The Bachelor's Bargain

by Catherine Palmer

  She began to walk about the bedroom, exercising her leg. Then she began to explore the corridors. In the third week, she asked to be taken to the garden. Walker volunteered to escort her, and Prudence insisted on attending Anne as well. They made their way down countless flights of stairs, through two drawing rooms, and finally out a pair of tall glass-paned doors onto a paved terrace. Anne took a deep breath of the fresh spring air and looked around her.

  “I am alive, Miss Watson,” she said softly.

  “Yes, you are, Lady Blackthorne.” The golden-haired young woman never flinched at calling her former maid by this new title, but it annoyed Anne to no end. “I must tell you the truth. I never thought you would live to walk outside again.”

  “Nor did I.” Thankful for life but confused at the turn it had taken, she took the arm of the tall Indian for support. “You saved me, Mr. Walker, and I am grateful. At the same time, I cannot think how I am to go on.”

  “Breathe air, drink water, sleep at night, find work for your hands. Life cannot be so difficult for the wife of a marquess, can it?”

  She sighed. “That is just the problem.”

  As her need for laudanum had eased during the past three weeks, Anne could no longer deny that she had, indeed, married the marquess. She was now the Marchioness of Blackthorne. Kitchenmaids dipped curtsies when she passed them, and housemaids scurried to tend her before she even requested help. Mrs. Davies, the housekeeper, assigned Anne a lady’s maid of her own, and she was bathed, dressed, and perfumed in a manner befitting the aristocracy to which she now belonged.

  Anne could hardly keep up with the changes. Not only did the household staff wait on her hand and foot, but seamstresses traveled from London to measure her, milliners came to fit her with bonnets and hats, and shoemakers arrived to design slippers and boots. Prudence Watson considered this turn of events the most delightful experience of her life, and she came out of her gloominess and anxiety altogether. She and Mrs. Davies spent every afternoon instructing Anne on the manners and etiquette befitting a marchioness. Even Mr. Errand came in once or twice to give his new mistress charts of the Chouteau family’s ancestry and to explain everyone’s titles and how she was to address them.

  Her meals could have fed the entire Webster family in Nottingham, who had learned to make do on dark bread, butter, shriveled potatoes, and strong tea. At breakfast Anne faced veal-and-ham pies, mackerel, dried haddock, mutton chops, broiled sheep’s kidneys, sausages, bacon, poached eggs, toast, marmalade, butter, and fresh fruit. At luncheon she met with hashed meats, bread, cheese, biscuits, and puddings. At dinner she encountered oxtail soup, crimped salmon, croquettes of chicken, mutton cutlets, roast filet of veal, boiled capon, lobster salad, raspberry jam tartlets, and plum pudding. No wonder the duchess’s middle had expanded and the duke puffed when he climbed the stairs.

  Since her wedding day, Anne had seen neither of those esteemed noble relations, nor had she laid eyes on the marquess or his brother. In fact, her world continued to be oddly dreamlike, as though she had stepped behind a green baize curtain in a dark corridor and into another existence. Now she could not remember how to get back.

  “I feel lost,” she said softly. “I do not know where to turn.”

  “You have been handed the whole world, my lady,” Prudence told her. “You remind me of my dear sister Sarah. You know that when her husband and our father died, she was left with a title and a fortune for which she had never been properly prepared. While I urged her to use the money to purchase a lovely country house, you remember what she chose to do with all that money.”

  Anne smiled. “Yes, I remember it well. She believed that God wished her to give away her fortune.”

  Prudence sighed. “Can you imagine? She sailed off to the Orient and did her very best to bankrupt herself by funding orphanages and schools for blind girls. Everyone thought her quite mad. But of course, you were working at Trenton House when she returned, and you are well familiar with the astonishing events that led to her marriage to Mr. Charles Locke. Oh, I do miss them both!”

  “I long for my family, as well.”

  “But you can do anything you like now, my lady. You can go anywhere. See anyone. What do you want?”

  “Only my family. I have no idea what has become of my father.” She touched the white linen of her friend’s sleeve. “The marquess never returned my lace, did he?”

  “You do not need that scrap of lace,” Prudence said. “As his wife, you have all the money you like. Why not send a letter to your mother on the mail coach? In the desk in your bedroom are enough pens, ink, and paper to write a hundred books if you like. Or why not dispatch a footman to inquire at the rectory in Nottingham? You could have your mother, sisters, and brother transported to Tiverton and put up in a good house.”

  “You say I have money, Prudence. Where is it? Am I to knock on the duke’s library door and ask him for a thousand pounds? Am I to go into the duchess’s bedroom and rifle through her bags?”

  “Inquire of Mr. Errand how you are to get at your fortune. He certainly knows everything else you are meant to do.”

  Anne tugged her shawl more closely around her shoulders. She might be the Marchioness of Blackthorne, but she still felt like Anne Webster. The thought of demanding anything of the formidable butler sent a knot into her stomach.

  If, as Prudence claimed, she could do anything she liked, she wanted to go home. In Nottingham the long hedgerows would be in full bloom—cow parsley, hawthorn, and hogweed dancing with white blossoms. Violets and yellow primroses shyly showing their faces. Ferns beginning to unfurl their green fronds. Kestrels and wood pigeons soaring on cool spring breezes as farmers turned over the rich soil.

  In contrast to the wild exuberance of her beloved Midlands, the Slocombe garden was crisscrossed by narrow brick paths, twelve-foot walls covered in ivy, and hedges pruned into sharp boxes or perfect orbs. Roses had been forced over metal arches; daffodils marched in straight, even rows. They looked as confined as she felt.

  “I should like to go home,” she declared, almost to herself.

  Walker stopped in the path. Turning to Anne, he gazed down at her. “You are home, Lady Blackthorne. This England, this Devon, this patch of soil near the sea, is your home. It is my home. Forces more powerful than you and I have made it so. Nothing can change that.”

  “This is not a home, Mr. Walker. It is a prison.”

  “No, it is only a place. Not so different from any other. If you do not learn to accept it as your home, you will live with anger and regret. You will have no hope. Your faith in God will grow weak.”

  “My faith in God.” Anne hung her head. “I fear in my recent behavior I have given little evidence of my surrender to Christ. I decided that I must pay for my father’s defense. I made the lace panel. I entered Sir Alexander’s rooms with the purpose of selling my lace. Of course I prayed to God, as I always do. But did I ask His will? Did I submit myself to His leading?”

  “Oh, Anne, you are the most faithful woman I know!” Prudence cried, forgetting her friend’s elevated status. “You always think of God first. You have taught me how to pray, and your reading of Scripture puts my own study to shame.”

  “I did not seek God’s will in the matter of my father,” Anne confessed. “I wanted to free him, and I devised a plan to accomplish that end. Perhaps he is meant to be in prison. From a prison cell, St. Paul led many men to Christ and wrote several of the Epistles we treasure so dearly.”

  “But your father faces a death penalty, Anne! I cannot believe God would wish that upon His humble servant. No, indeed, you were right to try everything in your power to assist him.”

  Anne pursed her lips, thinking of the chaos she had created by choosing to follow her own desires. “I did not seek God when I agreed to marry the marquess. Now it is done, and whatever plan God did have for my life is ruined. And meanwhile I must reflect on my wrongdoings from a prison of my own device.”

  “Maybe one day you will go hom
e,” Walker said. “God can do anything.”

  Anne read the truth in the tall man’s dark eyes. During her recovery, as she sat making lace by the window, he had told her about the land of his birth: America. He made it sound wild and beautiful and free. She had heard the longing in his voice, and she knew her own echoed it.

  In silence, they walked on down the path. Stopping at a large gate, Anne peered up through the bars at the huge, gray-stone house with its parapets, its countless chimneys, its many-paned windows and heavy iron-and-oak doors. Home? No wonder the marquess had been eager to escape the place.

  They had just begun to walk again when Anne glimpsed a man in the grove that edged one side of the garden. He was moving their way, and she felt a sudden fear. She turned around, took Prudence’s arm for support, and retreated down the path. But the man, near enough to see them, called out.

  “Walker!”

  “It is the marquess, Anne,” Prudence whispered, clutching her friend’s arm. “Oh, dear!”

  “Blackthorne.” The Indian lifted a hand as the nobleman strode onto the path and approached them. “Where have you been keeping yourself?”

  “London, mostly. Good morning, Walker, Lady Black-thorne, Miss Watson.” He took off his tall black hat and bowed. “Out for a stroll, are you? Very good. I was told I should find you here.”

  Anne’s legs had turned to wooden boards, and her feet might as well have been nailed to the ground. It was one thing to adjust to her new social status and come to grips with its effect on her life. It was another thing to meet the Marquess of Blackthorne face-to-face and realize he was her husband.

  Husband.

  She could hardly force breath into her lungs. Her heartbeat hammered in her ears like an infantry drum. Husband! Husbands mean beds and babies and . . . oh, help!

  Unable to speak a word, she stared at the marquess. He was saying something to Walker about the weather. His black hair curled at the tops of his ears and lay in a ruffle against his high, stiff collar. Beneath his calf-length greatcoat, his shoulders looked enormous. And how prodigiously tall and strong he was!

  Mortified, Anne clutched her shawl at her throat. He had said he meant to make use of her. She had thought his statement referred to her lace. It never occurred to her that he had any other purpose in mind. She had expected herself to die and be free of him. But now . . . now!

  “And your injury, my lady?” he said, turning to her. “Has Walker healed you, as I expected he would?”

  Anne had no choice but to look straight into his gray eyes. His dark brows lifted a little in inquiry, and one corner of his mouth turned up. He leaned toward her, waiting for her reply like a cat toying with its prey.

  “I am well,” she managed, horribly aware that her voice sounded like a mouse’s.

  “Capital. Nothing could cheer me more. Then will you do me the honor of accompanying me into the arboretum for a brief tête-à-tête?” He glanced at the other two. “You do not mind, do you, Walker? Miss Watson?”

  Prudence glanced at Anne, wide green eyes clearly convey- ing her panic. She did not want to leave her friend, but what could be done but obey the request of a marquess? “Of course, my lord,” Prudence said meekly.

  The Indian tipped his head. “I shall return to my smithy.”

  “No, wait for me in the library, please. There is a fine prospect from the south windows to entertain you. I shall not be long, and I have a great deal to tell you.”

  Without waiting for his friend’s answer, the marquess took Anne’s hand, tucked it around the inside of his elbow, and set off toward the tree-filled park near the path. Anne glanced back to see Prudence staring at her, white-faced with trepidation, as she was led away by Walker.

  “London is abuzz with news of our wedding,” the marquess began when he had walked his wife through the gate into the arboretum. Trees of every species in England filled the walled grove, their shadows darkening the sunlit grass. “Miss Pickworth writes of little else. Her readers are desperate for information. Because this infamous creature chooses to write under a pseudonym, she cannot request an interview with you, but editors at The Tattler have been frantically sending me letters in the vain hope that I may address the issue.”

  “Miss Pickworth, whoever she may be, ought to keep her nose in her own affairs.”

  “Ah, but what fun is that for Society’s gossipmongers? No, indeed, you and I are quite the scandal of the moment.”

  “I have never been a scandal,” Anne said firmly.

  “You had better accustom yourself to it. A minister’s daughter snaring a marquess . . . it is deliciously appalling. The predators can hardly wait to get their talons into you. Errand assures me he and Mrs. Davies have trained you well, but you will have to rely on your wits when you enter the lair of Society.”

  “I have no plan to go to London, Lord Blackthorne.”

  “No? What do you plan?” He stopped walking and looked down at her.

  “I plan to get my lace back from you, Lord Blackthorne,” she said and held out one hand. “You made me a promise.”

  He took her hand, turned it over, and kissed it. “You made me a promise, my dear lady. To love, honor, and obey . . . until death do us part.”

  Anne snatched her hand away. “I was drugged, and you knew it! I believed I was going to die. Do not tell me you mean to continue this charade. Give me my lace, sir, and let me go back to Nottingham where I belong. I have had more than my fill of roasted pheasant, bowing servants, and ivied walls.”

  “Good, then you cannot object to embarking on a tour of pleasure. London first, then Belgium and France. We shall stay in all the best houses, dance at the most elegant balls, and eat and drink ourselves into oblivion. You shall have a new gown every day and the latest hats—”

  “I have more gowns than I can possibly wear already. And I do not want new hats, sir. I was happy enough with my straw bonnet.”

  “You were not.” He leaned close and took her chin. “You were trying to sell lace to my brother. You wanted more money than the laceman would give you.”

  Anne clamped her mouth shut. Vile man! He was a rogue.

  “You, my dear wife, are enterprising, visionary, and ambitious. You see curly hair where others see foggy windows. You weave silk threads with the skill of a spider. You managed to marry yourself off to a marquess. Do not tell me you are content with a straw bonnet and a dustcloth.”

  “I am meant to be a maid. That is all.” She knotted her hands into fists. “I shall not be played with, sir. I shall not be made sport of by you. I only want . . . I want . . . ”

  “What is it you want, Anne Chouteau, Marchioness of Blackthorne? Tell me. What are your dreams?”

  Anne turned her head away and stared into the top branches of a giant oak tree. Light green leaves rustled in the cool air. What did she want? Her old dreams had grown as tangled as the tree’s budding branches. To sell her lace . . . free her father . . . to marry . . . to start a lace school . . . to have children . . .

  “I want to do God’s will,” she said.

  “God’s will? And what is that, pray tell?”

  She swallowed. “I confess, I am not certain. But I do know that despite all your great wealth and prestige and standing in Society, you are powerless to make me happy.”

  “I shall wager you are dead wrong there.” He caught her elbow and turned her toward him. “I would wager my entire fortune that I can make you happy . . . very happy. But then, you are not a gambler, are you? No cards or dice for my little saint who seeks only God’s will to make her happy. Tell me, wife, do you intend to read the Bible every night before we retire to our bed?”

  Anne gulped down a bubble of air. His fingers on her arm were warm and firm. His dark hair fell in a tumble of curls over his brow. The tendons in his neck bunched, and the small muscle at the side of his jaw flickered as he stared at her.

  For an instant, she was captured by the moment—aware of the man’s scent, entranced by the contrast between his
black hair and the blue sky behind him, trapped in his gray eyes, bewitched by his mouth. For an instant, she forgot her stolen lace and her imprisoned father and her desire to do God’s will. For an instant, she imagined she was melting into this man, enfolded in his strength and pressed against his beating heart. For an instant . . . and then she remembered.

  “Stop.” The word barely escaped her trembling lips. “Do not mock me.”

  “Never. I always tell the truth, and I always see the truth. Do not believe you can fool me with the façade you have built around yourself—minister’s daughter, lady’s maid, faithful Bible reader, common lace stitcher. From the moment we met, I knew you.”

  “You know nothing of me.”

  “No?” He slid his fingers down her arm and lifted her hand. Tugging away her glove, he regarded her with a confident smile. He dropped the glove into the grass and laced his fingers through hers. “I know your hands, my lady. Yours are fingers that can weave magic from silk thread. Magic and mystery. I understand how few can work such wonders. In the past three weeks I have been to the lace schools at Honiton, I have spoken with Mr. Heathcoat the lacemaker, and I have watched women bent over their lace pillows. You were quite right in your boast that day in my brother’s bedroom. Few can equal the skill with which you work lace; fewer still can prick patterns in parchment with your expertise. None . . . none I saw in my journeys could design with such inspiration as you.”

  “You are a demon with your bewitching words.”

  “I know your hands,” he went on, as if she had not spoken, “and I know your mouth. Your words made a beggar believe she was a duchess. Your words cowed the vicar of Tiverton. Your words charmed and delighted my father. The duke simply cannot stop talking about you.”

  “That is not true.”

  “Indeed, it is.” He drew his finger across her lips. “My lady, I know the magic of your mouth.”

  Anne gasped at the intimate touch. But how could she back away? She belonged to him now. He was her husband. Worse, she found she could not keep her eyes from his.