Page 19 of Alone with the Beastly Duke
Jasmine took out a red dress from her sister’s closet. She set the dress against herself and stood in front of the mirror, imagining what it would look like if she wore it.
Why just imagine when I can wear it?
No one could stop or reprimand her, so Jasmine decided to do what she had always wanted — wear Rose’s outfits and see what they would look like on her.
Jasmine gasped when she saw her reflection in the mirror when she wore Rose’s red dress. It fit snugly on her body, and the neckline was cut just in the right place. The upper part of her bosom spilled out, and the red complimented her brown hair just fine.
Jasmine took one of Rose’s pieces of diamond jewelry and wore it. She pressed a palm against the diamond necklace as it glistened against her neck.
I look breathtaking.
With that, Jasmine turned to another one of Rose’s dresses. She would wear one, pair it with a piece of jewelry, and then walk around the room, pretending to be at a ball where everyone was spellbound by her beauty.
Jasmine would smile and wave like she was waving at members of the Ton who could not take their eyes off her. She imagined that, for the first time, she was not the wallflower. She was the belle whose beauty held everyone spellbound.
A long while later, an exhausted Jasmine left Rose’s room for the kitchen after she had worn almost every ball dress in Rose’s room.
Fortunately, she saw leftover bread in the kitchen and some pound cake. Jasmine sat alone at the dining table, where she ate dinner.
She returned to the library and continued reading until early in the morning when she finally drifted off to sleep.
ChapterSix
Crack! Crack!
Jasmine squinted as she woke up. The sun was in full glare, its bright light shining on Jasmine, and the annoying chopping noise had woken her up.
Grudgingly, Jasmine stood up, her body aching just a little from sleeping at a desk instead of the comfortable bed she was used to.
Jasmine yawned and smiled. It was going to be a good day. She was all alone with all the time in her hands. Jasmine shivered just a little as the cold breeze of the morning blew in.
First, I need to make a fire.
She had not made fire the previous night and knew she could not survive another night without fire.
Jasmine went to the shed in the basement and got wood which she threw into the fireplace. It was then that she realized that she had no idea what she was supposed to do next. Jasmine was the daughter of an Earl, and as such, she had never had to make fire on her own. Instead, that was the duty of the maids.
She thought long and hard about it but did not know what to do. Then, she remembered that she had run into a maid making a fire a while ago, and the maid had a tinderbox with her.
That is what I need to look for!
Jasmine went to the storage room in the maids’ quarters, where she rummaged around for a long time before she finally came across the tinderbox. While she had no idea how to use the tinderbox, Jasmine was not one to give up, so she was determined to figure it out that day.
On returning to the library, she opened the tinderbox and saw flint, steel, tinder, and some matches. Jasmine sighed as she realized that there were a lot of objects in the tinderbox, and she still needed to decide which one to use to start a fire.
Plank! Plank!
The sound of chopping wood came again, and this time, Jasmine decided to check out where the sound was coming from. She dragged a chair to the window and climbed the chair. She peeped through the window to the estate of their neighbor.
She saw a bare-chested man with a body so muscular that she wanted to run her hands over it. He had an axe in his hand and was doubled over as he inspected the wood he was chopping.
Jasmine did not know why, but she had a feeling that the man was strangely familiar. It was when the muscular man stood upright that she realized why he seemed so similar.
She would recognize the deep blue eyes, long blonde hair, and, most importantly, the towering figure anywhere. The man chopping the wood was the beastly man she had met the previous day. The same whose image she could not keep out of her head ever since she had set her eyes on him.
As though he could tell she was peeping at him, he looked directly at her, and Jasmine immediately ducked, hoping that the man had not seen her.
Jasmine’s heart beat rapidly in excitement.
