by The Bargain
It was a misunderstanding that could cost a young woman her virtue, and a notorious rake his heart.
THE DUKE OF RAVENSFORD: He decided his grandson needed a woman with a reputation to complete his education, and he made it his business to find her.
ASHLEIGH SINCLAIR: She was an orphaned kitchen maid in one of England's brothels until she was tricked into taking the post as "governess" to the duke's grandson.
LORD BRETT WESTMONT: He was handsome, heartless, a man who'd had every kind of woman there was—except one. And now his grandfather had arranged that for him, too.
They could rob her virtue, but never her heart.
WORLDWIDE
TORONTO • NEW YORK • LONDON • PARS AMSTERDAM • STOCKHOLM • HAMBURG ATHENS • MILAN • TOKYO • SYDNEY
Ashleigh awoke slowly
A pleasant warmth infused her body as she gradually moved into consciousness. Then, as the last vestiges of slumber left her, she began to remember where she was and what had happened to her here.
"You!" she breathed as she turned to look at the man who hovered over her, entirely too near.
"The name's Brett," he answered with a lazy grin, just as his hand reached to tuck an errant tendril of hair behind her ear.
The movement, especially the touch of his fingers on her delicate flesh, sent a shiver through her, and Ashleigh tried to pull away but found she was trapped, for part of her long hair was caught under his arm as he leaned on the mattress. "Wh-what are you doing, my lord?" she managed to whisper as she felt his finger trace the delicate line of her jaw, then move to brush her lips.
"Brett. The name is Brett," he said as his finger again grazed her bottom lip. "Say it, beautiful Ashleigh. Say my name."
THE BARGAIN
A Worldwide Library book
First published September 1987
ISBN 0-373-97043-9
Copyright © 1987 by Veronica Sattler.
All rights reserved. Philippine copyright 1987. Australian copyright 1987. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any Information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the permission of the publisher, Worldwide Library, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All the characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
The Worldwide design trademarks, consisting of a globe surrounded by a square, and the word WORLDWIDE in which the letter "O" is represented by a depiction of a globe, are trademarks of Worldwide Library.
Printed in U.S.A.
For Alyssa, beloved daughter and bright, shining star
PROLOGUE
Kent, England, 1795
"Your parents are dead, boy, as is your brother, and you have yet to utter a word at their passing. Now I am asking you, what do you have to say for yourself in the matter?"
Ten-year-old Brett Westmont raised heavily lashed, startling turquoise eyes to meet the keen regard of his grandfather as he stood before him in the library at Ravensford Hall. The boy's small, square jaw was firmly set and gave no evidence of the quaking turmoil that had been threatening to break loose from a place deep within his small yet sturdy frame; he had been fighting to hold it in check for the past forty-eight hours, ever since he'd received news of the accident.
Leveling his gaze at the old man, Brett broke the silence in a clear, strong voice that did nothing to betray his chaotic feelings. "Only one parent, Grandfather, and the brother, a half brother, though I loved him well."
John Westmont, eighth duke of Ravensford, drew heavy, iron-gray brows over a pair of piercing blue eyes that endeavored to pin the boy to the carpet. Rising slowly from behind the carved-oak Georgian desk where he'd been seated, the duke drew himself up to his full six feet, three inches, and frowned disapprovingly at his grandson for several long seconds. "Boy, you are being impertinent! I requested your reaction to a senseless tragedy, not a nitpicking digression on the family tree!"
The turquoise gaze never faltered. "There was no impertinence intended, sir. I merely wished to point out that it was only one of my natural parents who was killed in the accident. My true mother—"
"Silence!" thundered the duke. "How dare you invoke the name of a person who ceased to exist for this household from the moment she left, over seven years ago? Have you forgotten my orders forbidding all mention of that female? A woman whose perfidy and betrayal could only result in her being branded and dismissed as the harlot she was? A woman who compounded the sin of her faithlessness to your father by then deserting both him and you—and you a child not yet out of the nursery? Well, boy, answer me!"
"No, sir," came the steady reply. "I've not forgotten." How could he forget, when every trace of the woman who was his mother had been removed from these halls, wiped away as if she'd never existed? When all his questions about her had been met by stony silence or the anguished look in his father's eyes? When the name, Mary, Viscountess Westmont, was forbidden from his lips while he went about yearning for some words that might put to rest his confusion, impart some sense to the tales he'd heard whispered. He had failed to reconcile those rumors with faint but persistent memories of warm, loving arms and—
"A terrible and senseless tragedy," the duke was saying, "and once again, a woman's fault. It was your stepmother, Lady Caroline, who brought them to this end. It was only after he married her that Edward began his profligate ways."
"John, can you not spare your censure at such a time? I—I cannot bear it. It is, moreover, not fitting to speak ill of the dead!"
It was only now that young Brett realized he and his grandfather were not alone. Looking toward the deepest of the shadows reaching across the far end of the richly appointed room in the fading autumn light, the boy perceived the tall, ramrod-straight form of his great-aunt, Lady Margaret, twin sister to the old duke, as she moved closer to the desk.
Her brother turned a disdainful profile to Brett as he coldly met the gaze of his twin. "I am not in the habit of being reminded of anything remiss in my behavior, Margaret. If you wish to continue to be privy to this interview—though why you would wish it is beyond me—you will refrain from interrupting. As for my castigation of the dead, let me simply say this— for the boy's benefit as well as your own: My son and his second wife were a pair of besotted fools!"
Ignoring the gasp of outrage that broke from his sister's throat, the duke continued. "It is no secret that they were blind drunk when they left the hunt party and appropriated the carriage that carried them and their young son to their deaths. Old Henry tells me it was Edward himself who wrested the reins away from the driver and insisted on driving the ill-fated vehicle at a breakneck speed; left the befuddled man in the dust on the drive as he whipped my finest pair of matched bays into a frenzy and took off for God-knows-where, with his still-tippling wife and their son in tow. Aye, and there's the real pity—that they had to drag young Linley with them! Who's to say if that faulty axle wouldn't have spared them a fatal end, if the carriage had been driven more sanely? Or at least have spared the life of that innocent child!"
The duke paused for a moment, and Brett thought he saw a flicker of pain cross his grandfather's face before the blue eyes shuttered and his anger returned in full force.
"Drunken fools, both of them, swilling and gambling their way from one drawing room to another, up to London and back again, in a continuing orgy of self-indulgence that made me ashamed to c
all Edward mine! And, say what you will, Margaret, you cannot deny that, on Edward's part at least, this unconscionable behavior began almost from the day he wed Caroline Hastings—a marriage, may I remind you, dear sister, that you arranged!"
"John, you cannot blame—"
"I can, and I do!" spat the duke, glowering at his twin. "Caroline Hastings was a worthless piece of trash, no matter how fine her lineage and title. But, then—" the duke smiled thinly "—what else could one expect? She was—" he returned his gaze to Brett "—after all, a female. Remember that, boy. Your life will fare far better if you never let yourself forget—as I shall take pains to see you are never allowed to forget—that women are the major source of evil in this world."
"Evil! Really, John," interrupted his sister, "I cannot allow—"
"Cannot allow? Allow? Woman, I shall decide what is allowed here! And I remind you for the final time that it is only through my sufferance that you are presently allowed in this chamber!"
The duke turned his attention back to Brett. Bracing his hands on the desk top before him, he bent forward and lowered his voice, the blue eyes piercing as they bored into the boy. "It was a woman every time, Brett. First, there was my mother, insisting on educating my twin sister here in much the same manner as I was educated, giving her unsuitable notions with regard to her place in life. Why, there were times in our childhood when I was hard put to remember Margaret was a girl!" He gave his sister a sneering half smile. "Isn't that so, Sister? And, being the elder twin by some fifteen minutes, didn't you chafe under the restrictions of the laws of primogeniture that gave the dukedom to me, the younger, simply because I was the firstborn male?"
Again a gasp broke from Margaret's lips, but this time it was followed by angry words. "I'll not listen to any more of this rubbish, John!" she snapped, striding toward the door. "Do with the child as you like. I wash my hands of the matter!" And with a swish of skirts, she was gone.
The duke stared momentarily at the door she had shut in her wake, then turned his attention back to his grandson. "You see, Brett? As I've said, women—they're a bad lot, always breeding strife and trouble. Latch onto this, boy—" the old man leaned forward almost conspiratorially "—women are good for only one thing, and that's breeding sons!"
He took a moment to search Brett's unwavering gaze, satisfying himself that he still had his undivided attention. "I particularly fault your grandmother, my own duchess. She managed to interfere in the rearing of your father, Edward, to such an extent and in such a manner, that he was a spoiled weakling from the outset. Coddled him, she did, despite my protests, and what were the results? First, he went off and wed that, that foreigner, and an unsuitable bluestocking to boot—a female whose subsequent behavior speaks for itself. A love match, they told me when the pair of them were found at Gretna Green after my weeks of searching!"
The duke pushed himself back from the desk and let his eyes roam carefully over the still figure of his grandson. "Believe me, boy, you were the only worthwhile thing to come out of that union," he said quietly.
Suddenly he turned his head sharply and focused on the door through which his twin had gone. "But she could not allow matters to rest there, could she? Oh, no, she had to interfere and arrange a second marriage, this time with one of her beloved Hastingses! 'Lady Caroline has the best of credentials,' " he mimicked. "'She will at last make a proper match for Edward.' Bah!" He took a backward step and fell into the chair behind the desk, suddenly looking, Brett thought, every minute of his fifty-nine years. "A proper enough match, that is, to lead him to an early grave!" he muttered. Then his voice grew faintly tremulous, and Brett caught a slight quivering of the old man's lower lip.
Grandfather's hurting, just like me! young Brett suddenly realized. He merely pretends he is unaffected—also like me!
"And," the duke was saying, "I find it difficult to forgive Edward for having the monstrous indecency to take the life of an innocent two year's child along with his own and that of his worthless wife!"
In an unsafe carriage that was intended for me! thought Brett, a shiver running through him as he recalled, not for the first time during the past two days, that the vehicle was to take him to Eton to begin his first term at the public school where he'd been registered since birth.
As if reading his thoughts, the duke's expression suddenly changed to one of speculative assessment. "I suggest you cease troubling yourself with the kind of debilitating guilt that comes of thinking your family died in your place, my boy. As one who has lived enough years to gain some wisdom, I tell you it is all a matter of accepting what was meant to be. Clearly, your death was not in the present scheme of things, while theirs was. Think no more on it. Do you understand me, Brett?"
The boy's turquoise eyes regarded the now tired-looking blue ones for several silent seconds before he responded in a voice that rang of stoical resignation. "Yes, Grandfather."
"Good. Then all that remains is for me to tell you of the changes these unfortunate events have wrought in my future plans for you."
Watching a flicker of interest enter the boy's eyes, John paused for a moment. He's sharp as a whip, he mused, and mature beyond his years... and almost too beautiful for a boy, with that sculpted face, and thick chestnut hair... Well, all the more reason to arm him well against... them!
"Brett, I have decided not to send you away to school after all." Pausing again to make sure the statement had sunk in, and perceiving no reaction beyond alert interest on the boy's part, John continued. "Public schools like Eton and Harrow do well enough in turning boys into men, I suppose, but after watching the muddle your father made of his life despite such an education, I've decided to modify yours somewhat. You have, of course, the advantage of the absence of meddling females, your Great-Aunt Margaret aside. She's never liked you much, has she, boy? Ah, well, more to the better! No loss there, believe me!
"Now, as I was saying, I've changed my plans. You see, I wish to take no chances on preparing you, my only heir... now... to take your place at the helm of the powerful dukedom you will one day inherit. My priority in this is to make a formidable man of you, Brett—a man whom no one will dare take charge of, least of all, a woman!
"The education you are about to receive will afford you every advantage in a world where advantage is everything. And, by advantage, I do not merely mean that of birth or wealth. These things you already have, and although they will serve you well, you must be carefully armed against the pitfalls and weaknesses that can attend them!
"It has long been my belief that a man is off to a good start if he is brought up on a regime of Spartan living and strenuous training in the manly arts, enhanced by an assiduously followed academic program that tests the limits of his intelligence. If this is coupled with unrelenting instruction in the almost forgotten art of being a gentleman of high moral fiber, and accompanied by an inquiring mind never given to swallowing things whole simply because others put them forth as true, then a man cannot help but succeed in this life...." Here the duke leaned forward in his chair, his blue eyes keen as they searched his grandson's face. "At least," he continued, "given the high native intelligence and inherent nobility of character I have already observed in you, Brett.
"Therefore I have decided to begin you on this course by sending you to sea for the next two years."
The duke noticed Brett's eyes widen slightly at this news, but, seeing no further reaction, he hurried on. "You will serve as cabin boy on one of my friends' oceangoing vessels, under the guidance of Captain Joshua Stockton, a fair but exacting master. In that position you'll be given no privilege or special treatment because of your title. Indeed, other than Captain Stockton, no one on board will have any inkling of your status, and you will be known simply as Brett Westmont, cabin boy. You will be expected to work hard and to earn your keep by that labor. Over the course of your two-year stint, I shall be receiving regular reports from Captain Stockton as to your progress, and I expect them to be excellent. Is that clear?"
Brett's young voice answered without wavering. "Yes, Grandfather."
"The only exception to what would be the normal routine for a cabin boy is that a private tutor will accompany you on board, and any free time you have will be taken up with an intensified program of studies such as you might have encountered at Eton. To put the crew and officers off the scent, Captain Stockton has agreed to hire another cabin boy from hereabouts, and it will be given out that he is the younger son of some nobleman, or perhaps a wealthy merchant, who wishes his son's experience at sea to be enhanced by academic studies, and that you are merely being included because you will be sharing quarters with him. We wish no hint of special privilege to attend you!
"When you return from sea, your education will continue here at Ravensford Hall. You will receive further academic tutoring as well as training in the things with which you already have experience—riding, shooting, fencing and the like—but you will also receive intensive instruction in estate management, commerce and the law.
"Eventually you will attend university—Cambridge, surely—and by the time you come down, I shall expect you will have read both history and law, for your present tutor seems to think you have a genuine natural aptitude for those, and having sat in on some of your sessions with him, I'm inclined to agree."
There was a moment's pause, and then the duke added, "Finally, I wish to reiterate the main goal of this plan. It will free you temporarily from one of the most contaminating aspects of our society, that weight on man's shoulders— woman!"
At last the duke fell silent, and for the first time since he had begun this discourse, Brett saw him relax his posture; his face softened, bearing that hint of a smile.
He continued speaking in a somewhat subdued tone. "I fear I have come across rather harshly, boy, and that has not been my intent. Rather, it is precisely because I have inordinately high hopes for you, and because I—" the duke's voice faltered and grew yet softer, and Brett beheld a rare infusion of warmth fill the blue eyes "—because I love you, dear Brett. Can you comprehend that, and will you accept what I have planned, courageously and with good grace?"
