Elisabeth Fairchild
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Authors: The Love Knot
The Love Knot, A Regency Romance
Elisabeth Fairchild
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Other Books by Elisabeth Fairchild
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The Love Knot
Book 1 in the Ramsay Family series
by Elisabeth Fairchild
Cover Design by Jim D’Arc Designs
Copyright Info:
The Love Knot
first published in paperback by Signet, a division of Penguin Books USA, November 1995
revised for release in electronic book format
by
Ink Lion Studios
, June 2012
copyright
1995
Donna Gimarc
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, downloaded, transmitted, decompiled, reverse engineered, stored in or introduced to any information storage and retrieval system, in any form, whether electronic or mechanical without the author’s written permission. Scanning, uploading or distribution of this book via the Internet or any other means without permission is prohibited.
Please purchase only authorized electronic versions, and do not participate in, or encourage pirated electronic versions
Visit the authors website at:
www.elisabethfairchild.com
Fairchild, Elisabeth (2012). The Love Knot. Regency Romance.
Reviews for The Love Knot
FIVE OUT OF FIVE STARS!! Amazon.com
FIVE OUT OF FIVE STARS
—“Aurora Ramsay and Miles Fletcher took my breath away. . .A true writer if I ever knew one, and one of my favorites.”
–Anny P. (wolfnme) paperbackswap.com
“A five star read from my keeper shelf.” Larissa Lyons, author
of Lady Scandal
FIVE OUT OF FIVE STARS
—“I loved this book.”
—Sylvia W., paperback swap.com
THE LOVE KNOT
4 1/2 STARS
—“Elisabeth Fairchild writes enchanting tales with lovely, appealing characters.
THE LOVE KNOT is no exception. Don't miss this delectable offering.”
--Rickey R. Mallory, AFFAIRE de COEUR
4 STARS
—“Elisabeth Fairchild charms us with an unusual love story with a wonderfully different hero.” “Ms. Fairchild exquisitely crafts an appealing love story with a subtly unique flavor.”
--Melinda Helfer, ROMANTIC TIMES
“Ms. Fairchild had developed larger than life characters. I found THE LOVE KNOT exciting and suspenseful.”--
RENDEZVOUS
To
Nina, Kat and Gretchen
Who all have a bit of Aurora in them
And to master archer
Cousin Jane
The Love Knot, or countryman’s favor, is an intricate knot woven of plaited cornstalks, in a loose doubled loop resembling a heart, bound at the bottom with a twist of ribbon grass to several stalks of golden grain. A fertility symbol, the number of stalks indicates the number of babies to come to a couple. The hand woven love knot was offered by a young man to his beloved as a blessing.
Acknowledgement
Special thanks to
the personnel at Holkham Hall,
for providing me with detailed knowledge of the estate.
LONDON in the spring of 1817
Miles Fletcher suffered not the slightest premonition that a page in his life quietly turned in the hands of Fate. Sunk in one of the comfortable leather chairs at the Travelers Club, blissfully unaware, he was leafing through a book of maps, making careful notes--Hertfordshire, Essex, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk--a seasoned traveler preparing for yet another journey. Miles liked to be prepared. He liked his travels, his very life, to go according to plan.
It was a quiet, mild, rain-scented evening perfumed by the promise of spring, but Miles had closed the door on the smell of freshly-turned soil and green things. Here, no matter the season, the odor that met one’s nostrils was that of cigar smoke and colza oil, traveler’s pie and a strangely piquant blend of exotic colognes from every corner of the globe, a comforting and familiar bouquet.
The languages of at least five different nations could be heard drifting from the card room, but this evening number 106 Pall Mall was neither crowded nor noisy. In fact, the bas relief characters in the Roman frieze that encircled the ceiling evidenced more animation than was to be witnessed between the rows of stylish Corinthian columns in the library.
One of the waiters bent to whisper discreetly. “Lord Ware, sir, is here to fetch you.”
Miles quietly closed the book of maps. Unhurried, he returned the volume to its proper spot in the shelves that lined the walls. His calm, collected expression evidenced no trace of alarm. Ware had come here to fetch him--here, where he knew he would not be admitted because club members were required to have traversed at least five hundred miles from London in a straight line before they were allowed into the inner sanctum. Ware had never set foot outside of the British Isles. A good and tactful man, he never bothered to
fetch
Miles unless Lester was bme quite unmanageable.
