Her Secondhand Groom
| Her Secondhand Groom | |
| The Grooms [3] | |
| Gordon, Rose | |
| Smashwords (2011) | |
| Rating: | *** |
| Tags: | Romance |
What he wanted was a plain and meek wife to take care of his children and stay out of his bedroom. What he got was a fiery temptress who, despite her plain appearance, was far more desirable than he could handle.
Patrick Ramsey, Viscount Drakely, is used to having everything go according to his plans. And usually, it does, except when it comes to his three young daughters who are in desperate need of mother and governess. In an attempt to find a suitable woman, he stumbles upon the perfect woman for the post: Miss Juliet Hughes. Juliet, a local village girl, has been educated at London's most highly respect school for young ladies, and better yet, her plain features will make it easy for him to keep his hands off of her.
But what Patrick doesn't realize is this plain young lady from a humble background is anything but the docile, biddable young lady he bargained for, and if he's not careful, he'll lose his heavily guarded heart a little more with each encounter they have. With unshakable confidence and a strong determination, Juliet has no intentions of letting this lofty lord run roughshod over her and will stop at nothing to remind him that they may have been born at unequal stations, but where it counts, they're matched perfectly.
...Gordon yet again offers a historical romance that's not only extremely vibrant with details and memorable characters, but also adds that touch of humor that makes her series stand out from the rest. This is a truly fun plot...
RT Book Reviews, 4-Stars
Being the third book in this series one would think that the story could start to slip, but that just hasn't happened here. Again the characters were so well rounded and full bodied that they could live off the pages in the real world and still be just as amazing as they are on the page.
--Romantic Crush Junkies-eZine
"
Her Secondhand Groom
is a lovely little Regency and shouldn't be missed"--
Rakehell
Rose Gordon is a
USA Today
bestselling author and writer of eight bestselling, unusually unusual historical romances that have been known to include scarred heroes, feisty heroines, marriage-producing scandals, far too much scheming, naughty literature and always a sweet happily-ever-after. When not escaping to another world via reading or writing a book, she spends her time chasing two young boys around the house, being hunted by wild animals, or sitting on the swing in the backyard where she has to use her arms as shields to deflect projectiles AKA: balls, water balloons, sticks, pinecones, and anything else one of them picks up to hurl at his brother who just happens to be hiding behind her.
HER SECONDHAND GROOM
Rose Gordon
HER SECONDHAND GROOM © 2011 C. Rose Gordon
All rights reserved
Cover art (c) 2011 by LFD—used with permission.
Amazon Edition
This book may not be copied in any form including but not limited to: audibly, mechanically, verbally, by Xerox, digitally, or any other way known to man.
This book should be read for entertainment purposes only.
All names, events, and locales are figments of the author’s imagination. If any such person, event, or place existed, it was merely by coincidence.
Other Titles Available
INTENTIONS OF THE EARL
LIBERTY FOR PAUL
TO WIN HIS WAYWARD WIFE
HER SUDDEN GROOM
HER RELUCTANT GROOM
HER SECONDHAND GROOM
And coming January 2012
HER IMPERFECT GROOM
Chapter 1
August 1815
Devon
Patrick Ramsey, Viscount Drakely, sank his fingers into his thick black hair, curled them tightly around the silky strands, and then nearly pulled it all out. Why did his daughters have to choose
right
now
to start singing? And of all the songs for them to pick, why did it have to be the one about that confounded London Bridge being broken down? Suppressing the groan that wanted to escape his throat the best he could, he settled for a quieter noise of aggravation: a sigh.
“
All right, girls,” he began quietly, “that’ll be enough of that song for the day.”
“
But Papa, we just started,” five-year-old Kate protested.
“
And now you’re done,” he informed her quickly before jerking his gaze away. He loved his daughters, he really did. But as much as he loved them, they needed a mother, and they needed one in the worst way.
“
You look like a porcupine,” Kate stated, reaching up to run her fingers through his out-of-sorts hair.
Patrick smiled thinly at her. “Thank you, poppet. I do what I can to expose you to the sights you may not otherwise get to see.”
She giggled, and Patrick’s smile grew bigger and decidedly more sincere.
Pulling Kate onto his lap, he leaned back against the blue crushed velvet squabs and looked at Helena and Celia. They’d both been unusually quiet today. Not that he was surprised they were so quiet. Before they’d gone to London for the Season, they’d spent a considerable amount of time with Miss Emma Green, now Lady Sinclair, a long time friend who was considering the post of governess. However, her marriage to Patrick’s friend, Marcus, put an abrupt end to any chance of Miss Green becoming the girls’ permanent governess, and condemned the girls once again to the insufferable Mrs. Jenkins’ care.
Not that Patrick and the girls weren’t happy for Marcus and Emma, they were. But, they were also disappointed. No one was more so than Patrick. His girls needed a decent governess. They also needed a mother. And to be honest, he had no idea which of the two they needed more.
He sighed again and set Kate back on the seat beside him. Just as he set her down and closed his eyes in deep contemplation, the carriage jolted with so much force he and Kate were nearly ejected from their seats, and would have been if Patrick had not planted his foot firmly on the floor to keep his seat and simultaneously grabbed Kate to keep her from sliding forward.
“
Botheration,” Patrick mumbled under his breath. The carriage was completely stopped and leaning decidedly to the left. “Wait here, girls,” he said, moving to the door of the carriage. Briefly he wondered if they’d actually be safer outside the carriage. Dismissing the thought, he stepped out and looked to Cruxley, his coachman. “What the devil’s going on?”
“
It’s this rut here,” Cruxley said, gesturing down at the deep rut in the middle of the road where the carriage wheel was lodged and looked to be splintering.
Patrick muttered a curse and slung the carriage door open. “Why don’t you girls come on out here, it looks like we’ll be here for a while.”
One by one, Patrick helped his three girls down and watched as they started chasing each other around the dusty road, kicking up enough dust to rival a fog cloud. Coughing, Patrick waved his hand in front of his face in an effort to clear the dust and find his way back to where the wheel was wedged in the rut.
“
Are ye sure those gels should be runnin’ ‘roun’ like that?” Cruxley asked him as he wiped his brow with an old dingy handkerchief.
Patrick glanced back at the girls. Nobody was around, besides they weren’t hurting anything except the new gowns they were wearing. That seemed like a small price to pay for having them otherwise occupied while he helped Cruxley with the wheel. He shrugged. “They’re fine.”
“
Aye,” Cruxley agreed, moving to unhitch the horses.
While Cruxley went off to go tie the reins to a nearby tree, Patrick eyed the wheel and silently prayed they had a spare. If not, it was going to be a long walk to the nearest place that was likely to have one. Sure there were houses close by, they were on the outskirts of a village, but this side of the village didn’t have the type of tenants who were likely to have a spare carriage wheel―if they had one at all.
Cruxley came back, folded his arms across his chest, and stared at the wheel. “I says we jist break it,” he suggested with a shrug.
Patrick shook his head and refused to roll his eyes at his coachman’s wasteful suggestion. He reached forward and grabbed onto the carriage, gently rocking it to see if the carriage could rock to the side or roll forward at all. It couldn’t. He didn’t like the idea of intentionally breaking the wheel more than it already was though. The wheel was broken, but not beyond repair. He might be a viscount, and a wealthy one at that, but he had no intention of purposely being wasteful when so many others had far less than he did. He knew how fortunate he was to be titled and wealthy. After inheriting his title at two and being forced at thirteen to take over the running of his estate to ensure its profitability, he took nothing for granted.
“
Let’s try something else first,” he said, using his toe to check the softness of the ground around the rut. It wasn’t quite soft enough where it would be possible for one to rock the carriage while the other tried to push it, but it wasn’t so hard they couldn’t try to dig out the wheel.
“
Eh?” Cruxley fairly shouted, cupping his hand around his ear like a giant shell.
Patrick glanced at his girls who were giggling and screaming playfully as they continued to chase each other around. “I think we should try to free the wheel without breaking it first,” he said loudly.
Cruxley nodded but didn’t look too convinced.
Ignoring his overly opinionated coachman, Patrick went inside the carriage and lifted up the seat cushion to see what tools might be stored there, hoping to find a shovel or something that could be used like one. Not finding what he was looking for, he selected a gardening tool he’d often seen his tenants use for cropping. It wasn’t perfect, but it would work. Scowling at Cruxley’s laziness, Patrick started swinging what he was certain was called a hoe at the ground in an effort to break up or beat down the earth that seemed to have swallowed the bottom fifth of the carriage wheel.
***
Juliet Hughes looked down at her lot of younger brothers and sisters and forced a smile. “How about if we go for a walk?” she suggested, her smile turning genuine as her siblings nodded their heads in excitement. For the last year she’d taken to teaching her younger siblings to read, write, and any other academic she could think of as a way to earn her keep.
Her father was the son of a second son of a baronet, the only claim to gentry her family could cling to. And cling to that scrap of prestige they had. At twelve, Juliet’s parents borrowed enough money to send her away to Sloan’s School for Young Ladies in an effort to allow Juliet a chance to mingle with the more eminent members of Society and snag a titled and wealthy husband. That, however, did not work out so well.