The Indebted Earl by Erica Vetsch (best new books to read .TXT) 📗

And it is my hope that in your mutual grief—I am vain enough to think you will both grieve for me—that you will find comfort together.

Yes, Sophie, I am asking that at some point after I’ve gone, you will give yourself permission to love again. You try to take care of the whole world, and I wanted to be the one to take care of you, but that is not to be. Instead, I hope you will allow yourself to be cared for by Charles.

If I have to give you into the keeping of anyone else, I hope it is my dear friend. I feel you will need each other in the coming months, and I know he will treat you well.

But also know that if Charles isn’t the one for you, you must follow your heart. My prayer is that you let your heart be free to remember me fondly but not hold you back in loving again.

Give my love to Mamie and share my regards with your family.

There was a space, and then the writing continued, but in a weaker, more spidery hand.

Dearest Sophie, my strength is fading, and this will be the last I write. Charles has offered to take dictation in the future, and I will communicate through him.

When you read this, I hope you will know all that I cannot put into words and that you will go forward with your life knowing yourself to have been greatly loved.

God bless, my darling,

Rich

Sophie leaned her head against the windowpane, letting the tears fall. Not giant sobs, but a quiet release that cleansed and healed.

And freed.

The last vestige of guilt at loving someone other than Rich drifted away with her tears. She had, in his own handwriting, his wish that she love again. And his hope that she would come to love Charles.

And she had come to love him, but what to do about it? He had been forthright with her that theirs was not a conventional marriage. She would live at his estate and care for his wards. In exchange she would be free to nurse her broken heart forever and escape her mother’s matchmaking efforts. She would have a home, Mamie could stay with her, and Charles would give Sophie his protection, his provision, and his name.

It had all seemed so simple mere weeks ago.

Before her heart got involved.

A noise from her dressing room drew her attention, and she looked up, but no one was there.

Wiping her eyes, she folded the letter, tucking it into the envelope and returning all the things to the chest. When she finished, she locked it.

Like Mamie had said about Primrose, she would keep the memories, and the rest she would let go.

Charles strode along the cliff edge, grappling with his emotions. She still loved Rich. In spite of what her brother had said, in spite of what Charles had hoped, Sophie was still so in love with her dead fiancé, she wept over his belongings.

He had gone to her room, intending to speak with her, to bare his heart, to ask if she might consider changing the terms of their marriage agreement. He had planned to tell her everything, about how he had fallen in love with her, first through her letters and then by being with her day after day.

He had gone through his dressing room in order to retrieve the miniature, hoping to explain to her that in a moment of weakness, he had kept the likeness and to ask forgiveness.

He had been prepared to make himself vulnerable, something that came hard to him.

He wished he had never gone to her dressing room door. Never seen her tears.

Finding her trapped in the past, holding fast to her loyalty to Rich, communing with his memory and weeping for him, had jolted Charles back into reality.

She would never weep like that for him. He was too old, too reserved, too wrong for her. She could never love him, because he could never measure up to Rich.

At least Charles hadn’t revealed his folly in falling in love with her. He had his pride, after all.

Pride was a cold companion on long nights at sea with nothing to do but remember the warmth of her smile.

Blinded by his thoughts, he nearly tripped over Thea sitting in the grass.

“What are you doing here?” His tone was sharp, and she jerked.

“I live here, remember?” Sarcasm coated her tongue, and her eyes narrowed. “At least for now.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Why was he being so brusque when she wasn’t the one who had wounded his heart?

“I heard the admiral talking to Uncle Marcus in Lyme Regis. He said he had a new ship for you.” She wrapped her arms around her up-bent legs, barely taller than the waving grasses when she put her chin on her knees.

A concussion of surprised gladness shot through Charles. A command. At last. The thing he wanted most in the world.

Or at least the thing he had wanted, before he’d fallen in love with Sophie.

But with that door firmly closed, a command waited? It was exactly what he needed.

“I am a naval captain. That’s my job.” He squinted toward the horizon. To the east, a sail appeared. Patting his pocket, he realized he’d left his spyglass at the house.

He glanced down at Thea. She held his spyglass to her eye like some long-practiced pirate. “Borrowing things, are we?”

She had the grace to blush, collapsing the glass and handing it up to him. “Sorry. When you said the admiral and Uncle Marcus were coming by ship, I wanted to watch it sail round the point.”

“You’re getting as bad as Betsy, taking my things. When I get back to sea, at least my possessions will be my own once more.” He put the telescope to his eye. It was the Revenue cutter, her distinctive sails full and blazing white against the haze of the ocean and sky behind her. She would run in close