An Unlikely Father Read Online Free Page A

expected.”
    Oliver should have been delighted with his grandmother’s pronouncement, but somehow it only made his forthcoming marriage appear even less appealing. Still, to reassure the dowager, he said all that was proper about his proposed fiancé e.
    Some thirty minutes later, the dowager announced that she intended to return to the country that very day. She would await word from her grandson that all the arrangements for his impending marriage were complete.
    Oliver halfheartedly encouraged her to stay, but in truth, his mind was intent on searching through his raffish friends for a small group who would be willing to abandon the amusements of the Season and accompany him to Bath. How could he lure a party of men to the countryside? Females, horses and gaming were the entertainments that interested gentlemen most. Oliver decided that, to be safe, he would offer all three diversions to entice his friends out of Town.
    After bidding his grandmother and her companion good-bye, he called for his hat, coat and cane. He had a great many arrangements to make. First he would track down his oldest friend, Sir Ethan Russell. The baronet, hopefully, would help him with the arrangement for his impromptu house party. Sir Ethan was well known to the leading actresses of the Season, preferring ladybirds to widows and straying wives. Perhaps he could introduce Oliver to several who might be induced to come and entertain his friends—for a large fee.
    No matter what happened, he intended to be in Bath by the end of the week. At the present, all he wanted was to be away from London, from the Marquess of Halcomb’s daughter and that ever-looming specter of an impending marriage.

 
    Two
    Hawk’s Lair Castle, a large Elizabethan structure notable for the ornate domes on the four outer towers, lay some ten miles southwest of Bath at the edge of the Mendip Hills. In the darkness the occupants of the newly arrived vehicle could see little of the looming building except the huge lacquered doors under the arched portico. The brass-studded wood was lit by two oil lanterns fixed into the white stone pediment surrounding the portal.
    “We are here at last,” Emily announced as her sleeping fellow travelers began to stir beneath the woolen traveling rugs. Hawk’s Lair was a welcome sight, since the heated bricks placed in the carriage were now stone cold. She’d had no idea of the trials and tribulations she and Delia would face while journeying the thousands of miles from Calcutta to England with three children and sundry animals. The problems seemed endless — abandonment by the children’s nurse at the first port of call, storm-tossed seas followed by becalmed days without a hint of wind, and lastly a bout of illness visited upon the children within days of arriving at Plymouth.
    Perhaps the most worrisome of her problems involved the unknown Lord Hawksworth. In the three weeks they’d been stranded at the Hart and Hound in the Devonshire countryside nursing young Wesley and Honoria back to health, she’d sent letters to both his Bath estate and his residence in Town without the least response. Emily was beginning to suspect that she and Delia might end up permanent caretakers of the children. But she knew that would be no hardship, for they’d come to love the trio over the course of their travels together.
    The jangle of a team announced the arrival of the cart loaded with their trunks as it drew to a halt behind them. The sound caused the goat, Matilda, to baa with misery at having long been cramped on the floor of the coach. Emily reached down and stroked the animal as Jamie summoned Kali from the goat’s side. Janus, in his covered cage in the corner , echoed the call.
    Swarup opened the door and let down the steps. He tied Matilda’s lead rope round her neck and urged her from the vehicle to clear the aisle so the others might step down. Soon everyone, human and animal, was standing on the frozen ground in front of the