s chest.
    “Into the train with you,” he said. “I have questions about Balfour’s holdings, and if we’re quick, we can snatch the box of chocolates and nobody will notice.”
    “Nobody will notice for about five minutes,” Hector said, climbing aboard, “and Balfour’s situation was hard to gather information about. Until a year or so ago, the present earl was presumed dead, and a younger brother was styled as the earl. An older relation had the keeping of the earldom’s trusts, and the family has been wrangling ever since.”
    “They’re Scottish. Of course they’ll wrangle,” Dante said, while outside, the sound of laughter cut through even the bustle on the platform. “The present earl owns ships, I know that much. Bloody fast ships, if the captains at the Edinburgh docks can be believed. Where there are ships, there can be capital.”
    Dante hung his coat on a peg while Hector lingered at the window.
    “Margaret isn’t wearing a bonnet.”
    Neither had Lady Joan been wearing a bonnet. Perhaps Hector’s habit of observation was contagious. “A good wool scarf is better protection from the elements.”
    They fell silent while porters appeared with another bucket of coal, more tea, and scones—in this modern age, could Her Majesty’s rail services boast no fare more imaginative than tea and scones?—and a few disapproving looks aimed at the swag-less mantel.
    “I’d kill for a pair of hot bridies,” Dante said. “The spicy kind my grannie used to make for my nooning.”
    “Shall I have meat pasties delivered on your next trip?”
    Hector was quintessentially Scottish—in his diction, his substantial build, his stubbornness—and yet he made the occasional swipe at English vocabulary. Dante had no idea why.
    “Not meat pasties, a batch of damned bridies. Somebody’s mama likely sells them out front of the station, fresh and piping hot.” Dante grew hungry even thinking about them. “Stay here and prepare to explain to me about Balfour’s personal assets when I get back.”
    Hector raised one dark eyebrow high enough to let Dante know that attempts to deliver orders were humored rather than tolerated—Hector was plenty Scottish when he wanted to be.
    When Dante returned with the box of chocolates, minus the last piece of that almond sweet, Hector had wedged himself in at the table and was making notes in pencil on a sheet of foolscap.
    A conductor’s whistle sounded a single blast.
    “I didn’t quite manage to memorize the guest list for this holiday farce,” Dante said, “much less untangle all the begats and wed-the-daughter-of’s. Tell me about Balfour’s money. Why would an earl who owns a shipping enterprise want to involve himself with my mills?”
    And how much could Dante charge him for that privilege?
    “You could sell the mills,” Hector said, running his pencil down the side of the page as if a