Thirty-Three“What the blazes are you doing here?”
Edmund was practically tramping on Jessie’s heels in his haste to enter the room. When he saw Sebastian and Isabella he stopped in mid-stride and stiffened.
“We could ask you the same thing.” Sebastian’s stomach tightened. The set of Edmund’s powerful shoulders, the pugnacious jutting jaw hummed with aggression.
He glanced to Cressida and started toward her. “Mrs Washington, I presume.”
“That’s correct. And you are?” She raised one eyebrow, the model of matronly dominion, her back as straight as the three-foot ruler she used in her work, her voice carrying a deep measured authority.
Edmund halted, raised his hat and bowed. “Corporal Edmund Quincey Jnr, ma’am.”
Cressida looked him up and down, assessing the newcomer, then coolly gestur
