That had come from Hyacinth. One glance at Primrose told him she was too furious to speak. “It wasn’t charity, Miss Collier. The coins were well spent just to see him eat a bit of crow. I detest a bully. The question does remain, however, what will you do when the rents are due next month and again the month after?”
“We will make do, Lord Ambrose, as we have always done,” Primrose answered. Her manner was stiff, her shoulders stiffer still, and her chin jutted forward with a mixture of stubborn pride and banked fury. It was an easy thing to read in her eyes.
“And what if you could get by without having to simply make do?” he asked.
“We will manage, Lord Ambrose,” Primrose snapped. “We have always done so and we do not require your assistance!”
“Misses Collier,” Nicholas said, “I apologize for my brother’s high-handedness. He means well, but as a person who has never been in the position of struggling to meet financial obligations, he doesn’t understand how that feels. Please know that any offer of assistance, for today or for the future, does not come with obligations attached for you.”
Garrett blinked in shock. Surely they had not thought he meant to have them be beholden to him in some way. But then, what else would they have thought given their experiences in life with men like his father and like Severne?
“I am only here to offer assistance and to make amends,” Garrett stated emphatically. “There is a cottage on my estate near Taunton in Somerset. It’s slightly larger than this one though I daresay not by much. But it does at least offer three bedrooms and a roof that doesn’t leak. It is yours. You and your siblings may live there free of rent. An annuity would be provided for you that would allow you to live comfortably. I will see to it that a governess is hired for Lila and for your younger brother if that is your wish. When it is time, I will help him get into a school and learn a trade where he might be able to provide for himself and a family of his own. This is a good offer… a fair and reasonable offer. You have but to take it!” he implored. He wanted to know his sister, he wanted to provide for her. But his intention had only ever been to provide them funds, not to take them home with him. And yet, now, with the offer hanging there between them and Nicholas looking at him as if he’d lost his wits, he couldn’t regret it.
Primrose was regarding him suspiciously. “You speak only of what you may offer us. But what does that offer provide for you in return, my lord? No man does so much for so little!”
“It affords me a chance to know my sister… to build a relationship with her and to ensure that the sort of fate that befell her mother will never await Lila. It is a chance to right the wrongs of my father, Miss Collier.” There was truth in it. But not the entire truth. He didn’t know why he’d made the offer or what ultimately it would provide. But he knew he couldn’t walk out of there that day and never lay eyes upon her again.
“That is hardly a compelling reason for our part, Dr. Warner,” Primrose snapped.
“Misses Collier,” Nicholas interrupted her once more. “I’ll be the first person to admit that it is often difficult to accept such generosity at face value. But I can assure you that my brother is here with only the best of purest intentions. As much as it pains me to praise him, I’ve never known a more honorable man in my life. I would stake my life and my reputation as a physician on it. Do not allow pride and cynicism to influence your decision to the exclusion of things that would dramatically improve both your lives and the lives of your younger siblings. At least consider it.”
“It isn’t your reputation that—”
“We must think on it, Lord Ambrose,” Hyacinth interjected, cutting off what was likely to be a scathing retort and an outright refusal from Primrose.
Primrose looked to her sister, her blue eyes flashing with anger, with temper and pride. But it was the most receptive response he’d had to anything he’d said since they arrived on the Colliers’ doorstep. It seemed like a good moment for a strategic retreat. He rose. “I will be at the inn in the village until tomorrow. Send word to me if you decide to accept. It will take time, of course, for you to make all the necessary arrangements but I will be happy to send carriages for you whenever you require them.”
He turned to leave, Nicholas following behind him. Garrett could feel his half-brother smirking at his back. But he wasn’t in the mood for Nicholas’ needling. The Collier sisters, or more particularly Primrose Collier, had gotten under his skin in a way that no one else ever had. It was bad enough to have happened, but worse still for it to have been witnessed by someone like Nicholas Warner who would beat that dead horse until they were both exhausted from the topic.
“I wasn’t aware that primroses were quite so thorny, Brother. Perhaps it’s your sparkling personality that brings out her rather argumentative nature?”
“I had things handled in there,” Garrett insisted.
“Oh, please. We both know you were making a muck of it!”
“I was not! They were on the verge of seeing reason.”
Nicholas laughed at that. He quite literally threw his head back and guffawed like a drunkard in a tavern. “Of course you did,” he said after he recovered his composure. “I’ll forgive you delusions, Brother, seeing as how you were struck dumb at the sight of the younger Miss Collier.”
“I found her rather shocking is all,” Garrett lied.
“Shocking is one word for it. Another is smitten. Infatuated. You, Brother, took one look at her and went cow-eyed.”
Garrett sighed. It had begun. Nicholas would make his life hell. And so would Primrose Collier.
Chapter Four
“We cannot simply pack the children up and move them to Somerset!” Primrose insisted.
“What choice do we have, Prim?” Hy countered. “We’re out of money. Even with your wages from Lady Linden and even if we could manage to double the amount of sewing and washing we take in, we’d still barely be able to pay the rent. And if we do that, neither one of us will have time to sleep. Our budget for food would be nonexistent and if, heaven forbid, something were to happen and either one of us or the children became ill—Prim, we are sinking here. Lord Ambrose’s offer is a godsend! We’d be fools not to at least consider it.”
Prim wasn’t so certain of that. Surely God could have nothing to do with the feelings Lord Ambrose stirred in her. Irritation, anger, resentment, and then, beneath it all, there was still that irresistible pull. His presence played on her worst fear—that somewhere deep inside, she was just like her mother and would fall victim to her own desires and poor judgment in men. “Hyacinth, we can find another way!”
“Yes. I’m certain we could. But at what cost? Should we all continue to exist in poverty? To go to bed with empty bellies and wake up in cold rooms when there is another way?” her sister retorted hotly. “We are failing, Prim. And we can’t continue this way. Not without succumbing to the very fate we swore to avoid. I don’t want to sell my body and my soul to feed our siblings. But you and I both know, we are quickly approaching the point of no return. If it came down to it, and it was that or seeing them starving or in the streets, what would you do? What would I do?”
To Prim’s horror, Hyacinth sank onto the settee again and the iron will she’d come to rely on in her sister simply evaporated. Her dear sister simply shattered before her like the most fragile of glass. Petite and pale, Hy always looked fragile, but rarely did her behavior and her appearance match. Harsh, wracking sobs escaped her and a well of tears that she had denied herself for years fell down her cheeks. Uncertain of what else to do, Prim dropped down beside her, pressed Hyacinth’s head to her shoulder and held her older sister as she cried.
After the longest time, when the sobs had subsided to the occasional hiccup and a punctuating sniff, Hy continued, “I cannot watch them suffer for the sake of my own pride, Prim. And I’m begging you not to either!”
“It isn’t just pride,” Prim insisted. “I’m afraid of him.”
Hyacinth rose and looked at her. �
�I do not think he is a bad man, Prim. Despite his display with Mr. Severne, which I must admit I enjoyed more than a small amount, I felt he was quite well spoken and gave every appearance of being an honorable gentleman!”
“I am not afraid of him in that way, Hy,” Prim admitted. “He’s not dangerous to you or to the children. But I’m very much afraid that he might be terribly dangerous to me.”
Understanding dawned bright and clear and Hyacinth’s lips parted on a soft “o.” “I see… well, he is very handsome.”
“And very titled and very much out of my league. A man like that would—well, he could never have honorable intentions toward a woman like me. Assuming he has any intentions at all. But if I am constantly in his path, if I see him day after day, Hy, what if I do something rash? What if that same base and desperate nature that prompted our mother’s demise suddenly takes over in me? I’m not afraid of men, Hyacinth. I know what they are capable of. But I am afraid of loving one and of being broken by him.”
Hyacinth shook her head. “That will not happen. I will not let it. Mother was vulnerable because she was alone, because there was no one else to care for her and no one else to see that she did not succumb to the wickedness of the world. We will look after one another, Prim, just as we always have.”
The front door opened and they could hear Lila’s quiet tones and the excited chatter of Rowan. At just past nine years of age, he had not yet mastered the ability of curbing the natural exuberance of his voice. He was mad for horses and had apparently seen an exquisite matched pair on the lane. Likely Lord Ambrose’s, she thought.
“They were gray, P-p-prim,” he said, stammering her name as he often did. It was always worse when he was excited or scared. It was clear from the gleam in his eyes that it was the former and not the latter. If they took him to Somerset he might even learn to ride, a little voice whispered in her mind. What would she be depriving them of if she succumbed to her fears?
“Yes, Rowan. I heard you say that very loudly as you came in the door,” she said. “I’m certain they were grand.”
“They were, Prim,” he said, his eyes as round as saucers. “And the carriage was all black with gold on it and the curtains inside it were yellow!”
“They were gold,” Lila corrected. “They were gold damask, like Lady Linden’s but not faded and old.”
Prim didn’t know why Lila detested Lady Linden but she did. In fact, the girl always had. “Lila, you know you mustn’t speak of Lady Linden so. She’s been very good to this family.”
“And she likes to tell everyone how good she’s been to us, as well,” Hy muttered under her breath.
Lila nodded at Hyacinth and added, “I heard her in the market saying she’d taken you on as a housemaid. It was her Christian duty to see that you did not fall. Whatever that means.”
Prim sighed heavily. She knew what it meant, and so did Hyacinth. It was the very thing they had just discussed. In the decade they’d lived there in the village, their mother posing as a widow of the war with Rowan growing in her belly even then, people had, by turns, pitied and reviled them. But Lady Linden had made them her own personal charity and she never let anyone forget it. Prim gave her elder sister a quelling look. “Go and wash up, please,” she said to Lila. “And be certain Rowan does as well. Hands and face must be washed. We could grow turnips in the dirt on your neck, young man! When you’re done with that, there’s something very important we need to talk with you about.”
Lila’s expression became instantly anxious. “Is it very bad? Will we have to go to the workhouse?”
“Who on earth said we’d go to the workhouse?”
“You did,” Lila countered. “Well, you didn’t say it to me. You said it to Hy and I heard it because you were very upset and very loud and I was just outside the kitchen window picking herbs like you’d asked! I can get a job! I could help sew or I could dig for truffles in the woods!”
Guilt washed over Prim. They were struggling and had been for some time. But for Lila to be aware of it, for her to have heard such distressing things from her own mouth left her feeling terribly ashamed. “Well, we are not going to the workhouse. None of us. And you won’t be digging for truffles in the woods. Go wash up, Lila. This is good news.”
When the children had disappeared up the narrow staircase that led to the cottage’s two bedrooms, Hyacinth took Prim’s hand. “We don’t have to. We can find another way if you are really afraid.”
A feeling of inevitability washed through her. This was her fate it seemed, and everything that had happened up to that point was pushing her so that she would not be able to deny it. “There is no other way, Hy. And I don’t want her to be afraid… or for Rowan to realize just how bad things are. Perhaps going to another place where no one knows our history, where no one remembers what our mother was will be the best thing for all of us.”
“I will send a note round to the inn,” Hy said.
“No. We’ll go there. Both of us together and see him this evening… and we’ll take Lila and Rowan with us. Until she’s met him, I won’t commit to anything,” Prim stated thoughtfully. “She has a sense for people, Hy. If she trusts him, if she likes him even a little, then we’ll know what we’re doing is right. For now, we’ll simply tell her she has a half-brother who wants to meet her. And if it goes well, then we’ll discuss moving there.”
“You’re right, of course,” Hyacinth agreed. “And I suppose it really ought to be up to her, at least somewhat. It’ll mean far more to her life than it ever will to ours.”
Of that, Prim wasn’t so sure.
Chapter Five
“They were lovely girls… though I suppose a bit long in the tooth for that description. They are firmly on the shelf by now. The oldest must be thirty at least and the younger of the two, the termagant, can’t be far behind.”
“Stop it, Nicholas. I know precisely what you are about and I will not be goaded by you,” Garrett said. “And they are hardly that old. Neither of them can be more than a few years past twenty, if that.”
They had returned from the Colliers’ humble cottage and were having a light supper in one of the inn’s private dining rooms. It was simple fare, but filling and well prepared. The wine was only tolerable, but the brandy was quite good and clearly smuggled. Of course, none of it mattered. Cornelius’ mind was not on the food or the spirits. It was on her. She had taken over his thoughts with a ferocious hold that he could not seem to break free of. Infatuation wasn’t unfamiliar to him, but nothing so intense or instantaneous had ever befallen him before.
“But the younger one is certainly a termagant. Even as besotted as you were with her lovely hair and fine blue eyes, you must admit that!” Nicholas insisted.
“I must admit that I do not know her well enough to have formed an opinion. She appears to be protective of her siblings. But then, perhaps she finds her siblings more lovable and worthy of protection than my own,” Garrett added snarkily. Had he really longed to form a connection with his brother? It was surely the most ill-advised under taking of his life. Nicholas loved nothing better than to torment him.
Nicholas laughed heartily at that, throwing his head back and giving in fully to his own amusement. Cornelius wanted to plant his fist into his brother’s face for that.
In the five years since they’d first met, they’d forged a relationship that was very similar to that of siblings raised together. They laughed and teased. They shared deeper moments, as well, such as the scandal that had rocked Garrett’s life and left him an outcast to the society of which he had once been a darling. It would have been easier, Garrett thought, had he been a rogue to start with. But he’d set himself apart from his father by electing to always do the right thing, to be responsible and forthright, to weigh his every action against his honor and always err on the side of honor. And because of that one fateful night, when he’d fired the pistol that ended the life of the man who had claimed to be Lord Ramsleigh, a man who had been wicked through and through,
it had all gone to ruin.
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
He’s just as rotten as his father but gives himself airs.
I heard he killed him in cold blood and then rode away pretty as you please.
Now he’s thick as thieves with his bastard brother and that wife of his.
All of the ugly whispers were along the same vein. Everyone believed that the first thirty years of his life had been nothing but a sham and in that one decisive moment, his true nature, wicked and unrepentant, had come to the fore. Never mind that Randall Grantham had a pistol pointed at his aunt, Viola Grantham, the woman to whom Nicholas was now married. In that moment, when Cornelius had fired, Grantham was already squeezing the trigger. The pistol ball had struck Viola in the shoulder and very nearly killed her. Cornelius’ own shot had been true. Grantham had died instantly. His only regret was that he had not fired a second sooner and spared his sister-in-law the pain and suffering of a pistol ball and the resulting fever that had raged in her for days.
There had been a feeling that night that he was on the brink of some cataclysmic change. Long before those events had unfolded, he’d felt that strange prickling sense of unease, all his senses on alert. And now, he found himself faced with that sensation once more. Whatever happened, his life would alter irrevocably. Of that much, he was certain.
“I want to see the child,” Cornelius confessed. “Regardless of what the sisters decide, I’d like to at least meet her.”
Nicholas frowned. “I understand that. I confess to a certain degree of curiosity myself. But your drive to create a family out of the cast-off bastards of our father puzzles me… still. What are you searching for, Cornelius?”
It was odd to hear his given name on anyone’s lips. He so rarely used it. “I don’t know really. An escape from the loneliness of my childhood? I might have been legitimate and the heir, but there was no sense of family or belonging. Father and I butted heads from the start and he was always far more interested in his own hedonistic pursuits than in his son. Or any of his other offspring for that matter. It isn’t that he was unkind or cruel. He just simply couldn’t be bothered. I don’t want these other children, even if they are grown, to feel that no one would ever bother for them.”
The Awakening of Lord Ambrose (The Lost Lords Book 6) Page 3
