His Lady Mistress

Elizabeth Rolls161core. She had been gaining a little weight, getting some colourin her cheeks. He remembered the journey up to Londonfrom Faringdon Hall. She’d barely eaten then. Had she beenfrightened? Alone with a man who was savagely angry withher? Realising that Henny was still there, he pulled himselftogether. ‘Do you happen to know which way she might havegone, Henny?’ he asked.She smiled. ‘She likes the cliffs out over the sands. Likesthe view and the birds, I dare say. Shouldn’t be hard to findher.’Max felt every drop of blood congeal as Henny turned togo. Verity...too upset to eat properly, near those damn cliffs.His stomach churned. Six hundred feet high the cliffs werein spots. Fear rose in his throat, acrid and metallic. No. Shewouldn’t. He didn’t believe she would take that way out.But if she was upset...she might not be as careful as sheought to be. And the cliffs could be unstable. If she were toonear the edge...High on the cliffs, Verity stared out over the Channel.Somewhere in the blue haze lay France. She kept well backfrom the edge, Mrs Henty’s warning fresh in her mind. Yoube careful. Tricky the cliffs are. Falling all the time. And theturf is slippery.The salt-laden wind buffeted her mercilessly, whippingaround her, so that her dress moulded to her. It caught theseabirds and whirled them shrieking aloft. A falcon hoveredout from the clifftop, waiting patiently for an unwary pigeon.She watched it, yearning. If only it were possible to ridethe wind, to fly beyond the disaster she had made of everything.Looking back, she could see the foolishness of herdecision to deceive Max and become his mistress. If she hadrealised that he would find out...And if only she had not been foolish enough to believethat she could regain his trust, that his concern for her wasspurred by more than his respect for her father, that some