by Cheryl Bolen
She placed a gentle hand on his forearm. "Oh, look, Blanks! The leaves on the elm are beginning to blossom. A new beginning. Just like us."
Chapter 10
Before dinner that night Glee felt obliged to introduce herself to Blanks's stepmother for a few private words. Already dressed in the russet gown she would wear to dinner, Glee strode to the east wing and softly knocked on the door to the room given Mrs. Blankenship.
"Yes?" a voice called from within.
"It's Glee Pembroke. Do you have a moment, Mrs. Blankenship?"
"Come in." The woman's voice was harsh.
Perhaps she was not yet dressed, and Glee would be viewed as an intrusion. "If you're not ready. . ."
"I'm ready." She sounded impatient.
Glee slowly turned the knob and entered the sage green chamber as Mrs. Blankenship's maid exited. Aurora Blankenship stood up to greet Glee. The woman was twice Glee's age and was barely taller than Glee, though her thick body with no waist differed vastly from Glee's. Mrs. Blankenship bore a striking resemblance to Jonathan.
"I wished to meet with you privately before our families assemble for dinner," Glee said.
The woman openly stared at Glee, her green eyes slitted as she moved her head up and down the length of Glee. "I see Gregory has done very well himself. You're not only pretty, but you also come from a titled family. My husband would have approved."
"You malign your son if you believe he selected me for such insignificant attributes."
Aurora Blankenship tossed back her head, her grayish-brown locks skittering, and laughed heartily. "First of all, Gregory is not my son," Mrs. Blankenship said with emphasis when she finished laughing. "And secondly, I hardly need malign Gregory when his actions do so thorough a job of it already."
Glee instantly regretted her unwise decision of making herself known to the vicious woman who had been the only mother Blanks had ever known. "If you think to poison my mind against Gregory, I warn you, I'll hear none of it. There's nothing you can say that will make me love him less."
Mrs. Blankenship's eyes narrowed as she continued her lazy perusal of Glee. "You're merely attracted to his tall body and pleasing appearance." Her eyes lowered and her voice softened. "A pity my Jonathan did not inherit his father's height—or his wealth."
Glee's heart melted for her beloved Blanks. Had he always been forced to endure this wicked woman's prejudice? "My only pity is for you, Mrs. Blankenship, for not knowing the wonderful man your step-son has become."
Then, with no further words, Glee turned and left the woman's room.
* * *
Only Jonathan separated Glee from Aurora Blankenship at dinner. A most unpleasant dinner, to be sure. For Aurora Blankenship preferred to dominate the conversation.
"Now that you're to be a married man," she said to Blanks, who sat across the table from her, "you could learn economy from your brother. Jonathan's scorn for frivolousness allows him to channel his money into more worthy endeavors than your set is prone to do."
To Glee's consternation, Blanks made no effort to change the direction of her conversation. Nor did he in any way acknowledge it. He merely listened to her, his ever-present grin sliding across his face, and continued eating his sturgeon. Had he grown enured to Aurora's humiliations? Poor, sweet Blanks.
When the second course was served, Aurora started in on George. "A relief it is to see you nicely settled here at Hornsby and not gallivanting with Gregory's set. I used to tell Mr. Blankenship it was a pity Lord Sedgewick should be caught in Gregory's net, for I believe you must have more in common with my Jonathan. My uncle, you know, was Sir Quimby."
"I did not know," George said absently as he studied his spoon full of peas.
The horrid woman was jealous of Gregory's association with a peer! Nothing on earth would give Glee greater pleasure than hurling her own peas into Aurora Blankenship's mean face.
The woman rambled on about Blanks's great many shortcomings, and he never once defended himself. Glee's heart bled for him.
Then Aurora addressed Glee. "I hope you're up to the challenge of being married to Gregory. Time and again his father had to extricate the boy from one scrape after another. Now that my dear husband's gone, I fear you'll be called upon any number of times to bail him out of trouble."
"I will always be there when my husband needs me, but I can't fathom him doing anything for which I would disapprove. You see, Mrs. Blankenship, I've known him almost as long as you, and I find nothing at all objectionable in him." Nothing but sharing Carlotta Ennis's bed. And that she had already pretended to accept.
To Glee's utter surprise, Jonathan clapped his hands together. "Well spoken, Miss Pembroke."
The brothers exchanged amused glances, Blanks's smile ever ready. So Jonathan was aware of his mother's cruelty toward his brother. Glee decided she detested mother as well as son. When she and Blanks were married, she vowed to have nothing more to do with the pair of them.
* * *
A lump lodged in Gregory's throat the next morning as he stood at the front of the little chapel, his brother at his side, watching George escort Glee down the aisle. His wedding day. His bride was undoubtedly the most beautiful woman he had ever beheld. She wore a gown of snowy white silk threaded with silver. A cascaded veil of filmy white silk did little to hide her glorious auburn hair. Upon the satiny skin above her bodice, his mother's emeralds rested. They were a perfect match to Glee's sparkling eyes.
Glee came to stand beside him, and he took her quivering hand, only to realize his own was also shaking. She looked up at him, squeezed his hand, and smiled.
It was such a simple gesture, yet her easy smile calmed him. After all, his bride was just Glee, a woman he had known since childhood, a female he had treated as another male for most of those years. Most of all, she was a friend. Perhaps marriage, to Glee, would not be so repugnant as he had imagined marriage to be.
This would be his only wedding. Ever. And he was glad to share it with those he cared most about. George. Jonathan. Appleton and the twins. And Glee. For he could not deny he cared for her. He just did not care for her in the same way a man cared for his wife.
He was not nearly as nervous as he had thought he would be when the vicar started the wedding ceremony, but he was completely astonished over his own response when the vicar asked him, "Do you take this woman to be your wife?"
Gregory swallowed hard, and in a voice trembling with emotion, he answered, "Yes." Then his eyes filled with tears. A glance at his bride confirmed that her eyes also become moist.
After the ceremony, he and Glee served as host and hostess at their wedding breakfast. Here is where he made every effort to convince Jonathan of his love for Glee. Every time she spoke, he looked at her with glowing admiration. Between each course, he took her slim hand within his and pressed soft kisses into her palm until the blush colored her cheeks.
When the servants carried away her unfinished toast, his brows lowered in concern. When she did not touch the comfits, he stroked her face as would a lover, and he inquired if she felt altogether well. With smiling eyes she looked at him and assured him she felt all that was healthy but that her appetite was not as great as the lavish fare that spread over the table and throughout every sideboard in the room and the adjacent butler's pantry.
Once the last of the sweetmeats was consumed, Gregory rose and with a voice choking with emotion thanked all of their friends and loved ones for attending their wedding. He looked down at Glee adoringly. "My bride and I must journey now to Bath in order to arrive before dark."
In the event of inclement weather, he had brought Glee's new carriage to Hornsby for their return to Bath. He saw her into it, and spread a rug over her lap.
"She won't need that with you to warm her!" George said good-naturedly.
Glee turned crimson.
With the carriage door still open, the two of them said good-bye to their well-wishers.
Then meeting Appleton's gaze, Gregory challenge
d his friends. "A pony says my matched bays will get us to Bath before your old nags."
"You're on!" Appleton responded, hurriedly moving toward the stable.
Elvin answered for himself and his twin. "We'll hate to take the bridegroom's money," he boasted with a smile before he and his brother started after Appleton.
With the carriage rattling over the long avenue to the manor house, Glee pulled off her headdress and settled back into the squabs with a sigh. Even during their wedding day, she would not be alone with her new husband. They would share the day with his bachelor friends. And she would appear to be enjoying every minute of their company.
She smiled at her husband. "The bays are beautiful, but do you really think they can outdistance a lone rider? George always said Appleton was every bit as talented as you in selecting outstanding horseflesh. And five-and-twenty pounds is a great deal of money to lose."
Blanks shrugged. "It'll be close, but it will make the ride faster—and jollier." He moved across the carriage and sat beside her, taking her hand in his. "Never worry about the money. You are now a very rich woman."
It seemed peculiar that she was now rich. Even more peculiar was the idea that her husband believed her mercenary enough to wed for money. "I daresay the wager's quite a lark. Mr. Appleton and the twins are so very much fun to be around."
"Quite," he uttered, lifting the carriage's privacy curtain in order to catch a glimpse of his challenging friends. "They haven't finished saddling yet, I suppose," he said, dropping the curtain and meeting her gaze.
"You were a wonderful husband! So solicitous you almost fooled me. I am sure you fooled Jonathan."
"Let us hope," Gregory said solemnly.
Now it was time for Glee to begin Phase II of her battle plan.
"Oh, please, Blanks, have the driver slow down so I can make a wager with the fellows. Since I am now a woman of means, I shall wager five quid that we win."
Blanks straightened up and shot her a queer look. "I'll do no such thing. A lady doesn't wager on horses."
"Silly, I'm not a lady anymore. I shall be one of the bloods. We'll have great fun."
"Bloods? That is not a term a lady uses. And I won't have my wife cavorting with bloods."
Though she rather liked that he referred to her as his wife—it sounded so blessedly good—she had failed to achieve her goal. For her Phase II consisted of emulating a fast woman. After all, Blanks had always been enamored of fast women. "Really, Blanks, you sound so terribly prudish. Better that I cavort with your friends than take a lover. And I've promised not to do that the first year of our marriage."
The very idea of Glee taking a lover—their first year of marriage or at anytime thereafter—fairly singed his hair. Glee was, after all, a lady. A complete innocent.
And later? He would never allow her to take lovers, never be able to stand the idea of losing her on childbed. “Having my wife spoken of in demeaning terms is something I will not tolerate. You will behave with propriety."
Her mouth slid into a challenging smile that reached her emerald eyes. "We'll see."
He struggled to control his rising temper.
"What time do you think we will arrive in Bath?" she asked.
He shrugged. "The weather's fine. The horses are well rested. I hope to be there by nightfall."
"It does get dark so dreadfully early this time of the year."
He absently nodded.
"Have you seen Thomas's little lame lad?"
At first he did not comprehend. Then he remembered the lad in front of the milliner's where he purchased Carlotta's pretty hats, and he vaguely remembered that Felicity's husband had provided assistance that enabled the little boy to walk.
It brought to mind his own recent preoccupation with the urchin in front of his solicitor's office. He had been unable to shake the pity he felt for the wretched boy. The lad was so small to be so ill treated. "The milliner's lad prospers, and he walks everywhere now—though he has a pronounced limp."
"He's not the milliner's lad. His mother assists the milliner. Isn't it wonderful what one man's care and ministration can do for helpless creatures? I vow, now that I'm a woman of means I shall help other prostrate children."
Had she intruded on his thoughts? It was the very same thing he had been thinking. "Then we must start with the wretched lad who hangs about my solicitor's office. When last I saw him, snow was falling on the ground and the lad had no coat, and there were great, gaping holes in shoes."
Her brows lowered and she murmured her pity. "Surely you offered him assistance?"
"I merely gave the clerk enough money to procure shoes and coat for the lad."
"We'll have to do more, Blanks."
His very thoughts. "Yes, I know, my dear."
"I know what we can do!" she shrieked with excitement. "Since we're to have no children of our own, we'll bring him to live at Har-. . .I mean at Blankenship House."
"I've told you I don't want children."
"But you've admitted you have worried about the lad. That proves you like children."
"Of course I like children. They're such helpless creatures."
"And you've agreed to help the most helpless."
"Yes, but having the responsibility of raising one is something altogether different. 'Tis much easier to empty one's pockets."
"Does the boy have a family?"
"Mr. Willowby's clerk said he had no father. His mother cleans the building where Willowby's offices are housed."
He watched her slim little face as she thoughtfully nodded. "You must introduce me to the boy."
"As you like." Gregory lifted the curtain and saw Appleton a distance of half a mile behind on the level country road. He had gained considerably on the twins, who were but two specks on the horizon.
"Did you ask your step-mother to our wedding?" Glee asked.
How had she guessed? He had kept his dislike of Aurora as concealed as a grave. "I did not."
Glee's eyes narrowed. "A more beastly woman I've never met! I declare, I don't know how you tolerated life under that woman's roof."
"Another thing on which you and I agree."
"Why do you allow her to remain mistress at Sutton Hall?"
"Only until you come, my dear."
"It will be my pleasure to usurp the woman, for knowing your amiability, I surmise that she has always been the evil step-mother."
A feeling of warmth and contentment mingled with Glee's rose water fragrance rushed over him. "You exaggerate my amiability, I'm afraid. Where Aurora is concerned, I've been no saint."
"But you could have been no more than a babe when she had to take the place of your mother. You could hardly have been mean spirited then."
"I suppose not." He shifted his weight and stretched out his long legs. Glee's questioning made him uncomfortable.
"Did she always show so marked a partiality toward Jonathan?"
"Who can blame her? Jonathan was her very own flesh and blood. Not the progeny of a dead woman whom she envied excessively."
"She was jealous of your mother?"
He smiled as if he had been asked to recall a humorous event. "She had every portrait of my mother—indeed everything that indicated my mother had ever lived at Sutton Hall—removed when she married my father. I only knew of my mother's loveliness from the servants. Aurora could never bring herself to utter my mother's name. She vengefully referred to her predecessor as your mother. I think, more than anything, it was to remind me that she was not my mother."
"So she was never affectionate to you," Glee said sorrowfully.
He gave a bitter laugh. "Hardly."
"Yet she was affectionate with Jonathan?"
He continued to smile. "He was, is, unquestionably the light of her life. She was forever lamenting that our father's lands would not go to him, since he was the good son."
"She said that in your presence?" Glee asked incredulously.
"Every day."
"So you determined to show h
er how truly bad you could be."
He chuckled. "Something like that."
"I vow, I detest the woman excessively!" She turned to him, "I don't see how you could be close to Jonathan."
"I wouldn't call it close. Naturally, I love him. He's my little brother."
"Did he resent that you—and not he—was first born?"
Gregory shrugged. "I don't think so. At least not until later when he began to fear I would squander away Sutton Hall. Then he rather aligned himself with his mother. Also, being a pinch penny, he heartily disapproves of the manner in which I spend money, or to quote him, the manner in which I waste money."
"I don't see how he could not be jealous of you. You're far more handsome and personable. You excel in sport. And you control the purse strings. It's only natural he would resent you."
No woman—not even Carlotta, who professed to love him—had ever taken such an interest in his forlorn youth. Nor had anyone before ever guessed the extent of his childhood suffering. Yet, his slim wife who wasn't much more than a child herself, displayed uncanny understanding of human nature. "Resent isn't the right word. There's always been some degree of jealousy, which was only natural. I was bigger and stronger and faster—all things he envied. I daresay there's not a younger brother in the kingdom who hasn't envied his older brother at one time or another."
She smiled wistfully. "Or younger sister. I used to lament that I couldn't be blonde and blue-eyed like my beautiful sister. But I've always loved her fiercely."
"As I love Jonathan and he loves me." He gave her a long look. "While I admit your sister is an extraordinarily beautiful woman, I think you are even prettier."
A smile slanted across his face as he watched the color rise in her cheeks.
"Remember to say such flattering things when we are in company. All of Bath will believe you in love with me," she said with a self-conscious laugh.
"It will take no effort for me to compliment your beauty. It's as evident as the stars in the sky."
"Now you've gone and put me to the blush."
