by Lucy Monroe
Emerson drew himself up. "That is quite impossible. Those ledgers are confidential, sir."
Thea cleared her throat delicately and Emerson shifted his affronted gaze to her. "As acting partner, I will of course oversee Drake's perusal of our books, Mr. Merewether."
She stressed the words "acting partner" and "our" to remind Emerson just who was ultimately in charge in this situation.
He had the grace to blush. "Yes, of course. I'm sorry if I offended you. Miss Selwyn. I have come to think of the company as a family venture, you see. I am very protective of your and Uncle Ashby's interests."
She smiled her understanding. He really seemed like a dear man.
"I should like to take the books with me today. We will return them in the next week or so after I have extracted the information I need for our marriage settlements from them," Drake said.
Emerson frowned. "Surely whatever information you need could be procured here in the offices. We need our ledgers for reference. In fact"—Emerson's frown turned to a smile—"Barton could compile whatever numbers you require and deliver the papers to your town house."
She understood Emerson's unwillingness to let the ledgers from his sight. It was really quite natural, but rather annoying. "I'm afraid Drake is a rather independent and obstinate sort of person. He will not trust the numbers compiled by anyone but himself."
"Thea is correct. I prefer to do my own accounting. My man of business finds my ways quite tiresome as I insist on double-checking all financial transactions for my company."
Emerson's face started to show signs of Uncle Ashby's temper. "I assure you, Barton is above reproach. Any numbers he supplies you with will be accurate to the pence."
Drake smiled and her heart did a small flip at the charm oozing from him. "Nevertheless, as Thea so sweetly put it, I'm rather independent and obstinate. I should like the ledgers."
"Couldn't you at least do your checking here?"
Really, it was a reasonable request and Thea was about to agree when Drake shook his head. All charm had vanished and his face took on that impassive expression she had come to think of as rather dangerous. Standing, he extended his arm to her. She took it without thinking.
Leading her out the door, he spoke over his shoulder. "Have the ledgers brought out to my curricle immediately. Miss Selwyn and I have promised Lady Boyle we will be in attendance for tea."
* * *
Chapter 13
« ^ »
I have discovered an aptitude for business. Ashby wanted to let me invest in the shipping venture, but my funds are limited. I offered to keep his books. At first, he refused, believing such a position would be beyond a lady. I proved him wrong. Now, I keep track of all inventories and accounts, and yesterday I negotiated my first shipload of cargo. It was a most amazing experience—one I look forward to repeating in the future.
July 15, 1801
Journal of Anna Selwyn, Countess of Langley
"Really, Drake. You did not need to be so abrupt with poor Mr. Merewether. I think you offended his dignity."
He flicked the reins, setting the horses in motion. Thea grabbed the side of the curricle as it lurched forward rather quickly. The ledgers, stacked between her and Drake, shifted and she put a restraining hand on them.
"To hell with his dignity. He is your employee and had no business arguing with your fiancé."
"Well, as to that. Do you think it was a good idea to tell him we are engaged? Word is bound to get out."
"Word will get out anyway. Once the ton learns of our close association aboard the Golden Dragon, you will have no choice but to become engaged to me. Like it or not, you have been compromised."
She didn't like the implacable tone of his voice. "That is silly. A few visits to my stateroom surely cannot require marriage."
"We did a lot more than just visit, or had you forgotten?"
Her cheeks heated in embarrassment, but she could not deny the truth. "I remember. The moments I spent with you were the most wonderful of my life. I am not likely to forget them."
He swore savagely. "Then why refuse to marry me? No. Don't answer that. I know why. You think I'll turn into a cruel monster like your father. Has it ever occurred to you that perhaps he wasn't such a monster? That your mother's view of events was skewed by her own feelings and perceptions?"
"You don't understand."
He flicked the reins until the horses were going much faster than the rest of traffic. "No, I don't. If your sainted mother, as Melly is so fond of calling her, were alive, I would have a few things to say to her."
His sudden anger confused her. "You don't mean that. You're angry for some reason, but don't take it out on my mother. She lost more than you could possibly know, and my father is the cause. He deserves my disgust, not your championship."
Drake came within inches of another carriage. She should say something about his neck or nothing driving, but one look at his set features changed her mind.
"How do you know?" he demanded. "Don't you think he at least has the right to tell you his side of the story? Maybe you don't want to hear that your perfect mother might not have been so perfect after all."
Moisture burned Thea's eyes. "You don't know what you are saying."
Drake was forced to slow the horses as they entered the thicker traffic of London proper. "Thea, you have an entire family here in England. People who would love you if you gave them the chance. Are you content to deny them all for the sake of your mother's memory?"
He knew his arguments had as much to do with convincing her to stay in England with him as they did with believing she should reconcile with her family. He would use any means to convince Thea that she belonged in England, with him.
"I don't have to deny them all, just my father."
He sighed at her insistence on that particular point. If she were going to make her permanent residence in England, she had to come to some sort of understanding with her father.
"Don't you think that will make life a trifle awkward for them and for you? What are you going to do? Have Lady Upworth introduce you as her niece, but refuse to tell anyone who your father is? They'll figure it out, you know. I doubt that many of her nephews had their wives abandon them."
"My mother didn't abandon my father. He abandoned her." Thea's outrage fueled his frustration.
There was no doubt that her father had misused her mother, but that didn't mean that the man was a complete ogre. For all she knew, he had mellowed with age—stranger things had happened. He didn't like to see Thea's generous heart torn in pieces by bitterness toward a father she'd never met.
He tried reason one more time. "She took you to the West Indies and hid from him. What do you call that?"
"Survival."
The one word said a great deal. Dread snaked in his gut. Had the man been violent? If so, he certainly understood Thea's certainty that her father was a monster. Drake would not allow her father to threaten her. He would protect her from everything and everyone—excepting himself, of course.
"Thea, was your mother afraid for her life?"
"No." Thea swiped at her eyes and he felt helpless in the face of her distress. "She was afraid he would discover me and take me away. Then she would be left with nothing."
"What do you mean, discover you? You said that she spirited you away after he threatened never to let her see you again."
"No, I said she took me away after he threatened to never let her see her child again."
He wished for the second time that day that they weren't publicly exposed in a carriage. She had more secrets than the War Department.
"Tell me what you mean."
He didn't expect her to acquiesce to his demand, but then when had she ever done what he expected?
"Very well." She sucked on her bottom lip, and he could almost see her mind working on the problem of how much to tell him.
Finally, her words came out in a rush like steam escaping through the safety valve on the Golden Dragon's boile
r.
"My brother was born first. Father stormed into the room and took him away right after my mother gave birth. She pleaded with him, but he ignored her. He didn't care how much he hurt her. I was born a few minutes after he and the wet nurse left Langley Hall. The midwife and Melly agreed to help my mother hide me. She was desperate to keep at least one of her children."
"If she loved your brother so much, how could she leave England and never see him again?" He hated asking the question after everything else he had already said, but he had to know the whole.
"She didn't at first. She tried to see him. Lady Upworth would have my brother to visit and then Mama would come over, but Father discovered what they were doing and put a stop to it. Mama's journal says that he came by one day unexpectedly to harangue her for seeing her son. He almost found me in Mama's arms. That's when she decided that to keep me, she would have to leave England. It was a hard decision and she regretted it many times. But according to Lady Upworth, Father never softened toward Mama and would not have allowed her to see her son."
He took time digesting what she had told him. Thea had a brother, a twin brother. According to her account, she had never even met him. That must be very difficult for someone with her open heart.
"I understand you not wanting to see your father, but what of your brother? Now that you are of age, there is no risk in making yourself known and meeting him."
He had learned to live with the fact that he had half brothers and sisters who knew nothing about him. But he was a man, not a tenderhearted female like Thea.
"I'm not ready."
A memory tugged at his consciousness. "You said your mother made you promise two things. What was the other one?"
She sighed and wiped her cheeks with her gloved fingers. "To give my brother her journals. She wanted him to know that she never stopped loving him or thinking about him."
He was beginning to understand Thea's certainty that her father was beyond redemption. Not only had he torn their family apart, but he had withheld her brother from Thea and hurt her in the process.
"In effect, your mother made you promise to meet your brother."
She must have worried that Thea would never have made the trip to England otherwise. She must have wanted her daughter to return to their homeland.
"I plan to keep my promise, truly. Just not immediately. Everything has been happening so fast, and the most important thing right now is to find the thief and protect Uncle Ashby. But it's true—eventually I will have no choice but to meet my brother."
"You have no choice about becoming engaged, either." Didn't she understand?
The same honor that required her to keep her promise to her mother required him to marry her.
She scowled, her expression no longer one of pain, but of anger. "Of course I have a choice."
"Not if you wish to take your place in Society."
"How many times do I have to tell you that it doesn't matter to me?" Her exasperation with his reasoning was clear in her voice.
"Does your aunt's acceptance among the ton matter to you?"
She took a deep breath and let it out again slowly before asking, "What do you mean?"
He glanced at her. "If she continues to acknowledge you, as you know she will insist on doing, the damage to your reputation will also affect hers."
"That is ridiculous. Our friendship aboard your ship cannot affect my aunt's standing in the ton."
"I realize that you know little of the ways of the ton, but you must accept my greater experience in this matter. I am intimately acquainted with scandal. Your aunt's life will be made very difficult by our association if we are not engaged."
"That's so unfair. I don't even want to be introduced to the ton, and yet if I don't, my aunt will be hurt. If I do and I refuse to become engaged with you, she will suffer. It isn't right." She pulled her lower lip between her teeth and his tolerance snapped.
"Stop that. Every time you take your lip between your teeth, I am reminded how good those lips taste and how much I want to kiss you." And he was bloody tired of driving in an uncomfortable state of arousal.
She immediately let go of her lip. "I … it's an old habit. I'm sorry it disturbs you."
He sighed. "Everything about you disturbs me, Thea."
She cast him a sidelong glance. "I suppose we could pretend to be engaged as long as I am in England. If it will make things better for Lady Upworth, that is."
Drake felt a slow burn of satisfaction. It would not be a pretend engagement, but he wouldn't argue that point now. "Good."
"Still, you should have told me before you said something to Mr. Merewether. I could have ruined our story by denying it in my surprise."
"You are too intelligent to be so easily tripped up. Besides, I had to think on my feet. If I hadn't said that, he would have written a very upsetting letter to his uncle."
She started to bite her lip and then stopped, giving him another sideways glance. "I guess so. I'm surprised he accepted your story, regardless."
"Why is that?" He thought he'd done an excellent job of being convincing.
The truth was like that.
"I can't believe that he accepted the faradiddle about you controlling my share of the company once we were married. Mr. Merewether and I are not totally unknown to each other, though we have never met. We have been corresponding since he took over the London office. He must realize that I would never give up my role in Merewether Shipping—even if I were foolish enough to marry."
Drake disliked the comment about being foolish enough to marry, but understood her other concern. Anyone who knew Thea at all would realize she was not the type to give her company over to her husband's care.
"He believed it because that is what most women of his acquaintance would do."
"Is that what you would expect from your wife?"
Drake sensed the deeper meaning behind her words and hesitated before answering. "I would not expect you to give up all interest in your shipping company, but you must realize that as my wife and the mother of our children, you could not spend your days at Merewether Shipping."
"I could do a great deal of business from our home." She cleared her throat. "I mean to say, your wife could."
"Yes, you could. It pleases my family for me to conduct most of my business that way as well."
"It would not be the usual sort of marriage."
Drawing the horses to a stop in front of his aunt's town house for the second time that day, he formulated his response in his mind. Once he'd secured the reins, he took her chin in his hand and turned her face toward him. "We are not the usual gentleman and lady. We are both different, made that way by the circumstances of our births and upbringing. I don't want to marry a lady who has no interest in her business. I want to marry you. I would only ask that for the sake of our families and children, you be circumspect in your business dealings. There is nothing like the hint of trade to tarnish your standing among the ton."
Her brow furrowed. "Don't you think one must spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about what is and is not acceptable to Society when one lives in England? I can assure you that back on my island I did not worry overmuch about what others would think of my actions."
He grinned. "I have no doubt."
The footman came out to take charge of the curricle. Drake swung down and went around to collect Thea. Once he had her on the ground, he tucked her arm into his and gave instructions for the ledgers to be delivered to his aunt's library. "Shall we tell my aunt our happy news?"
"I suppose." She did not look overjoyed at the prospect. "Will she be very angry with you when you tell her it was all a sham?"
"I won't tell her."
"Oh." She stopped to think. "We could fabricate an argument and add a pretend crying off to our pretend engagement."
He gripped her arm more tightly, wanting to anchor her to himself. "Let's not plan that far into the future."
If he had anything to say about it, their very real
engagement would be followed by an even realer marriage. An unconventional one, perhaps, but real nonetheless.
Thea followed Drake into his aunt's drawing room, still uncertain about the false engagement deception he was set on perpetrating.
She wasn't such a fool that she didn't realize he'd prefer it to be a real one, but she was at a loss as to how to convince him that his honor would not be tarnished by not marrying her. She understood his concern for her aunt, but surely Thea's actions would not have such an impact on her aunt's standing among the ton. Back home on her island, one would never be ostracized simply for being related to an unsavory character.
Not that she was unsavory, but she did seem to have a difficult time adhering to the ways of the Polite World every moment of every day.
"Mama, this is a pleasing surprise."
Thea's thoughts scattered to the four winds at Drake's words. His mother had come to London? She was sure Lady Boyle had told her that Lady Noreen was not expected in Town for the Season. Thea had been disappointed, for she had wanted to meet a lady of the ton with the courage to bear an illegitimate child and raise him as her own.
But now the thought of meeting more of Drake's family gave Thea heart palpitations. What would Lady Noreen do when she heard of the supposed engagement?
She was a duke's daughter; she would want more for her son.
Thea's gaze flew with trepidation to the beautiful, petite woman Drake had spoken to. Lady Noreen shared Drake's dark hair and brown eyes, as well as a feminine version of his perfectly formed features, but she was tiny beside her tall son.
"Pierson." Smiling, Lady Noreen reached her hands out toward him.
He crossed the room with rapid strides and took her hands in his, leaning his big body down so he could kiss her cheek. "It is good to see you."
"I have missed you, darling."
Thea knew that such open affection between members of the ton was not the usual way of things, and she took an instant liking to this woman who had given Drake birth, and had taught him that there were more important things in life than mere societal strictures.
