The girl hesitated, passing her tongue over her lips. Her apprehension was understandable. After all, no girl would want to face her father with the news that her reputation had just been compromised. Jack decided it was a good time for another display of chivalry. “With all due respect,” he said, “I ought to be the one to explain. It’s my office.”
“Not a chance,” the girl cut in before the mother could reply. “This is all your fault, yes, but I have no intention of allowing you to sugarcoat the story to press your suit. I’ll be the one to tell my father what a despicable cad you are!”
She strode past him and started for the door, but she’d done no more than open it and cross the threshold before her mother spoke, causing her to stop and turn in the doorway.
“Linnet? Be sure to tell your father how determined you are to marry Frederick. When I come, I shall be interested to hear his views on that score. Very, very interested.”
Van Hausen, it seemed, cut no ice with either of the girl’s parents, a fact that brightened Jack’s spirits a bit. Without the approval of the girl’s father, Van Hausen would never be able to borrow against his expectations as her future husband and escape his fate.
Miss Holland, he noticed, was frowning, and it was clear her mother’s words puzzled her. “But what objection could Daddy have to Frederick?”
“We can discuss that later. Go. We shall join you and your father in the library shortly, and this matter will be decided.”
“Whatever Daddy’s own opinion, he’ll understand I have to marry someone, and he won’t look more favorably on this man than he would Frederick. Daddy,” she added with a baleful glance at Jack, “doesn’t like fortune hunters any more than I do.”
With that, she marched out of the pagoda and closed the door behind her, leaving him alone with her mother.
Given a choice of which parent to deal with first, Jack supposed Mrs. Holland was the better bargain. After all, they’d at least been introduced. In addition, their few minutes of conversation in the ballroom had made it clear she had a high regard for men with titles, and though his title might be a bit tarnished, he did have one.
“How dare you?” she demanded, her voice and manner seething with outrage. “How dare you compromise my daughter? You will explain yourself at once, Lord Featherstone, or I will have my husband shoot you like a rabid dog.”
He grimaced. Mrs. Holland’s high regard for titled men clearly wasn’t going to be of any help to him right now.
EPHRAIM CORNELIUS HOLLAND might have been born into wealth and privilege, but he was no weakling, a fact Linnet was reminded of a few moments after she began her account of the evening’s events.
“Frederick Van Hausen has asked you to marry him?” he roared, the booming echo of his voice making his daughter wince. “Without my permission?”
Linnet glanced at the door of Prescott Dewey’s library. Reassured that she had indeed closed it after pulling her father in here for this consultation, she attempted to placate her outraged parent.
“I know he should have come to you first,” she began, but she got no further.
“Indeed, he should have,” her father bellowed, his silver-gray brows knitting together to emphasize his disapproval, as if his raised voice wasn’t enough to make the point. “Not that it matters, I suppose.”
With those words, Linnet let out her breath with a sigh of relief. Not that she’d been worried, precisely, but the way her evening had been going gave her cause for some amount of concern, and the manner in which this engagement was coming about was less than exemplary. “I realize that bringing it to you as a fait accompli isn’t the best way of going about it. No doubt you wish to speak to Frederick as soon as possible, but just now he’s rather . . .” She paused for a little cough. “Ahem . . . indisposed. But later, the two of you can discuss the details, and—”
“You misunderstand me, Lin,” her father cut in. “There will be no engagement between you and Van Hausen. I can’t allow it.”
“What?” Linnet blinked, her relief dissolving. Her mother had been right, then. “But why?” she asked, more confounded than ever. “Mother’s opposed, and of course, I know why. But you, Daddy? Why should you be opposed?”
“He’s not good enough for you.”
“Not good enough?” That was so absurd, Linnet almost laughed, but her father’s expression told her this was no laughing matter. “But Frederick is no different from us. I’ve known him all my life. His family is even older than ours, and almost as wealthy. And besides, I thought you liked Frederick.”
“I do like him. Can’t deny it. But he’s still not the man for you, Lin. I can’t give my consent.”
Linnet stared, still not able to quite believe what she was hearing. Daddy wanted her to marry an American. He’d supported her position on this ever since Lord Conrath. “But I don’t understand this at all. What possible objection could you have—”
“I said no, and that’s the end of it.”
In most situations, this sort of uncompromising refusal wouldn’t worry her. Given enough time and enough persistence and tact on her part, she could get around her father’s objections to just about anything. But in this case, she didn’t have time. Mrs. Dewey would never keep silent about what she’d witnessed. The odious woman was probably whispering all the lurid details to various friends in the ballroom at this very moment. By tomorrow afternoon, everyone in Newport would know about it. Any delay in her engagement to Frederick would fuel the gossip about Featherstone and further endanger her reputation.
“But Daddy, you don’t understand,” she choked out, feeling a hint of panic. “I must marry.”
He smiled and took her hand in both of his. “Now don’t you go worrying about your future, Lin. Your mother’s still got her head set on you marrying some Englishman with a title, but we’ve managed to nix that plan so far, haven’t we?”
Linnet was pretty certain her mother’s plan was anything but nixed, thanks to a certain British earl, but when her father winked at her, she couldn’t help a little smile in return. “Poor Mother. If she knew how we’ve plotted against her in that regard. But she won’t give up. Not until I’m married.”
“I agree, but the man you wed won’t be Frederick Van Hausen.” He gave her hand a squeeze. “I want someone far better than that for you, someone who’s good enough to marry you, someone who’s good enough to be allied with our family.”
She frowned, feeling a sudden uneasiness that had nothing to do with her father’s refusal of Frederick and everything to do with his odd choice of words. She gave a little laugh. “Oh, Daddy, you talk as if you already have someone in mind.”
Her father laughed, too. “I never can put anything over on you, Lin,” he said, patting her hand. “Not for long.”
Linnet froze, the implications of her father’s words striking her with a force that left her unable to move or even react. Her uneasiness deepened into dread. It seemed like an eternity before she could bring herself to ask the vital question. “Who are you thinking of, Daddy?” she whispered.
“Davis MacKay.”
“But . . . but . . .” She paused, for the notion was so absurd, she couldn’t even credit it, much less refute it. “But that’s impossible,” she managed at last. “I can’t marry Davis.”
“He’s a good man, Lin.” Ephraim’s voice was pleasant, agreeable, and yet, that very quality seemed to worsen the horrible, sick feeling in her stomach. “With a good character. He’ll make you a fine husband.”
“But I don’t love Davis, and he doesn’t love me.”
“Once the two of you are married, love will follow. No reason to think otherwise.”
“I can give you a very important reason.” She pulled her hand out of her father’s grip. “He’s already in love with Cicely Morton.”
Her father shrugged as if that were of no consequence. “You turn your charms on him for a while, and he’ll forget the Morton girl ever existed.”
“I doubt that. He�
��s been in love with Cicely since we were all playing in sandboxes. He’s always intended to marry her. And from the letters Cicely’s sent me and the way they looked together earlier this evening, their feelings for each other haven’t changed in the year I’ve been away.”
Her father’s expression hardened into implacable lines. “Davis,” Ephraim said, “will do as he’s told.”
Her stomach twisted with dread and something deeper, something she’d never felt near her father before, something a lot like fear. “Told?” she echoed, her voice just above a whisper. “Told by whom, Daddy?”
The ruthlessness faded, then vanished, leaving the face of the benevolent father she recognized, but to Linnet, it was too late. The affection in his expression seemed unreal to her now, like a mask. Her mind flashed back over the past year, to all the ways he’d helped her evade her mother’s plans, particularly during her recent London season, to all the times he’d professed to understand that of course she wanted a husband who loved her and wasn’t after her money, and she realized all his support and assistance had not been for the sake of her happiness but to further some secret ambition of his own. She’d always known her father was ruthless—he couldn’t have turned their respectable family fortune into a vast empire of almost obscene wealth if he didn’t possess that quality—but in her entire life, Linnet had never seen his ruthless ambitions directed at her.
He smiled. “I meant that Davis will appreciate the advantages of an alliance between our families, once his father and I have discussed it with him.”
“Once you’ve bullied him, you mean,” she corrected with asperity, in no mind to sacrifice her happiness—or Davis’s either—for the sake of alliance. “Does Mother know this?” she demanded, remembering again Helen’s complacent reaction to her earlier threat to take matters to her father. “Does she know Davis MacKay is whom you want me to marry?”
“Of course she knows.”
“But she doesn’t agree with your choice.” Even as she spoke, Linnet felt as if she were grasping at straws.
Her father bristled. “It doesn’t matter whether she agrees or not. We had a deal.”
“A deal?” Linnet echoed, her voice rising, her dismay giving way to a renewed sense of outrage. “What sort of deal?”
“Your mother wanted the trip to Europe and she wanted to wind things up in London so you could do their season. I don’t understand why, but even after that snake Conrath, she thinks a British husband would be better for your future, so I agreed to let you have a season there. The deal was that if you met some British lord and fell in love with him, I’d pay over the dowry and not kick up a fuss.”
“While you did everything you could to discourage the possibility. Pretending to be on my side, but all the while, making your own plans for me to come home and marry Davis, without any consideration of his feelings or mine. Oh, Daddy.” Her voice cracked on the last two words, and if she wasn’t already spitting mad at the realization she’d been played between her parents like a pawn, she might have burst into tears.
Her father shifted his weight, looking for the first time a little guilty, but he brushed it off with a shrug of his shoulders. “Don’t make me out to be some sort of domestic tyrant. Ever since the Conrath business, you’ve said you didn’t want a British lord. You said you wanted to marry an American and keep living here in America.”
“Which doesn’t mean you should be choosing my husband for me,” she cried, stunned by how little regard either of her parents seemed to have for her feelings. “Just because Davis MacKay is acceptable to you does not mean he’s acceptable to me. He isn’t. He’s in love with one of my best friends, who also happens to be in love with him, and I wouldn’t dream of tearing them apart. You can put aside any notion of Davis as a son-in-law right now, Daddy. I won’t marry him.”
“Don’t take that defiant tone with me, young lady. I am thinking of your future.”
With those words, Linnet was reminded of the brutal fact that as of right now, both her future and her reputation hung by a thread. This was not a good time to be ruled by anger. She needed her father’s help, and she wouldn’t get it by outright defiance. A lifetime of experience had taught her that.
Linnet took a deep breath and tamped down the chaotic mix of anger and hurt swirling inside her. “Why is Davis MacKay the best choice for my future?” she asked, working to keep her voice calm and reasonable. “Why him and not some other man in our set? Why . . .” She paused, stepping onto the thin ice. “Why Davis rather than Frederick?”
“Frederick’s an investment banker, and his father’s in shipping. Neither of those do anything to help Holland Oil. The MacKays, though, are fully invested in coal, now that Franklin MacKay bought out Kentucky Jubilee Coal. An alliance between our families would enable Franklin and I to control over half the fuel supplies from the Atlantic seaboard to the Midwest.”
“I see,” she murmured, her voice faint even to her own ears, her mind stunned by her father’s mercenary logic. “To you, my marriage is just another business deal.”
“We’d corner the market,” Ephraim went on, so enthused by his own plans that he either hadn’t heard or he’d chosen to ignore her comment. “Everyone, Albert Van Hausen included, would have to dance to our tune. The money to be made is enormous. Think of it, Linnet. Your children will inherit an empire.”
Linnet didn’t care about empires, and she doubted Davis did either. After all, he was intelligent enough to have grasped the advantages marriage to someone like her would bring him, and it hadn’t seemed to dim his love for the poor, but wholly respectable Cicely one bit. Once he heard what had happened to Linnet this evening, Davis would seize on Lord Featherstone’s supposed claim on her affections as the perfect excuse to evade the alliance their fathers had concocted. And she guessed his father wouldn’t retain much enthusiasm for the match either, once the scandal hit the papers.
No, though Ephraim didn’t know it, his candidate for her hand would soon be out of the picture. But Linnet knew she didn’t have the luxury of waiting for the problem to play itself out on the front page of Town Topics. She had to become engaged to Frederick now, tonight, before news of the episode with Featherstone could spread. If that happened, she’d either have to marry the blackguard or face ruin. No, everyone had to be made to see as soon as possible that she had been innocent, Frederick had been honorable, and Lord Featherstone had been the one to behave inappropriately.
“Daddy, something’s happened tonight that you don’t know about, something I’m afraid throws a wrench into your plans.”
With those words, Ephraim’s entrepreneurial enthusiasm dimmed somewhat. He frowned. “What do you mean?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she stared at him, swamped by a sudden feeling of helplessness. How could a girl look into her father’s face and tell him she was facing shame and ruin?
“Lin?” He took her by the shoulders, his frown deepening, his blue eyes so like hers scanning her face. “What haven’t you told me?”
Linnet swallowed hard, mustered her courage, and started at the beginning. By the time she’d reached the part about being alone with Frederick in the pagoda, he had let go of her and was pacing the library. By the time she told of Featherstone’s unexpected arrival, he was biting his thumbnail, and by the time she got to the impending approach of her mother and Mrs. Dewey, she knew his shrewd, businesslike brain was appreciating the possible consequences and coming up with stories to offer the papers. But Featherstone’s marriage proposal must not have figured in Ephraim’s chesslike calculations, for news of it stopped him in his tracks.
“But I thought you said you don’t even know this man.”
“I don’t. I’d seen him in the ballroom, that was all. Mother pointed him out to me, but I never spoke to him. And when I went down to the pagoda, I never dreamed—”
“My God, Lin.” Her father sighed and raked a hand through his silver hair. “My God, do you know what you’ve done?”
“
I didn’t do anything,” she flared. “Why does everyone always blame the woman in circumstances like these?”
“Maybe because the woman in question put herself in these circumstances by sneaking off to meet with a cad.”
Those words, coming from the man she’d always adored, felt like a slap across the face, but Linnet strove to maintain her dignity. “Frederick is not the cad in this. His intentions were honorable.”
“Honorable?” her father echoed in disbelief. “That’s not what I’d call it.”
“He was there to propose marriage.”
“This Lord Featherstone had the same intention, apparently. Would you call him honorable, too?”
“Of course not.”
“Then what’s the difference?”
“Featherstone didn’t just propose. He—” She stopped and gave a grimace. “It’s worse than that, I’m afraid.”
“Tell me the rest. There is nothing you tell me,” he added when she hesitated, “that could be worse than what I’m imagining.”
“He kissed me.”
“Kissed you?” Ephraim roared, and Linnet cast another alarmed glance at the closed door.
“Sssh. Daddy, keep your voice down. Things are bad enough already. If someone overhears—”
“I’ll kill him,” her father muttered between clenched teeth. “I’ll kill that British, fortune-hunting son of a bitch.”
Linnet might have been warmed by that show of paternal outrage but for the suspicion that his anger wasn’t solely on her behalf. “Killing Featherstone won’t save my reputation. Mrs. Dewey heard his proposal and saw what he did. No doubt she’s telling everyone in the ballroom all about it right now. The one thing that will stop the scandal is an announcement of my engagement, followed as soon as possible by my wedding.”
“You’re right, of course.” Her father stepped around her. “Which means there’s no time to lose.”
“Where are you going?” Linnet turned, watching as he strode toward the door. “What do you intend to do?”
“I’m going to find Franklin MacKay and tell him what’s happened before he hears it from someone else. You and Davis will have to become engaged right away.”
Catch a Falling Heiress: An American Heiress in London Page 6
