Lady Clarice’s lips thinned. “He is respected, wealthier than you, and he’s keen to have you as his wife.”
“What would I be? His fifth?”
“His third.” April looked up from examining her fingernails. “You can be quite pleased by his interest.”
“Why don’t you marry him?” Melissa smiled. “You’d exasperate him so quickly that he’d keel over, leaving you his vast fortune.”
“Melissa!” Lady Clarice’s brows swooped down. “That will be enough.”
“I agree.” Melissa gave her an even frostier smile. “I will not marry Sir Hartle, so there is no reason to waste conversation on him. I will find out who is trying to hurt me.”
To kill me.
And though you surely did not push the urn or tamper with the footbridge, I have no doubt that you are responsible.
“And when I discover the truth,” she said aloud, “the perpetrator will be exposed, ruined, and will no doubt hang.”
“You can’t hang the wind.” Lady Clarice didn’t blink.
“Nor can anyone fault the rotten, centuries-old planks of an ancient footbridge.” April flicked at her sleeve. “You should be glad my mother is seeing to Cranleigh’s restoration.”
Melissa glanced to the once-library’s far wall, the first one to be dressed with a solid row of tall, gold-framed mirrors rather than the well-filled bookshelves it’d held for centuries. Her heart twisted and anger simmered in a deeper place, in the very roots of her soul. The changes being made to her home – in her view, horrible disfigurements – were simply too much to bear.
Thunder boomed so powerfully that the walls almost shook. Even the rain lashed down harder, as if the weather gods understood her fury, and agreed.
Turning back to her stepmother, she met her gaze.
“I care for none of this,” she said. “You are destroying heritage. The Tandy legacy my family worked so many centuries to uphold.”
“Was it not strengthening your family’s legacy to donate so many books to the surrounding villages and towns?” Lady Clarice feigned sincerity. “You should have seen the people clamoring for them, how their faces lit to collect them. A pity you stayed away.”
“I had my reasons.”
“Hah!” April left the hearth to join them. “You were sulking.”
“A bit, I will not deny,” she said, straightening her back and then walking to the windows.
She stepped as close to the glass as she dared, considering the storm, and stared through the pounding rain to the far boundaries of the estate. She couldn’t see the stables from here, but she fixed her gaze on the place where she knew a corner of grazing pasture met the first gently sloping hills. Curtains of drifting mist hid them, but she knew that if she could see better, her heart would lift to catch glimpses of the retired carriage horses who’d found refuge there.
They were the reason she’d been absent when Lady Clarice had the once-library emptied and her family’s precious books loaded on carts and hauled across the countryside, given to anyone wanting them.
The villagers and townsfolk were eager takers, she’d heard. But she suspected many grabbed the books only to use in winter as welcome, additional fuel.
“Many of the villagers cannot read.” She turned from the windows, not wanting to draw her stepmother’s attention to the pasturelands, the horses Melissa loved so much.
“Like as not,” she continued, “the books will light more than faces when the first snow comes.”
April rolled her eyes. “Must you always paint such a dreadful picture of everything?”
“Do I?” Melissa glanced round at the crystal-dripping chandeliers, the damask settees and the dainty mother-of-pearl-inlaid tables. The still-wrapped gilt mirrors waiting to be fastened to the denuded once-library walls. “I would say, Lady April, that things here are dreadful enough.”
“Oh!” April’s face colored. “You ill-mannered git!”
“Leave her be, dear.” Lady Clarice placed a hand on her daughter’s arm. “She will be leaving us soon enough.”
“Not by cracking bridges or hurled urns, I won’t be.” Melissa saw no reason not to speak her mind. “Nor whatever else you might dream up for me.”
This time two spots of crimson appeared on Lady Clarice’s cheeks.
