Page 1 of Rakes & Reticules
HOW TO CHARM AN EARL
BY USA TODAY BESTSELLING AUTHOR - DAWN BROWER
PROLOGUE
Lady Athena Thompson stared at the treasure chest located in the attic. She had never seen anything more beautiful in her entire life. It was a rich mahogany with gold filigree, and it was covered in a layer of dust. The box was bigger than a jewelry chest, so it would hold more than a few precious baubles.
“What do you think is inside it?” her twin sister, Maeve, asked. They were mirror twins. They each had hair as dark as the night sky and ice-blue eyes, but where they differed was where their dimples were placed, and they each only had one. It was a little eerie… Athena’s was on her left cheek, and Maeve’s on her right. That was how the servants had been able to tell them apart. Somehow their father knew how to tell the twins apart even if the dimple wasn’t visible.
“There is only one way to find out,” Isla, their older sister by two years, said. “We need to open it.”
“But it has a lock on it,” Athena said. “How are we going to do that?”
Isla grinned. “Leave that to me,” she told them. She pulled a pin out of her hair and bent it a little, then placed it in the lock on the chest. Isla tilted her head to the side and leaned it closer to the box. It seemed as if she was listening for something… Then she grinned and twisted the pin. “There you are,” she said, beaming. “Unlock now, you little beastie.”
Athena frowned. Her sister could be a little odd at times, but this was…definitely leaning toward beyond strange. “Are you talking to the lock?”
“And if I am?” Isla lifted her brow, daring her to say the wrong thing.
Maeve giggled. Athena lifted her hands and said, “I mean nothing by it. I don’t know how to pick a lock. I’m only curious.”
What she didn’t say, and probably should have, was to remind her sister that everyone already stared at them as if they were odd creatures. It had a lot to do with how they looked, but even more to do with their family’s history. All three of them got their appearances from their mother—from their dark hair right down to their ice-blue eyes. Somewhere along the way in their family line, that coloring had bred true. Their father was blond and had blue eyes, but his eyes were darker in color than theirs.
Many believed they descended from witches. One of their ancestors, John Alden, had been accused of witchcraft in Salem in the seventeenth century. He had been acquitted, but that stigma had followed him. Their mother was an Alden and her family still resided in Boston. Their American roots were another check against them as far as the ton was concerned.
The lock clicked, and Isla lifted the lid on the box. They all leaned over it and peered inside. “Is that a book?” Maeve asked.
“It is,” Isla said and pulled it out. She flipped open the cover and read the first page. “The Diary of Sybil Alden,” she said quietly. “Was this mother’s before she wed father?”
Athena swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat. None of them truly knew their mother. She had died giving birth to her and Maeve. Isla had her for two years, but even she was too young to remember her. All they had were tales her father told them, and some stories from theirgrandfatherJack when he came over from Boston. They didn’t get too many visits from him either…
“I want to read it,” Athena said. “Let me see it.”
Isla clutched it to her chest. “No,” she said. “What I mean is…” She sighed. “We all should have a turn with it in private. This is something that we will all treasure and we shouldn’t fight over it. None of us want to accidentally damage it, do we?”
Athena and Maeve both shook their heads. “You’re right,” Athena said. “How do we decide who reads it first?” As much as she wanted to grab it out of her sister’s hands she understood what that diary would mean to all of them. They all had lost their mother and craved to know more about her.
“First, let’s see what else is in the chest.” Isla glanced down. “There is more than this diary inside.”
They all huddled around the chest once more. There were some trinkets inside. Three to be exact… They were pendants. Each had a thin gold chain with a little black stone attached with a gold initial embedded in it. The first letter of each of their names. “Do you think mother meant for us to have these?”
“But how would she have known…” Isla frowned. “She didn’t know you two would be girls…”
She was right. They hadn’t been born when their mother had died, yet here were three pendant that were designed for them. “What should we do?”
“I think we should keep the pendant with our respective initials on them,” Maeve said. “I want it.” She held out her hand palm side up waiting for it to be handed to her.
Isla grinned. “Then you shall have it.” She handed Maeve the stone with a clear M embedded in it, then handed Athena the one with her own initial. “We should wear them.”
“I agree,” Maeve said and then did exactly that. She placed the necklace around her neck and patted the little black stone pleased with her actions.
Athena stared at her own pendant. She wasn’t certain she wished to wear hers, but they might question her reluctance. So she folded it in her palm and clasped it tightly. She would decide later if she wished to wear it. “What about the diary?” she asked in an attempt to distract her sisters from her actions. “Do you want it first, Isla? Since you’re the oldest?”
She shook her head. “No,” she told Athena. “I think it should start with you, since technically you’re the youngest. I have no wish to marry, but I know you do. Perhaps there is some useful incite in these pages that will guide you.”
Maeve wrinkled her nose. “I’m too young to marry.”
They were both eighteen. Their birthday had just passed a month earlier and their father had decided it was time for their debut ball in the next couple of months. They would return to London after the season was in full swing. In late April, their London townhouse would be opened and they would take up residence there. They would have all of March and a couple of weeks in April left in the country before they departed. Maeve would have been happy to remain out of society. Athena didn’t blame her. No one seemed to like them; however, she wanted to fall in love. She couldn’t very well do that if she remained cloistered in her family home.
