The Exploits & Adventures of Miss Alethea Darcy
A Novel
Prologue
The window slid up without a sound, with not a rattle nor squeak to break the silence of early morning. Alethea hitched a leg over the sill, leant down to pick up her bundle of clothes, and swung the other leg over to perch some fifteen feet above the ground. She glanced back into the bedchamber. The motionless figure on the bed was snoring quietly, an arm flung out over the covers, his hair ruffled. The remnants of a fire crackled as a burnt log broke and fell apart in a shower of sparks.
She eased herself down from the sill on to the branch of the magnolia tree espaliered against the red bricks of the house. The huge creamy flowers showed pale in the greyness of the early morning. She shut the window by tugging on the glazing bars, dropped the bundle, and be ... read full excerpt from The Exploits & Adventures of Miss Alethea Darcy ebook
