To Win a Lady's Heart (The Landon Sisters) by Ingrid Hahn Page B

attention to a private matter. There was no reason to think Jane would notice the letter.
    “I wanted to check on Mother before retiring, but was told she was sleeping. Do you know how she is?”
    “Mama isn’t asleep.” Unlike all the rest of the females of the family, Jane never bothered with curls. Her straight hair hung in a braid over her shoulder, the strands almost reddish by the light of the few burning candles.
    “Is she feeling better?”
    “She wasn’t feeling badly, Grace, she’s working on trying to find us a new place.”
    “What? What do you mean, a new place?” Her mouth went flat. Part of her already knew what it was Jane was driving at. “Cousin Bickham doesn’t want us back, I suppose.”
    “She didn’t want you to know.”
    “Well, that was foolish. I obviously ought to know, and you’re going to tell me.”
    Jane remained steadfastly resolute, as calm as she was the very picture of steely resolve. It was nothing if not a stern reminder to Grace never to underestimate any of her sisters, least of all the quiet one. “I know you thought Mother was unforgivably rude by descending early upon the earl when we came to Corbeau Park.”
    “I’m quite reconciled to her actions now. I know her very well, and I know why she chose to do what she did.”
    “That’s it, though, Grace, you don’t.”
    “Very well.” She braced herself. “Tell me.”
    “Actually, I came here to talk to you about something else—something rather…rather particular.”
    For a moment, she wasn’t about to allow the change of subject, her mouth open, ready to bring the topic back to the questions left unanswered.
    Then she relented. If it was a difficult matter, perhaps Jane needed to draw more courage. “To tell me all about the spectacle I was making by sequestering myself away with the earl tonight, no doubt. It’s all right, you’ve been saved the trouble. I was fortuitous enough to be near Lady Rushworth when she loudly proclaimed that very thing to her daughter.”
    Jane withdrew a small silver object and placed it with a clink on the surface of the dressing table, her slender fingers lingering to hover over the ornamental surface before withdrawing.
    It was the snuffbox. Father’s snuffbox, the one Grace had sold in London to afford herself the luxury of ensuring her secret correspondence remained absolutely unknown. What hadn’t gone to paying the postman for her letters and servants for their silence had bought their cousin out of an upset. For all the good it did them now, considering he’d turned them out anyway. “I want to talk to you about this.”
    Grace went silent, saying nothing.
    Jane was studying her carefully. “Isabel found it in a shop in London and sent it to me.”
    Grace looked away. “I don’t see what concern it is of yours—either of yours.”
    “Why would you sell this?”
    Now she couldn’t help herself. Grace crossed the room to sit at the writing desk and began tidying the cluttered surface. If she were lucky, her sister would read the action as an attempt at pointedly ignoring the question instead of trying to conceal what she wasn’t yet ready to have revealed.
    She’d done as her mother had demanded—she’d written the letter graciously refusing the position. But she hadn’t posted it. Instead, she’d burned it and written her acceptance.
    “Why would Isabel buy it? And if she had the funds to do so—”
    “Our aunt apparently opened her purse for the purchase.”
    Grace dropped the letter containing the original offer. It fluttered to the ground where it landed at an angle by the fluted chair leg, the surface of the paper catching the dancing lights and shadows of the fire.
    Before Grace could retrieve it, Jane had picked it up.
    Grace reached to take it back.
    Too late. Jane glanced at the direction and halted, brows knitting as she brought the folded page closer to better read the writing. “ Miss Landon?”
    What’s done was done. There would be no