Deck The Halls With Love: Lost Lords Of Pembrook Novella Read Online Free

in a chair by the fire in the billiards room, Chetwyn savored his Scotch and reminisced about the first time that he’d set eyes on Merry.
    For more than a year he’d been in seclusion, grieving the loss of his brother. Finally, the Season before last, Chetwyn had taken the first step out of mourning by attending a ball. He had felt as though he were a stranger in a strange land. All the finery, the food, the laughter, the gaiety—did any of them deserve any of it when so many had died?
    Suffocating in that overly flowered ballroom, attempting to talk about weather and theater and books, had made him feel as though his clothing were strangling him. He was merely going through the motions of being present, wishing he’d not been so quick to return to Society.
    And then his gaze had landed on Lady Meredith. He was struck with the romantic notion that she was the sort over whom men fought wars. He’d desperately wanted to release her raven hair from its pins. The pink roses that adorned it matched the ones embroidered in her pale pink gown. It had draped off her alabaster shoulders, enticing a man to touch them. She was talking with three other ladies, and then she tilted back her head slightly and laughed. The glorious tinkling had wafted over to him, and for the first time in a good long while he didn’t feel dead, didn’t feel as though he had been buried alongside Walter. He was ever so glad that he was alive to hear such sweet music.
    As though noticing his regard, she looked at him with eyes of clover green, and he had to take a step back to maintain his balance. The force of her was like nothing he’d ever experienced. Initially, he attributed it to being out of the ballrooms for so long, but he slowly came to realize that it was simply the power of her.
    Throughout the Season, he danced with her at every opportunity, strolled with her through gardens and parks, sent her flowers and sweets. She returned to her father’s estate for the winter. Chetwyn returned to his, but he’d been unable to forget her. She was more than a passing fancy.
    Then in early spring a soldier delivered a letter from Walter, long after he was gone. The man hadn’t posted it for fear it would become lost on the journey from the Crimea. Walter’s words had shaken Chetwyn to the core. As he lay ill, he must have known that the Grim Reaper was hovering nearby, because he asked Chetwyn to promise to ensure that his betrothed was happy. Chetwyn, numbskull that he was, had thought the only way to ensure Lady Anne’s well-being was to marry her himself, so he’d held his growing feelings for Lady Meredith in check. When the next Season was upon them, he turned his attentions to securing Lady Anne’s happiness while Lady Meredith slipped beyond reach.
    He had no right to ask her for forgiveness, no right to ask for a second chance. She had moved on with her life, she had found another. It was time for him to do the same, to stop living in the past, to stop focusing on what might have been—
    If he’d not been so insistent on restoring his estates to their former glory.
    If he’d not been hoarding his coins for that purpose rather than giving his brother an allowance so he could live the life of a gentleman.
    If he hadn’t purchased Walter a commission so he was forced to live the life of a soldier.
    If he hadn’t read Walter’s final letter and allowed it to skew his perspective and overwhelm him with remorse.
    It mattered little to him now that Walter had once commented that he enjoyed being in the army, had felt he had gained purpose. He had died as a young man, while Chetwyn would no doubt die as an old one. And without Merry at his side.
    He downed the contents of his glass, reached for the bottle he’d set beside the chair, and refilled the tumbler. As the room was beginning to spin and his head was feeling dull, he knew he should be abed, where in sleep he would dream of Merry, of her raven hair and green eyes and the way she