Page 139 of The Language of Love

When Annis reached her room, she shut the door and collapsed against it.

How had this happened? Was it merely a coincidence? After all, Mr. Leech had said he was taking up a curacy in Yorkshire. Obviously, he had lied about the curate part, but perhaps he’d intended to come to Yorkshire all along?

But Yorkshire was a big county—the largest in Britain—what were the chances that he’d end up on Annis’s doorstep?

She felt the door move behind her and realized somebody was trying to come in. She stepped away, her legs as wobbly as a newborn colt’s.

“Oh, I didn’t see you come in, my lady,” Grace said. “I went down to look for you, but his lordship hadn’t seen you.”

“No, I just arrived.”

“I don’t think you’ll have time to bathe before dinner, my lady. I laid out the blue and silver, like you wanted.”

Annis felt like she was going mad, getting dressed as usual and answering mundane questions about baths and clothes while the man who’d almost wrecked her life—and that of her grandmother—was mere minutes away.

This had to be a bad dream. Surely this could not be happening.

But it was.

Oh God. What was she going to do?