“As a matter of fact,” Bridget said, “I fear that is what must be done with my cousin. Would you by any chance be willing to bury him at sea in Irish waters? That is what he would have wanted, and I am ready and willing to pay.”
“Unnecessary,” Colin said. “I am already in the process of arranging it.”
She swung around to gape at him. “Why?”
“Because a corpse requires an inquest, and that might cause complications, don’t you agree?” She shivered at the bite in his voice. “I don’t intend to admit to shooting him or why, but nor do I want to blame it on mythical highwaymen.”
But why would he conceal the treason? Not for Bridget’s sake; she had deliberately disobeyed him. Perhaps for Sylvie’s. Bigoted though he was, he had a sense of familial responsibility.
“Wouldn’t want to harm any genuine highwaymen,” Evans said. “A man should only be hanged for his own crimes.”
“Precisely,” Colin said.
Bridget glared. “I wasn’t asking why his death must be concealed, but rather why should you do it? He is my cousin and therefore my responsibility.”
Colin glared right back. To hell with him. She took out Martin’s purse. “Please tell me how much.”
Mr. Evans named an exorbitant sum.
“But—but that’s absurd,” she said. “Passage to Ireland for a living person is far less.”
“Maybe so, ma’am, but shipping corpses is risky.”
“You see why I offered to pay for it?” Colin said coldly.
Bridget fumed, once more at a loss. “Apart from this purse that Mr. Fallow left at my house, I am penniless until quarter day.” So penniless that she might have to depend on Mr. McCrumb’s help until then. “But if you would permit me to pay the balance later—”
Colin interrupted. “As I recall, you had a fair sum about you when we were in London. Fare to America and more.”
Now he was accusing her of lying, and in front of a stranger, no less! “That sum is in your possession, Mr. Warren, and I have no way of retrieving it.”
“In my possession!” Colin expostulated. “Did you imagine I would withhold it from you?”
“Why not?” she retorted furiously. “You have me at a complete standstill and in your power. You can have me thrown into prison. You can take my daughter from me. You—”
Mr. Evans slipped quietly from the room and shut the door behind him.
“I’m not like Martin Fallow,” Colin snarled. “I would never take her away.”
“And yet you told me you would.”
“I didn’t mean it. I spoke in haste and anger, and—and disappointment.”
Oh, just fine! “How dare you be disappointed in me? At least I was acting in accordance with my conscience, whilst you are nothing but a bigot.”
“Perhaps, but I’m a patriotic one. What sort of conscience can you claim to possess, when you are loyal to both sides at once?”
Misery swamped her. “I don’t expect you to understand.”
“Good, for I never shall.” He looked as defeated as she felt. She knew an absurd longing to put her arms around him and comfort him. There was no hope for reconciliation. She couldn’t help who she was, and nor could he be anyone but himself.
“I’ll pay to get rid of Fallow’s remains,” he said. “Keep your cousin’s money and your own and go to America, or wherever else you choose. I won’t attempt to stop you.”
Stunned, she didn’t know what to say. She should be relieved, but her blurted response emerged as stupidly indignant. “Why not?”
“I shall make the process as smooth and easy as possible for you. However, I insist on sending a servant to see that you are settled safely, with ample provision for Sylvie should anything happen to you.”
He wanted to get rid of her—and she could hardly blame him. He was not only putting her out of harm’s way, but out of the way of doing any harm. She tried not to take offense. As usual, he was generosity personified, and she should be grateful.
She wasn’t. Her overriding emotion was dismay.
“I am aware that you can’t stand the sight of me anymore,” he said. “Abroad, you won’t be plagued with me any longer, but I will know that Sylvie—that Sylvie is safe.” He bowed and left the room.
It took a long moment before his words penetrated. “He thinks I can’t stand the sight of him?” she whispered to her cousin’s corpse.
Colin hurried down the stairs to settle with Andy Evans and get the whole blasted business over with. Not that it would ever really be over with. Even once he got Bridget and Sylvie out of the way, he would always be responsible for the child, always wonder how Bridget was doing, whether she had married some other man—and all because of his wretched tongue.
“Where is my mother?” cried a familiar child’s voice from somewhere close by. “She is not permitted to go anywhere without me.”
“She’s upstairs,” Andy Evans said. “She’ll be down soon.”
“She’s talking with your papa,” added Mr. Bennett, the former smuggler whom Colin paid to keep any eye on Daisy.
“My papa?” Sylvie cried, and with a sigh Colin entered the parlor, where Sylvie was facing down Evans and Bennett, arms akimbo. She turned. “Mr. Warren! Everyone says you’re my father, even these men.”
“Do you believe me now?” Colin asked.
“Yes, because Miss Daisy says I look like Emma. May I see the miniature of her?”
He hesitated. “If your mother permits. If there is time before you leave England.”
Sylvie scowled. “Leave for where?”
“America, I believe. Wherever your mother wishes.”
“But I don’t want to leave!”
“I’m sure they will have ices in America,” Colin replied cynically, trying to conceal the grief rising within him. He didn’t want her to leave either. He wanted his child. He wanted his wife, too—except she wasn’t his and never would be. “I shall make sure your mother has enough money to buy plenty of them.”
Tears sprang to her eyes. “I don’t care about ices! I have a new friend. Her name is Jenny, and she lives in the same inn as Miss Daisy, and Miss Daisy says she is my aunt and I may visit her often and see Jenny again.”
Colin blew out a breath. He wanted this too, at least the part where Daisy cared about her niece. Too bad; he’d destroyed everything with a few harsh, thoughtless words. “You’ll make new friends wherever you go.”
“And she says I may have a proper horse of my own instead of a poky old pony, and she will ride Snappish and I shall ride my horse—”
Oh, for God’s sake. “They have plenty of horses in America, and—”
Sylvie interrupted, her voice rising with rage, reminding him strongly of her mother. “And I want you to marry Mama and be a proper father, and I want a little sister, and—”
“Hush, Sylvie!” Bridget came into the room. “How dare you shout at Mr. Warren?” Sylvie burst into sobs, and Bridget pulled her into her arms.
“I don’t want to go to America,” Sylvie wailed. “I want to stay here.”
Bridget sighed. “I know, dearest, nor do I, but it seems we have no choice.”
What the devil did she mean by that? “Of course you have a choice,” Colin said.
The choice he’d given her last night?
She’d had enough of airing her private affairs before strangers. “We’ll discuss it later, dearest,” she told Sylvie. “I’m sad to have to tell you this, but Mr. Fallow is dead.”
“Oh,” Sylvie said. “Well, I don’t think I’m sad. He lied to me, and isn’t that a sin?”
“It is, but I don’t think it’s one that deserves death.”
“Depends on the lie,” Colin muttered. “Let’s get out of here. I’ll drive you two
home.”
“That’s not necessary,” Bridget said. “I came with Mr. Bennett.”
“Mr. Bennett has pressing business elsewhere,” Colin said.
“But Snappish and Sylvie’s pony are at the Diving Duck!”
“We’ll send a groom for them,” he said, and when she opened her mouth to retort, he gave her a look of such fury that she shut it again. She didn’t want to listen to whatever he had to say, but regardless of the role he assumed before others, he wielded all the power.
“Add it to my bill, Bennett,” he said, and Mr. Bennett bowed politely, expressed his pleasure at having driven Bridget and Sylvie and said, his kind eyes twinkling, how much he looked forward to meeting them again.
Colin passed a roll of bills to Mr. Evans. “Thank you, old friend. If you get caught and I’m obliged to bail you out, you’ll have to pay me back all of this and more.”
“I won’t get caught,” Mr. Evans said.
“In the meantime, lend me your gig. And stable my gelding, will you?”
Mr. Evans chuckled. “Anything in the cause of true love. A pleasure meeting you, Mrs. Black.”
Several minutes later, Colin lifted Sylvie into a waiting gig and handed Bridget up after her. It was an awkward, largely silent ride for the first quarter hour, punctuated by a few desultory remarks from Sylvie, whose fit of rage seemed to have exhausted her. Finally she fell asleep, her head on Bridget’s lap.
At last, thought Bridget. “What do you mean, I have a choice? You want me to leave, and therefore I have to go. That doesn’t seem like a choice to me.”
“I don’t want you to go,” Colin said. “By God, woman. Do you think I want my daughter living thousands of miles away? Fifty miles is too far.”
“But you know I can’t stay under the—the terms you dictated.” Her voice shook at the memory.
“Forget what I said. As I told you at Evans’ place, I was angry and spoke out of turn.”
“Out of turn?” she cried, and took a deep breath to calm herself. They had to get this conversation over with while Sylvie slept. “That wasn’t speaking out of turn. That was rank bigotry!” She would never be able to forget it.
“Very well, I proved myself to be rather prejudiced against the Irish.”
“Why?” Bridget barely managed to keep her voice below a shriek. “What have the Irish ever done to you?”
“Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I suppose the prejudice has been fed to me over the years, and I hardly noticed. As I discovered this morning, quite possibly my prejudice extends to the Scots as well, although your neighbor gave me no reason to think him anything but a true gentleman.”
Bridget nodded. “Mr. McCrumb is most kind.”
“I may simply have been jealous because he cares for you, but I’d rather not attempt to trivialize my unpardonable reaction last night. It’s the second time in my life that my behavior has made me physically ill.”
“And the first time . . .” Oh. “When Emma died?”
He stared down at his hands, giving a barely perceptible nod. She’d never expected him to admit how unpardonable his prejudice was, much less to react as to a tragic death.
And he was willing to give himself a similar punishment to that meted out by his mother after Emma’s death. His mother had refused to speak to him ever again. If Bridget and Sylvie went to America, he would likely never speak to them again, either.
Bridget would have protested, but he put up a hand. “I had a long time to think whilst driving that loaded wagon last night. I may be a bigot, but I’m not an idiot. I have many flaws, but loyalty matters to me more than anything else—to family, to friends, to my country. I can’t reconcile loyalty to opposing sources, while you…” He sighed. “You are able to accept and appreciate both English and Irish patriotism, but you won’t support one against the other—for which reason you understood Fallow’s goals but refused to assist him. More than that—you would have killed him to block them.” His eyes were on the road. “I checked the pistol. Despite my anger, I wanted to believe you.”
“Thank you.” But since they were being frank, she wouldn’t leave it at that. “However, it’s not quite that simple. Regardless of the English view, I believe that Ireland’s time for independence must and will come—just not yet.”
“Perhaps,” Colin said. “But if I were an Anglo-Saxon thane oppressed by William the Conqueror, I would hope to throw off the Norman yoke—and yet that never happened. We merged to become one English people.”
“The Normans went to Ireland as well, but the Irish remain Irish hundreds of years later, and they will continue to do so. They will never give in, but another rebellion now would bring only disaster. I tried to convince Martin of that. He wouldn’t listen.” She shook her head. “But I wouldn’t have let him steal the rifles even if I’d approved of his plan. That was wrong regardless.”
“And if you found that the Irish were planning to do harm in England, you would oppose that as well.”
“Obviously,” she huffed. “I don’t want people here harmed either! Fighting is a stupid way to settle differences, and if people would only talk through their misunderstandings and try to get on with one another in spite of disagreeing…”
“Bridget, may we start over? I was upset last night, and jealous that you could be loyal to Fallow.”
“It wasn’t that kind of loyalty, Colin. He was my cousin, and my father was involved as well. There’s family loyalty on my side, too.”
“I understand that now. Bridget, that bigot isn’t really me.”
She wished she could believe that. “It seems to me that what one blurts out in times of anger is the most revealing of all.” Her heart twisted; she didn’t want to hurt him. “I thought I loved you, but now I don’t even know you.” She paused. “I don’t know whether the vast gulf between us can ever be bridged, but cutting you off from Sylvie would be utterly wrong. I won’t leave England. We’ll find a way for you to see her often.”
“Thank you.” Colin set one large warm hand atop hers, beneath which lay their slumbering daughter. “I know it’s the wrong time to say this, given the events of the past few days, but my offer of marriage remains open. I won’t try to push or force you, but I love you, Bridget, and I always will.”
She caught his eyes, the warmth and the fatigue and the sadness in them, and tears threatened behind hers. She turned away, blinking hard. How she wished he hadn’t uttered those few, hateful words—but they could never be taken back, never erased from her memory.
He squeezed her hand and then let go, facing front again. “Ironic, isn’t it? A Warren, not only falling in love but admitting it—and then destroying it before it has a chance.”
Chapter 15
“You told her what?” Fletcher said, omitting the customary sir.
Colin buried his head in his hands. He’d left Bridget and Sylvie in Littlecombe, returned the gig to Andy Evans, and arrived home at last to find a job chaise in the drive. Fletcher had made excellent time from London.
Now they were in Colin’s bedchamber with a decanter of brandy and several trunks of clothing. “You heard me.” He’d repeated last night’s ultimatum to his valet, word for word. Hopefully Fletcher hadn’t lost all respect for him, for he had no one else to talk to.
He poured himself some more of the blessedly numbing liquid—not that he was anywhere near numb yet. He had a feeling only death would take care of that. “Sure you don’t want some?”
“One of us should remain in control of his faculties.” Fletcher folded a striped waistcoat. “Not that sobriety seems to have guaranteed your self-control.”
“I thought she was committing treason!” Colin said. “And I was jealous as the devil, too, but that doesn’t excuse me.”
“No, sir, it doesn’t.”
“Oh, shite, Fletche
r, old friend. What am I going to do?”
Fletcher said nothing for a while, unpacking and stowing articles of clothing in the chest of drawers. “If you wish, I could put a good word in for you with Mrs. Black,” he said at last. “I’ll say it’s a pity you’re English, but you’re not such a bad sort for all that.”
“An impressive encomium.” Impressive, too, that he’d got the words out without slurring them.
Warming to his subject, Fletcher said, “I’ll tell her you’re far too lazy to impose any ridiculous restrictions on her, but she’ll probably become more Irish than ever all the same.”
Colin wasn’t drunk enough to burst into maudlin tears, but it was a close-run thing. He loved her Irishness, horse magic and all. “Oh God, why?” he groaned, not because he objected, but because he wouldn’t have the pleasure of enjoying it.
Naturally, Fletcher misunderstood. “Think about it, sir. How will you react if Napoleon invades England and tries to make us speak French?”
Colin already spoke French reasonably well, but… “English or die, damn him!” He heaved a gusty, brandy-laced sigh. “Thank you for the lesson, my friend, but it’s too late to help me with Bridget O’Shaughnessy Black.”
“Perhaps she’ll come round if I tell her you only have a tantrum every twenty years or so.”
“What?”
“Last time, you called me a stupid barbarian when I wouldn’t play ‘defeating the Scots at Culloden’ with your tin soldiers.”
Yes, Colin had been an obnoxious brat, but he’d had no way of knowing that Fletcher’s grandfather had been killed at Culloden, and that Fletcher’s mother, his nurse, still grieved. “Is it too late to apologize?”
“Apologies are meaningless. They don’t change what you really feel.” Fletcher shook out the greatcoat Colin had worn the night before and proceeded to empty the pockets.
The Rake's Irish Lady (Scandalous Kisses Book 2) Page 24
