An impossible dream. It still feels like a dream, for I cannot have possibly traveled so far from being the exceedingly proper wife of the local vicar to kissing an earl with a dark and violent past in a hothouse. It is unthinkable.”
“’Tis anly a dream, yet ye’ve gone an done this to me?” His eyes seemed to plead and accuse at once. But he had done it all to her, taken her in his arms and touched her and made her need not some ephemeral taste of spring, but him. She wanted to be the spring ewe to his ram. She wanted to be the nectar in the bud to his hummingbird’s probe. She wanted him to make her a woman in this hothouse. Now. Before it was too late and she had to box up her mating metaphors as well as her dreams and store them all away at the back of a closet forever.
His arms fell away from her and he stepped back. “The exceedingly proper wife o’ the local vicar?” he said in a thick voice.
“Not yet. And his idea. And my parents’. Decidedly not mine.” She shivered in revulsion.
“Ye’d be a poor match for a beadle.”
“If by beadle you mean a vicar, I consider that a compliment.” She lifted her hands to her flaming cheeks. “Now what?”
“Nou, Miss Teresa Finch-Freeworth,” he said in his beautiful rolling brogue, a muscle contracting in his jaw. “Ye leave.”
Of course. He had paid on the wager. He owed her nothing more.
She moved around him toward the door, but he grasped her hand and stayed her.
“Ye’ve got me so I dinna ken what’s up or down.”
“Then the sentiment is mutual.”
She disengaged from his grasp and left the hothouse. As she walked rapidly along the path toward the picnic blankets, willing away the heat in her cheeks and the quivering in her blood and the sudden acute disappointment of having gotten what she wanted but not at all what she began to realize she needed, she noticed a small carriage alongside the others.
She recognized it, as well as the soberly clad gentleman disembarking from it. Like the devil, the Reverend Elijah Waldon had arrived at the ideal moment to cause the most damage.
Her vicar was a starched, priggish pole of a Sassenach, and Duncan took a quick disliking to any parents who would seek to ally their vibrant, passionate daughter with such a man.
She affected the introductions with grace. Only a hint of dismay in her lily pad eyes conveyed her displeasure over welcoming Waldon to her party.
Duncan shook the man’s hand and found his grip surprisingly firm.
“How fortunate you gentlemen are,” Waldon said expansively, “to enjoy the company of so many lovely ladies.” He chuckled as though he’d uttered a witticism.
“Will ye join us for refreshments, Reverend?” Elspeth said.
“I should like that, my lady.” With amiable, self-satisfied smiles he arranged himself stiffly on the blanket. Duncan moved to Finch-Freeworth standing apart.
“Yer sister says yer parents intend her match wi’ Waldon,” he said easily, as though the notion of it didn’t clamp his stomach in a vise.
Finch-Freeworth nodded. “Is it any wonder she felt she had to do this”—he gestured to the picnic—“to escape that fate?”
Clearly her brother didn’t know the entire truth of it. She was not only escaping her fate. She was trying to build a dream.
He’d done the same. Seven years ago, after he returned from the East, he’d found and killed the man that had led his sister, Miranda, to her death.
Then he went to work for Myles. Every guinea he’d earned for the odd strongman jobs he’d performed had gone home to his lands. He’d made Myles pay him well and he’d sent thousands of pounds to Scotland. But putting the estate back on its feet was only part of his plan. He dreamed that someday when he died, Sorcha would inherit the estate that she so ably managed despite limitations.
That his stubborn half-sister refused to marry and produce an heir was the only weakness in that plan. If Elspeth were to inherit, it would be the end of their lands. Elspeth was as starched and prim as Waldon, and she’d give away the land management to a useless fool like their father had, and the family would be ruined once and for all.
They were nearly ruined already.
His brow loosened. All but Moira. She would live in comfort. And Lily and Abigail were finding happiness too, all because of a fiery-haired, moss-eyed whirlwind of a lady who, it seemed, was as nonplused about this all as he was.
“I saw you walk away with my sister,” Finch-Freeworth said. His brow was low. “I didn’t stop you because I know you’ve spent little time in each other’s company. I think if she intends to marry you she should know who she’s marrying before it’s too late. But when I saw her return I regretted that I hadn’t gone after you. Are you dealing with her honorably, my lord?”
“If I told ye I weren’t, what would ye do?”
“I would call you out and shoot you in the heart.”
“That’d put period to her plan, nou, wouldn’t it?”
Finch-Freeworth’s throat worked. “I care for her, Eads. She may be a curiosity to you, but she’s one of the best friends of my life and here in London she’s under my protection. With a word I can send her home.”
“An wi’ a word, sir,” Duncan said quietly, “I can do the same.”
Finch-Freeworth’s gaze darted to Una. He swung it back. “Are you threatening me, my lord?”
“Wi’ what would I threaten ye, then? The dueling pistol ye’ve already got pointed at ma heart?”
“With . . .” He seemed to struggle. He set his jaw. “I will not trade my sister’s virtue for my happiness.”
“No one’s said ye must.”
Finch-Freeworth’s eyes were like his sister’s at times, swiftly assessing, but considerably more reserved. While her emotions were on her face for Duncan to read like a book, her brother’s were hidden. He’d seen the brutality of war; perhaps suffering had made him wary. Now he didn’t want to believe what he was hearing.
But Duncan had noticed Una’s happiness lately. He’d listened to her speak of this man with warmth and yet a guarded uncertainty that told him she was unwilling to give her heart away fully unless assured that her affections were returned. He could tell Finch-Freeworth now that the field was clear; the prize was won and he would hand it over when asked.
He didn’t. A man must come to his epiphanies in his own time.
Teresa cast him a glance, saw him watching her, and smiled as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
On the other hand, a man might be dragged to his epiphany against his will.
Laughing from yet another of Mr. Smythe’s thin flatteries, the moment Effie climbed from the carriage her giggling halted and her face grew weary.
“Ye dinna actually like Mr. Smythe, do ye?” Lily asked her as they ascended the hotel steps. Apparently she and Effie had burned the candle wax all night planning the wedding feast, but the betrothed twin did not seem any the worse for the lack of sleep.
Effie, on the other hand, was clearly miserable despite the day’s flirtations.
“Ach,” she grumbled. “Least he’s no such a sissypot as Mr. Waldon.”
“Sh! Dinna say such a thing.” Lily darted a grin at Teresa.
“Teresa daena like that prosy old bore any more than I do. She likes Duncan. But if she marries him she’ll probably start chastising me just like he does.” She looked back at Teresa. “So I hope ye daena because I like ye just fine nou.”
Lily laughed and squeezed her twin’s hand. “Oh, Effie, I do luve ye. I wish ye could be as happy as I am.”
Effie’s face took on a private, fighting look. Lily released her and hurried toward the stairs to the kitchen.
Teresa went to Effie. “Perhaps it is time to try something new.” When her misery and desperation had threatened to overcome her, it was what she’d done after all. The earl was right: She would not win the wager, but there was happiness to be had in her new friends’ joy.
Effie screwed up her delicate nose.
Teresa led her toward the parlor. The elderly woman in black sat at the window as always. Teresa whispered, “Sometimes leaving one’s own cares behind and focusing on another’s can ease the unhappiness of both.”
“I’m no unhappy,” Effie said truculently, but she wandered into the parlor and plopped down on the piano bench. She pursed her lips then set her fingers to the ivories and tapped out a tune. It was one of her favorites, sprightly yet with an air of melancholy that made Teresa imagine Highland skies stripped with grey clouds. Effie hadn’t a truly fine voice, but it was clean and sweet enough to please. When she finished, she rested her fingertips on the keys and turned to look at the old woman.
Two identical streaks of tears ran down the lady’s withered cheeks. Effie’s eyes went round. She went and stood awkwardly by the woman.
“Ma’am?” She fidgeted with her skirts. “I wonder if I may offer ye . . . tea?”
“Dear girl.” The woman’s voice was papery from disuse. “My Joseph liked me to play that song to him when he was a boy.”
Effie grabbed a chair and sat on the edge of it. “What does he like to listen to nou, I wonder?”
“He wrote to me of hearing the waltz in a Vienna ballroom. He said it was magnificent.”
“Weel, that must’ve been something, to be sure. I envy him. I’ve no gone anywhere, an soon I’ll be back home without having seen any place but Lunnontown. But, oh, hou I’d like to travel the world!” She sighed.
“My Joseph is an officer in the Royal Navy.”
“Is he yer son?”
“Grandson.” Another tear chased the silvery track. “He is a fine boy. The only family I have left.”
Effie chuckled. “I usually think I’ve far too much family.” Tentatively she reached forward and gave the woman’s hand a gentle pat. “Does he write to ye aften, then?”
“Every week.” The skin on her aged brow was like tissue. Now it crinkled.
“But I haven’t heard from him in over a month. He wrote that he would come home on furlough and that I was to meet him here in London, for his time in England would be brief. I fear something dreadful has happened to him.”
Effie waved a hand in the air. “Ye mustn’t think like that. There’s a guid explanation for it. Mebbe his horse threw a shoe, or the carriage wheel broke, or he left his luggage behind an went back for it.”
“Or the tide was low in port and all the ships I could have embarked upon were grounded for weeks.”
Teresa started. Beside her at the door stood a slim, broad-shouldered young gentleman in a crisp blue and white uniform, a plumed hat cocked beneath his arm.
“Joseph!” The old woman rose and teetered. Effie leaped up and grasped her arm to steady her.
“Grandmama.” He came forward with a warm smile for his grandmother and Effie. The woman grabbed his arms and clung. “How good it is to see you again, my dearest,” he said, lifting her gnarled fingers to his lips. “And how fetching you are in this frock.” His eyes twinkled. “You haven’t aged a day since we were together last Christmas.” He turned his attention on Effie. “And who is this lovely lady who has so kindly kept you company in my absence?”
Effie stammered and blinked pretty eyes and said nothing. The naval lieutenant smiled and made her laugh and regarded her with warm appreciation.
Later Effie told Teresa that her heart was so full at that moment that she could not even remember her name. And by the time her sisters entered the parlor an hour later for tea, she could not in fact remember that she had ever known the world without Lieutenant Joseph P. Caruthers in it.
9
Calling upon her the morning after the picnic, Mr. Waldon informed Teresa that she must cut her new friends and return to Harrows Court Crossing or risk unpardonable social censure for allying herself with a family of besmirched reputation.
Apparently word had flown to Cheshire via Mrs. Biddycock’s gossipy London cousin that Teresa had been seen in the company of the penniless half sisters of the scandalous Earl of Eads. Mr. Waldon insisted that the situation was unacceptable and warned that if she did not relent in her pursuit of social ruin he would inform her mother and father who were as yet ignorant of her mésalliances.
Teresa ignored his threats. Even if he sent a letter to Brennon Manor, her parents could not force her to return home unless they actually came to town themselves, by which time the wager would have already come to an end anyway.
Nevertheless he remained in town, insinuating himself into nearly every outing with the Eads sisters and regularly urging Teresa to return home at once. After days of resisting telling him exactly what she thought of this presumption, when he deigned to sit in judgment on the joyful announcement of Effie’s betrothal to Lieutenant Caruthers, and used Lady Elspeth’s disapproval of the match to support his case, Teresa exploded.
“It is insupportable,” she said between gritted teeth to Sorcha and Una as they walked along the Serpentine. Lily, Moira, and Mr. Baker-Frye strolled behind them, with Lieutenant Caruthers’ grandmother on Lord Eads’s arm.
Teresa practically felt the earl’s gaze on her. She’d spent a horrid sennight longing for more caresses that he would not willingly give her. Being infatuated with a fantasy from a distance had been tortuous in its own manner. But that was nothing to being in love with a man at close range and coming to the conclusion that she should not be.
“No everybody thinks marriage is the be-all to life,” Sorcha said, her steps on the path like everything she did, firm and confident. Teresa envied her attitude.
“But when the parties involved are so ideally suited”—unlike her and the Earl of Eads—“it seems criminal to discourage it.” The earl did not want her and she did not now know what she wanted, but it wasn’t this feeling of helplessness. “The lieutenant is an excellent person and he and Effie are besotted with each other.” Their union was proceeding precisely as it should, from tea with his grandmother to walks in the park, while Teresa was foundering in confusion. “He adores her spirit and she is eager for him to haul her across the oceans to God knows where for the rest of her life. They are thrilled with each other.”
“Elspeth thinks Effie’ll make a poor sailor’s wife,” Una said, her parasol shading her cheeks from the sun.
Teresa came to a halt. “I think marriage to him will in fact be the making of her.”
“Agreed,” Una said. “She needs adoration, amusement, an a firm hand all at once. Lieutenant Caruthers is weel suited to give her those.”
“Gird yer souls, leddies.” Sorcha folded her arms. “Here come the righteous.”
Ahead, Mr. Waldon and Elspeth passed Effie and Lieutenant Caruthers on the path. Lieutenant Caruthers tipped his hat, took Effie’s hand securely on his arm, and drew her away. Effie’s light laughter tripped behind her.
“Miss Finch-Freeworth,” Mr. Waldon said as he approached. “As Lady Elspeth desires a moment’s rest, may I take you on my arm now?”
She could not decline. They moved away from the group.
“I am disappointed that you have not yet returned home, Miss Finch-
Freeworth,” he said.
“I have not yet finished what I came to London to do,” she said honestly.
Lately it was not amusing to tell tales. Telling tales, after all, had gotten her here: confused and aching. It was not that the tales did not still occur to her, only that she was coming to see that they were much better confined to her stories for Freddie than spoken aloud.
Dreams were quite another thing altogether. She could never shut them away in a drawer. But they were not reality. The clergyman standing before her was reality. The future. Her future.
“I see,” he said pensively. “I had hopes for you, Miss Finch-Freeworth.”
She clamped down on the nausea in her stomach.
“I knew you to be lovely and well bred,” he continued, “and although the childish stories with which you enjoy amusing our neighbors caused me distress and concern, I knew that in time I coul
d mold you into an enviable wife. But now my mind and heart have taken another turn.”
She released his arm but could not reply; her astonishment was too great.
“Lady Elspeth informed me of the matchmaking program upon which you have embarked,” he said. “I have visited some acquaintances in town this week who assure me that this program has brought you under unflattering scrutiny in society. In my position as leader of our humble community, I must choose my wife so that she reflects upon me in the greatest light. It is with regret, therefore, that I must inform you that I have transferred my affections to a more worthy candidate, a lady of moral and social rectitude who will add to my happiness and consequence rather than subtract from them.”
Teresa struggled to find her tongue. “Mr. Waldon, I wish you the very best in your newfound happiness.” She refrained from shouting in joy. She was free! She would live with her parents for the rest of her life. But she was free!
Mr. Waldon frowned. “I had hoped for more than that.”
“I assure you, I know that feeling well.”
“Lily! Everybody!” Effie came skipping down the path, dragging a smiling Lieutenant Caruthers by the hand. “Joseph has asked me to marry him!”
Teresa’s gaze met the earl’s. She saw in his beautiful eyes that he already knew.
Four sisters betrothed. With six days left to the wager.
He knew she could not win. He liked her. He liked her lips and he liked to touch her and he seemed to enjoy her company. That only she felt an ache in her chest when they were together and an equally fierce confusion over it was a fate she must accept.
But must she?
He was a lord. He needed an heir. She didn’t see why she couldn’t be the one to help with that.
As though he knew her thoughts, his eyes narrowed. She looked at his three un-betrothed sisters. Lady Elspeth’s lips were predictably tight as the others celebrated Effie’s news. And Sorcha had resisted every opportunity to meet eligible bachelors. But Una . . .
How to Marry a Highlander (falcon club ) Page 9
