Love and Honor: The Coltrane Saga, Book 7 (37 page)

Her dear, departed father—the village school teacher and best man she’d ever known—had educated her beyond her needs. She saw problems and the obvious solutions too clearly, and she couldn’t comprehend why the easiest remedies were the hardest to attain. Especially from someone as rich and powerful as Lord Stafford.

His tenants were suffering egregiously. Crops had failed and conditions were desperate, yet he couldn’t care less. He’d never bothered to visit Stafford. Instead, he’d installed Mr. Mason as his land agent. Mason was a bully and fiend who had been given free rein and unfettered control.

His sole objective was to put the estate on a sound financial footing, by any means necessary. He implemented his draconian measures without regard to the human cost. Families had been thrown out on the road. Acreage had been confiscated.

No one was safe from his harsh edicts, not even Emeline. Despite her father’s three decades of loyal service, she—and her two sisters, ten-year-old twins, Nan and Nell—were about to be evicted.

Mr. Mason had already forced them to relinquish their comfortable house, located next to the manor, in which Emeline had been raised. They’d been relegated to a dilapidated cottage in the woods, and they had to start paying rent or leave, her dilemma being that she had no way of paying the rent and nowhere to live if she didn’t.

“Should I wait for you?” Mr. Templeton asked, yanking her out of her furious reverie.

“There’s no need,” Emeline said. “Go make your deliveries, then pick me up at four o’clock as we planned.”

“It doesn’t seem as if anyone is at home.”

Emeline studied the mansion. The curtains were drawn. No stable boy had rushed out to greet them. No butler had appeared.

“Someone will be here,” she asserted. “I have an appointment, remember?”

It was a small lie, but she told it anyway. She’d written to the earl three times, requesting an audience, but hadn’t received a reply. Finally, in exasperation, she’d written a fourth time to inform him that she was coming to London—whether he liked it or not.

She couldn’t abide snobbery or conceit, and considering Lord Stafford’s antecedents, why would he exhibit any?

Twelve months ago, he’d simply been a captain in the army. When the old earl had died without any children, it had been a huge shock to learn that title would pass to Nicholas Price. In an instant, he’d gone from being a common soldier to a peer of the realm. What reason had he to act superior?

“You asked for an appointment,” Mr. Templeton counseled, “but that doesn’t mean the earl will keep it. His kind doesn’t have to be courteous.”

“Maybe he should recall that he’s not all that far above us.”

“Oh, Missy, be careful with your disparaging talk. If you’re not here at four o’clock, I’ll likely be searching for you at the local jail.”

“Don’t be silly. He wouldn’t have me…
jailed
merely for speaking out.”

“He’s dined at the palace with the king. That sort of experience tends to alter a fellow. He might do anything to you.”

“He won’t. He’s an officer in the army. He wouldn’t harm an innocent woman.”

“You just never know,” he ominously warned.

“I’ll be fine,” she insisted as a shiver of dread slithered down her spine.

Afraid that her courage might fail her, she leapt to the ground before she could change her mind.

“Good luck,” he said.

“I don’t need any luck,” she boldly retorted. “I have right on my side, and
right
will always prevail over injustice.”

She marched off, and he clicked the reins, his horses plodding away. As he departed, she felt terribly alone, as if she’d lost her last friend.

She gave in to a moment of weakness, to a moment of doubt, then she straightened with resolve.

“You can do this, you can do this,” she muttered over and over.

There had been a neighborhood meeting, and in a unanimous vote, she’d been elected to present their grievances to Lord Stafford, to seek some relief from Mr. Mason’s oppressive decrees. She would
not
return to Stafford without garnering concessions from the earl.

She climbed the steps and was about to knock, when suddenly, the door was jerked open.

“It’s about bloody time you arrived,” a man barked. He grabbed her and yanked her inside.

Love and Honor

Patricia Hagan

From the glory of Spanish haciendas to the thrilling excitement of New York and the shadowy streets of Morocco, true love knows no bounds.

Beautiful Kit Coltrane has a fiery spirit to match her flame-red hair. No matter that her father is the U.S. Ambassador to Spain, Kit has no interest in all the fancy balls and dinner parties that go with his position.
 

It is at an embassy ball that wealthy rancher Kurt Tanner is smitten by the feisty beauty. A handsome, debonair man of the world, Kurt is used to being able to have his way with any woman he chooses, and Kit’s aloofness only makes him all the more determined to possess her.

When the stubborn Kit is kidnapped and taken to Tangiers to be sold into white slavery, it is up to Kurt to try and save her and prove to her once and for all that she is the perfect woman—and spitfire—for him.

This Retro Romance Reprint was originally published in September 1989 by Avon Books.

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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

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Love and Honor

Copyright © 2012 by Patricia Hagan

ISBN: 978-1-60928-996-6

Edited by Heather Osborn

Cover by Valerie Tibbs

All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Original Publication by Avon Books: September 1989

First
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
electronic publication: June 2012

www.samhainpublishing.com