The Surrender of Miss Fairbourne Read Online Free

voice to sound melodic instead of dull.
    “Good day, Lord Southwaite. We are honored that you chose to call at Fairbourne’s today.”
    E mma Fairbourne did not appear the least embarrassed to be greeting him, finally. She sat behind the big desk in the storage chamber and smiled brightly. She acted as if he had just tied his horse outside a few minutes ago.
    “Honored, are you? I am not accustomed to being cut by someone who is honored, Miss Fairbourne.”
    “Do you think I cut you, sir? I apologize. If you attended the auction, I did not see you. The good wishes and condolences of the patrons absorbed my time and attention.” She angled herself closer to the desk. “Yet, isn’t a cut a social matter? If I had neglected to acknowledge your presence, I do not see how it could be a cut when we have no social connection.”
    He held up one hand, to stop her. “Whether you saw me or not does not matter. You certainly see me now.”
    “Most definitely, since I am not blind.”
    “And when last we met, I specifically informed you that I would study the future of Fairbourne’s, and meet with you within the month to explain my plans for its disposition.”
    “I believe you may have said something to that effect. I cannot swear by it. I was a little overcome at the time.”
    “That was understandable.” She had been most overcome. She had appeared ready to kill him, she was so irate. Her emotional state was why he had put off the reckoning. That had clearly been a mistake.
    “I doubt you do understand, sir, but pray, go on. I believe you were working your way up to a lecture. Or a scold. It is hard to know which just yet.”
    Damnation, but she was an irritating woman. She sat there, suspiciously composed. From the way Nightingale had stormed out of this chamber, one gathered she had already enjoyed one good row with a man today and now was spoiling for another.
    “Neither a lecture nor a scold will be forthcoming. I seek only to clarify that which perhaps you did not hear that day in the solicitor’s chambers.”
    “I heard the important parts. It was a shock to learn that my father had sold you a half interest in Fairbourne’s three years ago, I will admit. I have accepted it, however, so no clarification is required.”
    He paced back and forth in front of that desk, trying to size up where she truly was in her emotions and thoughts. A stack of paintings against a wall interfered with his path in one direction, and a table of silver plate did so in the other, so it became a short and unsatisfactory circuit. The black of her costume kept pressing itself on his sight. She was still in mourning, of course. That checked his simmering anger more than anything else.
    Well, not entirely more than anything else. Ambury had been correct that, while Emma Fairbourne was no great beauty, she had a certain something to her. It had been evident in the solicitor’s chambers, and now was notable here too. Her directness had a lot to do with it, he supposed. Theway she eschewed all artifice created a peculiar…intimacy.
    “You did not inform me of today’s auction,” he said. “I do not think that was an oversight. Yet that day I told you that I expected to be informed about any activities here.”
    “My apologies. When we decided not to send out invitations, due to having no grand preview, I did not think to make special arrangements for you, as one of our most illustrious patrons.”
    “I am not merely one of the patrons. I am one of the
owners
.”
    “I assumed you would not want that well-known. It so smells of trade, when you get down to it. To have made an exception and brought attention to you in that way among the staff—well, I thought you would prefer I not do that.”
    He had to admit that made a certain amount of sense. Damnation, but she was a fast thinker.
    “In the future, please do not worry about such extreme discretion, Miss Fairbourne. Of course, there will be no cause for it, now that the final