Chapter 1 #3
Samantha thanked her, then waited until she’d shut the door before collapsing on the bed with a happy sigh. She had made it. Against all odds, she had escaped. It was a miracle.
She allowed herself approximately five minutes to simply sit and breathe before she looked around to see what her summer was going to include.
She was sitting on a bed that ran north and south in a room where the window was east and the door west. There was no closet or armoire, but she didn’t have all that many clothes so she would make do with the pegs on the wall and the very tall, thin dresser tucked into a corner.
There was a useful lamp on a table next to the bed and a rug under her feet. She couldn’t ask for anything more.
She put her suitcase on the bed, dug around for her toothbrush, then considered her bag.
She never went anywhere without it, ever, but that was simply because she’d grown accustomed to having her life tucked inside it.
At the moment, it contained all her money, her passport, and her personal notebook.
She didn’t suppose anyone would care about it, but she slid it under the bed all the same, used the bathroom, then descended the creaking sets of stairs to the ground floor.
Lydia was in the kitchen, making tea. Samantha joined her at the table and indulged with hardly a pucker. She wasn’t much for tea, but when in England . . .
“Your brother says your degrees are in textiles,” Lydia said without preamble. “Interesting choice.”
“I wasn’t given much choice,” Samantha admitted. “My mother is—”
“Louise Theodosia McKinnon,” Lydia said with a smile. “Yes, I know—and not just from your brother. She has an amazing reputation here in England. The Victorian era is her specialty, isn’t it?”
“It is,” Samantha admitted. “I came this close to being called Fanny.”
Lydia laughed, a sound that was so kind and gentle, Samantha had to smile as well. “No doubt. So, you were lured into the fascinating world of antiques but chose Renaissance England for your master’s. Any reason for it?”
“Rebellion,” Samantha said before she could stop herself.
And if her mother had any idea just how far she intended to rebel during the summer, she would have collapsed in a professional-looking swoon onto an original, perfectly restored fainting couch.
“I like you already,” Lydia said promptly.
“We don’t have anything very interesting upstairs, but my husband is fond of antiques.
Let me show you his treasure room and you can tell me all the appalling comments your mother would make about his poor collection.
I can guarantee there is nothing there to offend your Elizabethan sensibilities. ”
Samantha nodded, then left her tea behind and followed her employer up the stairs.
The treasure room was actually much more impressive than advertised.
Both her mother and her brother would have been quite happy to poke through things and argue over their value.
For herself, she was satisfied to limit herself to identifying the most valuable pieces immediately and heaping praise on her host for their acquisition and the lengths gone to in order to house and display them properly.
Lydia shot her a look of amusement. “It isn’t your era, is it?”
None of it’s my era was almost out of her mouth before she managed to bite her tongue.
No, the Victorian era wasn’t her favorite, but that was probably because she’d spent so many hours helping her mother catalogue its remains when she could have been babysitting and making some money.
She actually got chills down her spine when she contemplated how many years of indentured servitude she would have been engaging in if she’d actually had to pay for her education instead of getting scholarships and graduate assistantships.
“Gavin would be very impressed, though,” Samantha offered.
“He loves nineteenth-century silver.” That in itself was a surprise given that she’d heard her brother vow as he’d left the house for college that he would never, ever have anything to do with anything that needed to be dusted while wearing gloves.
She understood completely.
“We would like to extend our reach back a bit more in history,” Lydia said, “but that would require a better security system, I think. The great houses are very careful about that sort of thing, as you might imagine. Perhaps as time and means allow. And as for you, I think you might want some proper supper before you fall asleep. I’m not sure you’ll want to wake up for it later. ”
“Oh, I think the tea was plenty,” Samantha protested. “Or I could go to the grocery—”
“Of course you won’t,” Lydia said without hesitation. “Room and board is part of our agreement, along with the remuneration. And I think we’ll have the odd side job for you now and again. If you can bear to have anything to do with actors or lovers of antiques.”
“My brother has a big mouth.”
Lydia started to speak, then hesitated. “If I can say this without overstepping my bounds,” she said carefully, “I think it’s safe to say Gavin simply wants you to be happy and thought he might spare you discomfort if we had some idea of your likes and dislikes before we unintentionally upset you.”
Samantha looked at her and tried not to sound defensive. “I’m not really fragile. No matter what they say.”
“Oh, I never imagined you were,” Lydia said. “But you do look tired. I think rest might be what you need, if I could offer an opinion. Feel free to make yourself at home in the kitchen if you wake in the night.”
Samantha parted ways with her at the stairs, thanked her, then trudged up the stairs to her garret with as much spring in her step as she could manage. The thought of bed was almost too irresistible to be ignored.
She walked into her room, then sat down with her gear.
She unpacked, because she didn’t want her clothes to be too wrinkled, then pulled out a backpack and hung it from a peg.
She’d hoped for the occasional opportunity to do a few touristy things and liked to travel light.
That would be easier to use than a suitcase.
She took her plane ticket and shoved it in the drawer of the nightstand near her bed.
She didn’t intend to be using it anytime soon and didn’t suppose anyone would want to steal it, even if the Cookes’ security system wasn’t what it should have been.
She pulled her bag from under the bed, unzipped the secret pocket she’d put in behind the regular pocket inside the lining she’d installed herself—there was no sense in not being a decent seamstress if she couldn’t revamp things to suit herself—and took out the entirety of her funds.
It wasn’t much, just a few hundred pounds Gavin had traded her dollars for at Thanksgiving.
He hadn’t given her much of an exchange break, she was sure, but she’d been willing to pay for the convenience.
She counted it out, considered, then took most of it and looked for someplace to stash it.
She finally decided on the underside of the drawer of the nightstand.
After securing it there with the small amount of duct tape she never left home without—it was better than a stapler for blown-out seams or unraveled hems—she put her mother’s agenda back in her bag along with other necessities and decided it was probably time to sleep while she could.
She got herself ready for bed, then lay there and looked at the ceiling for far longer than she should have. She had made it. She had escaped the confines of her former life and marched boldly into her future life.
She sighed. Perhaps it would turn out to be nothing more interesting than her old life where nothing exciting ever happened to her, but at least that boring life would be happening in a different country and without her parents scrutinizing her every move.
She might actually attempt something daring, like leaving the house without checking the weather first, or attending a show with absolutely no educational or career-furthering value whatsoever. It could be very exciting.
She fell asleep smiling.