Because of You

by Cathy Maxwell

  “I’ll do whatever I like.”

  “This is a family matter, Yale. We don’t air family business to anyone other than family. You will accept a title.” He jabbed the air for emphasis. “You have no choice but to depend on me for a living. You have a wife now.”

  “I shall take care of my wife my way and I have many, many choices.”

  Ayleborough straightened, his hands behind his back. “She is part of the family. She will live in a style befitting a Carderock.”

  “Damn you, Wayland. You sound exactly like Father.”

  “And you are as headstrong and flighty as your mother!” his brother shot back, his words reverberating in the room.

  To Samantha’s surprise, Yale went very still, the color draining from his face. Then she remembered that the two brothers had different mothers. The duke’s mother had been the beloved first wife. Yale’s mother had been the much younger, and very foolish, second wife.

  “I want nothing from you,” Yale said.

  Ayleborough glared at him. “If that is the way you feel, why did you return?”

  Yale walked over to his brother until less than a foot stood between them. “I returned to prove to Father that I wasn’t the scapegrace he thought me.”

  The corner of the duke’s mouth lifted in grim amusement. “So, you married the vicar’s penniless daughter under an assumed name and planned to abandon her. Oh, that would have convinced Father.”

  Yale pulled back as if his brother had hit him.

  Immediately Ayleborough recognized his error. “I shouldn’t have said that. It was wrong of me, but you must see that is how it looks. We have to take care of her, Yale. As a family. Otherwise it doesn’t appear good.”

  “And you don’t believe I can?”

  The duke’s glance ran over his brother’s homespun outfit. “I feel it best if I help you.”

  Yale laughed, the sound without mirth. “You jump to conclusions, brother. I am not as bad as you believe. I have one hundred thousand pounds to my name and own a fleet of ships that ply the trade between here and the Orient. I did that on my own. I don’t need your money. I don’t need the family.”

  If the duke was surprised by this news, his face didn’t betray him. Instead, he answered quietly, “Father’s dead, Yale. You can’t prove anything to him.”

  The anger immediately left Yale. The hardness in his eyes softened. “I should have come back sooner.”

  “What? To throw his actions in his face?” Ayleborough placed his hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Yale, I will repeat it and repeat it until you believe me. Father wished he had not acted so rashly. He wanted you back.”

  Yale turned and walked to the window. He stood there, but Samantha doubted he saw the view of the hillside beyond the inn. He was lost in his own world.

  Something inside Samantha longed to comfort him, but she ruthlessly quashed the emotion. She would have nothing to do with him.

  Instead, it was his brother who went up to him. “Come back to the family. Bring your wife and let us make amends for the past. We are your heritage. We’re your children’s heritage.”

  “I wish you would stop talking as if I’m part of this plan, Your Grace,” Samantha said. “I’m not going to leave Sproule or go anywhere with this man.”

  However, he ignored her. Yale flicked a glance in her direction, and then said, “Call in the vicar.”

  Ayleborough clapped his hand on his brother’s back. “I knew you would see reason. Welcome back, brother.”

  Yale shook his head. “Don’t kill the fatted calf yet, brother. I’m only doing this for Sam.”

  “For me?” She wanted to scream at the two of them. “Don’t reconcile with your family on my account. I don’t want to marry you,” she told Yale flatly. “I didn’t want to the first time, and I certainly don’t now.”

  “Sam,” Yale said reasonably, walking toward her.

  She warded him off with her hand. “Samantha is my given name, but I’m Miss Northrup to you.”

  “You’re my wife to me.”

  “Not legally!”

  “We are going to rectify that momentarily,” he answered.

  “I-don’t-think-so,” Samantha said, speaking carefully so he could understand exactly what she was saying. “I won’t go through with it.”

  He shrugged. “You have no choice. The marriage has been consummated. We must make it legal.”

  She cast a look at the duke for support, but he was pretending to study the flames licking a log in the hearth. She drew a deep breath, lifted her chin, and said, “No, we don’t.”

  Ayleborough gave a sharp bark of laughter. “This is excellent. My brother has finally found someone as stubborn as he is.”

  Frowning, Yale went to Samantha’s side and took hold of her arm. She didn’t want him this close. It reminded her of the intimacy they’d shared, the way she’d craved his touch, the way he’d made a fool of her.

  She pulled on her arm and he released it, but he did not step back. “Sam, you must marry me. If you don’t, there will be no place for you, not in Sproule. These people are too narrow-minded. The only way I can safely steer you away from the threat of a scandal is if we marry. Otherwise, you will be ostracized. I’ve had that happen to me and I will not let it happen to you.”

  She didn’t speak; she couldn’t. She felt as if a heavy weight rested on her chest, making speech impossible.

  He placed his hand on her shoulder, his thumb resting on the pulse point between her chin and neck. “Ah, Sam, I’m sorry to drag you through this, but it will work out for the best. I really am a rich man. I can buy you whatever you wish.”

  “Whatever I wish?” She almost laughed. “I wish I’d never laid eyes on you. I wish you hadn’t humiliated and embarrassed me. I wish you’d had the decency to tell me the truth from the beginning! Can you accomplish that now?”

  His eyebrows rose. “No.”

  She sidled away from him, but still he followed. “What happened to the lass who said she was falling in love with me?”

  She shot him an angry glance. How could he use her words against her at this time? The sting of tears burned her eyes. She blinked them back, reminding herself that he wasn’t worth it. “It was lust,” she managed to choke out. “I mistook it for love.”

  Her words caught him off guard. The teasing light in his eyes died. “Sam, I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

  “You didn’t mean to be honest with me, either.”

  “Touché,” he answered softly.

  And so that is it, she thought sadly. They were done with each other. She hugged her waist and waited for him to leave, refusing to look at him, refusing to think of her future.

  He walked across the room to the door. She heard it open and held her breath. In a second, he would be gone from her life forever.

  Instead, he said, “Vicar, we are ready for you to perform the ceremony.”

  “What?” Samantha said, spinning around.

  Yale didn’t even bother to look at her as he answered, “We are going to marry.”

  Squire Biggers and Vicar Newell entered the room. Samantha stepped into their path. “Would you please leave?” Samantha said to them. “There will not be a marriage.”

  The two men looked at Yale. “Yes, there will,” he said solemnly. “You see, Miss Northrup doesn’t know what is good for her, so you and I must help her. Otherwise, she will insist on staying in Sproule.”

  “She can’t do that,” Vicar Newell said. “I just moved my missus into the vicarage and she’s happy.” He confided to Samantha, “We’re also going to have a wee one in a few months.”

  “You don’t have to worry,” Squire Biggers assured his nephew. “She won’t be moving back into the vicarage.”

  “Then I’ll stay with Miss Mabel and Miss Hattie!” Samantha exclaimed.

  Miss Mabel’s head popped into the doorway. “Did someone say our name?” She entered the room, followed by Miss Hattie, Mr. and Mrs. Sadler, and what seemed to be e
veryone in the village.

  Samantha gasped. She should have known a crowd would gather.

  She faced Yale. “I won’t marry you. I won’t answer the questions when asked, or say ‘I do’! Do you hear me? I refuse to speak a word!”

  “Aye, I hear you,” Yale said grimly. “But the marriage will go on. And these good people will witness it.”

  Samantha could hear the squire explaining to Mrs. Sadler what had transpired. Samantha was surprised he hadn’t already spread the word while he cooled his heels outside the door. Mrs. Sadler made a soft sound of surprise and then began whispering in Miss Mabel’s ear. Soon the whole village would know of her humiliation.

  Somehow, in some way, Samantha vowed she would learn to live with the disgrace. But she would not marry him.

  The Porters had arrived and pushed their way into the room. The duke of Ayleborough motioned for Fenley to make arrangements for drinks for everyone.

  “If you are related to the duke, then you must be very rich,” Miss Hattie said to Yale.

  “Yes, very,” he answered, and she turned in wonder at her sister.

  “How lucky you are,” Miss Mabel said to Samantha. “You are going to be part of the Carderock family. This is most romantic.”

  “This man has deceived me,” Samantha practically growled. “He’s deceived all of us. There is nothing romantic about it.”

  “But he wants to make it right,” Mrs. Sadler said, and the other women around her nodded. Even a few men agreed.

  Then the duke spoke, “I have one condition before giving this remarriage my blessing, brother.” Everyone went silent.

  “And that is?” Yale asked.

  “That you come to London with your wife, at least until she is properly settled.”

  “I will,” Yale said firmly. “I’ll do it for Sam.”

  The women in the room oohed their approval. Samantha harrumphed her thoughts. She turned her back on him.

  Emma and Fenley appeared with tankards of ale. More villagers crowded into the room. Glancing over her shoulder, Samantha realized that Yale was on one side, she on the other. Vicar Newell stood lost in the crowd somewhere in between.

  “Let us get this ceremony done with,” Ayleborough announced, taking a tankard for himself. “I am eager to be on the road to London to see my family.”

  “Well, then,” Squire Biggers said. “Let’s start the ceremony, else my nephew will find himself without a house again.”

  That was all the impetus the mousy Vicar Newell needed. He started reading the words of the marriage ceremony out of the Book of Common Prayer.

  Samantha kept her back turned to all of them, amazed that they should so completely ignore her wishes. Well, she wasn’t going through with this. She wouldn’t!

  She listened to Yale repeat his vows. He sounded more sure of them than he had the day before.

  Her jaw hurt from clenching her teeth to keep herself from crying. As he earnestly promised to keep her to him until death, she wanted to rage at him like some Greek harpy.

  Then it was time for her vows.

  “Samantha Northrup,” the vicar said. “Wilt thou have this man to be thy wedded husband?”

  Samantha stared at a crack in the plaster wall in front of her. She would not say one word.

  Miss Mabel nudged her. “You say ‘I will’ here.”

  Samantha ignored her.

  The crowd shifted uncomfortably. Then Mrs. Biggers’s overbearing voice came from the doorway, “Oh, pother! I’ll answer for her. She will!”

  Samantha turned on one foot. “I do not!”

  “You already have,” Mrs. Biggers said. She looked at her nephew. “She took these vows yesterday. There’s no reason to say them again. After all, she married him using her real name.”

  “Yes, that’s true,” Vicar Newell said, pushing his spectacles up the bridge of his nose.

  “Aye, what difference is it whether she said it yesterday or today?” Squire Biggers said impatiently. “Let’s get on with it.”

  And to Samantha’s horror, the vicar did exactly that. “Will thou love him, comfort him, obey him?”

  When she didn’t answer, Mrs. Biggers and the other women did for her, their voices speaking in unison, “She does.”

  “No, I won’t!” Samantha protested.

  “Wilt thou honor and keep him, in sickness and in health?”

  “She will!” The men joined in this time and the sound was much louder.

  “No!” Samantha stamped her foot, so angry she could burst into flames.

  “And wilt thou forsake all others, and keep thee only unto him, so long as ye both shall live?”

  “She will!” everyone answered, absolutely jovial by now.

  Before Samantha could protest again, the vicar said, “ThenIpronounceyoumanandwife.” He closed the prayer book and smiled beatifically. “Those whom God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.”

  The crowd responded, “Amen,” and hoisted their tankards to drink to her health.

  Stunned, Samantha stared at them, people she had known and trusted all her life. They didn’t care about her—finally she understood what Marvin, no, what Yale had been trying to tell her.

  And then the hairs on the back of her neck tickled, as if someone watched her. She shifted her gaze and met Yale’s. The expression on his face was one of sympathy touched with regret. He knew what she was thinking.

  She gave him her back.

  Chapter 9

  Yale watched cynically as the villagers rushed forth to congratulate Samantha. Mrs. Biggers droned on and on about how wonderful it was “our dear Miss Northrup is now related to the duke of Ayleborough.”

  Miss Mabel and Miss Hattie cried noisily, while Mrs. Porter and Mrs. Sadler both bragged that they’d known there was something “special” about Mr. Browne.

  “I knew the moment I clapped eyes on him that he wasn’t just a nobody,” Mrs. Sadler declared.

  “Aye, I felt the same,” her husband agreed.

  Yale remembered their first meeting differently. When he’d paid for his room in advance, the innkeeper and his wife had practically bit his coin in front of him to see if the metal was good.

  He was glad he was taking Sam away from them; they were all such hypocrites. They didn’t deserve a person as fine and giving as she was.

  Wayland’s voice was heard over the crowd. “I hate to spoil this splendid party in honor of my brother and his new bride, but we must be on our way. I plan to make London by Tuesday night.”

  “By Tuesday night, Your Grace?” Squire Biggers said. “That’s a spanking pace in this weather.”

  “It is, but I will do it,” Wayland answered, pulling on his gloves, while Fenley placed a heavy greatcoat sporting no fewer than five capes around his shoulders. “I have my own teams waiting between here and London. I promised Her Grace I will be there, and so I shall. I don’t like to be away from my family any longer than I must.” He gave his brother an indulgent smile before adding, “But then, it was a good thing I made this trip, no?”

  Yale wanted to answer, “No, it was not.” If Wayland hadn’t appeared, he and Samantha would be on their way and she would be as content and happy as a cat. As it was now, he’d be lucky if Sam thawed toward him by spring.

  But his answer wasn’t necessary. Mrs. Biggers was busy fawning all over his brother. “Oh, yes,” she trilled. “And you have a new baby, too. It has been years since we’ve seen the other boys. When you return to Braehall, do bring them to Sproule!”

  “Yes, I should,” Wayland agreed. “But Her Grace doesn’t enjoy traveling. Not with the children so young.”

  “It is hard,” Mrs. Biggers said, and Yale wanted to snort in derision. He doubted the woman had ever been more than five miles from Sproule in any direction.

  Then Wayland started for the door and Mrs. Biggers and her husband and all the others hurried after him.

  Yale looked across the room. Samantha had already been forgotten.

 
Fenley had her cape. Yale had out his hand and nodded for the servant to leave them.

  They were alone.

  He crossed the room toward his wife, uncertain of his reception. The cape in his hands was practically threadbare. He would buy her a new one, but not black. He would buy her a bright red one made of the finest wool. Perhaps that would sweeten her temper.

  He placed the black cape over her shoulders. She accepted it without looking at him.

  “We must go,” he said. “I had Fenley pack for us.”

  “Including my mother’s things?”

  “Yes.” He offered his arm to escort her to the waiting coach, but she didn’t take it.

  He waited.

  “I don’t consider us married.” Her eyes flashed with defiance. “Regardless of what happened between us last night and this morning.”

  He had expected such an ultimatum. His wife adhered to strong moral principles and rules. In the short time they’d been together, he’d managed to offend or break every one of them.

  Yale drew in a deep breath and released it slowly before saying, “Sometimes, Samantha, it is not what we think that matters but how other people perceive us. Whether you like it or not, we are married.”

  “I wonder if you even know what the word means, sir.”

  “That question could be asked of any man.”

  She rejected his claim immediately. “My father valued his marriage, and his family.” With a thin smile she added, “Of course, he was completely honest about his intentions from the moment he met my mother.”

  “Yes,” Yale said. “And he died leaving his daughter penniless and alone.”

  He regretted the words the moment they left his lips.

  If he had struck her with his hand, he could not have landed a more fatal blow. Her face paled. Then her anger rose with such force, her voice shook as she said, “I will never forgive you for saying that.”

  “Ah, Sam—”

  “My name is Samantha,” she said, refusing to let him speak. “And you are a stranger to me. What happened between us last night was…was not love or caring or any form of commitment. I shall not make the same mistake twice. Do not expect it!” She turned on her heel and almost ran from the room.