“Yes, it is. It seems to be the only thing that anyone understands.”
Ainsley was suddenly tired of this life—the court, the gossip, dealing in secrets and tittle-tattle. She had always been an outsider looking in, the nobody daughter of a nobody gentleman, hired by the queen for the sake of Ainsley’s mother. Ainsley had never been important enough to be bribed for favors or blackmailed into them; she’d only watched others do so to each other. No one had much noticed Ainsley at all.
Now, as wife of one of the notorious and powerful Mackenzies, heir to the dukedom, Ainsley could be used, or she could be dangerous. She preferred to be dangerous.
“Therefore, I believe that I will remain married to Lord Cameron,” Ainsley finished.
The queen glared at her, but Ainsley saw Victoria looking at her in a new way: not as a sycophant who could be sent on delicate errands, but as a woman to be reckoned with.
“Your poor dear husband will roll in his grave,” Victoria said. “Mr. Douglas was a respectable man.”
“My poor dear husband was quite generous, and I believe he’d want to see me happy.” John had been kind to the end, and Ainsley had always been very, very glad that she’d stood by him.
The queen continued to regard her with cold eyes. “I will pretend that I never heard this outburst. The conversation never took place.” She lifted her needlework from her lap. “If you had not been so rude, Ainsley, I would have told you that your brother has arrived. I’d arranged for him to take you home to wait for your annulment, but now, of course, you may do whatever you wish. We are finished. But there is a saying, my dear, that you might well heed, that those who make their beds must lie in them.”
My, they were full of old adages today. But as long as that bed held Cameron Mackenzie, Ainsley would happily lie there.
Ainsley thrust her embroidery into her work basket. “Patrick is here? May I go?”
“Please do. Send Beatrice to me. I do not believe we shall be seeing you again.”
Ainsley rose and curtseyed, relieved rather than dismayed to be dismissed.
On impulse, she leaned down and kissed the queen’s faded cheek. “I hope you’ll learn to be proud of me, one day,” she said. “And I assure you, your secrets are safe with me.”
Victoria blinked in surprise. Ainsley felt the queen’s gaze on her as she made her way across the room and out of it. The click of the door that a footman closed behind her seemed to signal the end of Ainsley’s old life.
Patrick McBride waited in a corridor not far away, looking uncomfortable and a little drab amidst the splendors of Windsor. Ainsley tossed down her sewing basket and ran the length of the hall to him, arms outstretched. Patrick’s smile as he swept her up was worth every one of the queen’s disapproving words.
“I’m so pleased to see you,” Ainsley said, smiling into his dear face. “I need a cohort in crime, Pat, and you, my so-respectable older brother, will be perfect.”
Chapter 27
The Mackenzies started pouring into Waterbury Grange in April, at about the time Ainsley’s letters stopped coming. Cameron would leave for the meets at Newmarket soon, the racing season once more reaching out to embrace him.
Mac and Isabella arrived first with their two children in tow, Mac taking over with his usual ebullience. Fortunately the house was big enough to absorb them all plus give Mac a place to set up his studio.
Mac had been painting with gusto this past year, in his usual getup of nothing but kilt and painting boots and a gypsy kerchief to protect his hair. He now spent his time fully dressed in the stable yard, doing preliminary sketches of Chance’s Daughter, while his wife kept her robust children from going too close to the horses, an arduous task.
A few days later Ian and Beth and child turned up, accompanied by Daniel, who’d traveled down with them.
In years past when Ian had visited Waterbury, he’d develop a rigid routine, allowing himself only into certain rooms and along certain paths around the unfamiliar house and grounds. He’d be fine if allowed to follow that routine, but the moment anything disrupted it, Ian would fall into confusion and rages, what he called his “muddles.” Only Curry, his valet, had been able to calm Ian back into the comforting routine.
This year, Curry seemed to have been recruited as makeshift nanny. He bounced the ten-month-old Jamie Mackenzie in his arms while Ian assisted Beth from the carriage.
Ian called out that they’d arrived and took his son back from Curry. He slowed his steps for Beth, who was plump with child, as they entered the house. Beth hadn’t been to Waterbury before—last year she’d been pregnant with their first child, and Ian had not wanted her to travel. This year, Beth had insisted.
Cameron greeted them, then stood back with Mac as Isabella hugged Beth and chattered with her about the journey. The two dogs that had accompanied Ian and Beth now swarmed around McNab, the three of them probably also chattering about the journey.
As Ian took Beth’s hand and started to lead her up the stairs, Cameron’s housekeeper blocked their path.
“I’m afraid you’ve been put into a different room this year, my lord,” the housekeeper said. “Her ladyship—Lord Cameron’s ladyship, that is—thought you’d be more comfortable in a bigger chamber. It’s a front one, my lord.” She smiled tightly, familiar with Ian. “It has a very nice view.”
Behind Ian, Curry stopped, looking worried. Beth smiled encouragingly at Ian and squeezed his arm.
Ian didn’t look at the housekeeper but glanced at Cameron, briefly meeting his eyes. “The one at the top of the stairs? I was going to ask you for it, Cam. My usual one will be too small. Ainsley was right to change it. This way, my Beth.”
He glided on up the stairs, baby on one arm and Beth on the other. Curry followed, the look of relief on his Cockney face obvious. The housekeeper relaxed as well, and Mac raised his brows at Cameron.
“Our baby brother has grown up,” Mac said.
He had. Beth had taken the wreck that was Ian and given him a life.
“Ainsley is very perceptive,” Isabella said, leaning on Mac’s shoulder. “I believe I have mentioned that she is excellent at organizing. She’s certainly done wonders with this dusty old place. When is she returning?”
“I couldn’t say.” Cameron’s voice was stiff.
“I’m certain the queen has her running about on some mad errand,” Isabella said. “Ainsley will finish it and sail back here before you know it.” She tapped Cameron’s wrist. “But I will never forgive you for marrying her in that underhanded way, without telling me.”
Cameron thoughts flashed back to Ainsley in Hart’s London parlor, promising in her unwavering voice to honor her husband and worship him with her body. “It was necessary.”
Mac laughed. “Because Ainsley wouldn’t have agreed if Cam had given her time to think about it.” He kissed his wife’s cheek. “It’s the only way to get a woman to marry a Mackenzie.”
“Yes, but one bride in this family should have a sumptuous wedding,” Isabella said. “We could do a second one, as Beth did with Ian.”
Cameron didn’t answer. For now, his bride was elusive, buried with the queen at Windsor while Cameron grew surlier by the day.
Daniel went out with Cameron to the paddocks in the morning to watch the horses run. Cameron liked Daniel there, enjoyed standing next to the solid wall of his son. The idea of Daniel coming to partner with him after university was a good one.
After they watched Chance’s Daughter leave the other horses in the dust yet again, Daniel said. “You’ll have to trust her, Dad.”
“Who, Chance’s Daughter?”
“Very funny. Ye know I mean Ainsley.” Daniel’s voice was even deeper now, his stance more confident. “If Ainsley says she’ll do a thing, she’ll do it.”
The next set of horses came running down the flat, hooves pounding, mud flying. The roar and rush was supposed to make Cameron’s world come alive, but without Ainsley to watch it with him, that world was flat and dul
l.
“Women change their minds at the drop of a feather, son,” he said. “You’ll learn that.”
Daniel gave him a patient look. “She’s not women, Dad. She’s Ainsley.”
He pushed away from the fence and strolled toward the stables, waving at the trainers on the way, but his words lingered.
She’s Ainsley.
The world took on a flush of color. Ainsley would come home. She’d said she would, and the truth of that struck Cameron with force.
He’d never trusted a woman before. Elizabeth had long ago stolen that trust from him, and Cameron had held women at arm’s length ever since. He’d always ended his affairs long before the lady in question had a chance to betray and hurt him, having learned, painfully, that he had to control any liaison he entered.
Then Ainsley had bowled into Cameron’s life and taken over. No, not taken over. She’d become part of him, bonded to his heart. Cameron felt that bond now stretching between them, across the miles to Windsor, or wherever she’d gone by now. That bond would pull him to her, and her to him, and he would never lose her.
A peace stole over him, one Cameron hadn’t felt in . . . Hell, he’d never felt anything like this in his life. He’d come close to it holding his son for the first time, the tiny being he’d vowed to protect with everything he had, but never since.
Cameron raised his gaze to the young man who’d grown from that tiny being, and his heart swelled with pride. Not for anything Cameron had done himself, but for what Daniel had become on his own. A good lad, smart and brave, who loved without resentment, who was as carelessly generous as the rest of the Mackenzies.
She’s Ainsley.
Cameron thought of Ainsley: of her beautiful hair spilling across her body while she slept, of her frank gray gaze that undid his heart, of her laughter that heated his blood. He missed her with brutal sharpness.
When Ainsley returned—and she would return—Cameron would show her how much he’d missed her, every detail of it.
And he’d never let her out of his sight again. Being without her was too damned hard.
When Ainsley told Patrick that part of her scheme involved him accompanying her to a canal boat full of the Roma, he was naturally perplexed.
“Ainsley. Stop.”
Ainsley set down her valise on the towpath of the Kennet and Avon Canal. A long canal boat rested beside them, rocking ever so gently. Children watched them from the deck, as did the adults, one man smoking a long pipe. Angelo had gone below to tell his mother that they’d arrived.
Patrick puffed from the walk from the village a little west of Reading, where the hired coach had left them. Ainsley’s forty-five-year-old brother, though he’d let himself go a bit paunchy, looked so utterly respectable in his dark suit, hat, and walking stick that Ainsley wanted to hug him again. She’d missed him.
Patrick pulled out a handkerchief that had been folded into a perfect square and wiped his brow. “We’ve never discussed what we are to do on this boat.”
“Nothing. It will take us, discreetly, to Bath.”
“A Romany canal boat is discreet?”
“Unexpected, certainly. I need to get to Bath without making a fanfare of it, without anyone knowing we’re coming.”
“Where I will be your cohort in crime?”
“I use the term crime loosely,” Ainsley said. “I’ll tell you all about it on the boat.”
“Ainsley.”
Patrick’s tone turned serious, and Ainsley sucked in a breath. She’d rushed him from his Windsor inn to his hired coach, and then kept up a steady stream of chatter about her life in Waterbury, the horses, Daniel, about redecorating her house, as they rode. Anything to prevent the talk she knew she had to face now.
“Ainsley, you haven’t allowed me to discuss your elopement,” Patrick said.
“I know that. I’m avoiding the scolding that I’ll know you’ll give me.”
“I merely wish you had consulted me about it first. What a shock we had when we received your telegram! My little sister married to a lord. And such a lord.”
“I know. I’m sorry, Patrick, but I had to choose quickly. There wasn’t time to consult you. I knew that eloping would disappoint you, and please believe me when I say that it hurt me to disappoint you. Very much. But Cameron was right when he told me I’d deliberately let myself become a drudge. Because, you see, I thought that, if you and Rona saw how sorry I was, how grateful I was that you stood by me when I was so foolish—and how good I’d be for the rest of my life—maybe you, my brother, would forgive me.” She ran out of breath.
“Ainsley.” Patrick’s gray eyes went wide. “Of course I forgave you. I forgave you years ago. And anyway, there wasn’t anything to forgive. You have such a large heart, of course you’d trust that blackguard in Italy. Why shouldn’t you? It was my fault for being so wrapped up in my own business that I didn’t notice and warn you in time. You should forgive me for not looking after you.”
“But I never blamed you, Patrick. It never ever occurred to me to blame you.”
“Well, I have blamed myself. You were so young and so trusting, and I should have kept a better eye on you.”
Ainsley stopped. She’d had no idea that Patrick had felt that way. Perhaps she’d been so busy with self-castigation that she’d failed to notice her brother doing the same himself.
“My dear Patrick, we can stand here on this towpath and exchange declarations of culpability for hours, but perhaps we should agree to put it behind us. I will simply say that I’ve always been very grateful to you. You stood by me when you didn’t have to.”
“You are my sister. I would never dream of deserting you, or throwing you to the wolves. And you’re avoiding my questions again. This elopement with Lord Cameron Mackenzie—”
“I had to jump the way my heart led me,” Ainsley said.
Patrick wiped his forehead again. “Let me finish, dear girl. At first I suspected that Mackenzie had abducted you, had tricked you into running away with him by pretending to marry you. Her majesty certainly thought so and had her secretary write me her suspicions. I was inclined to investigate. I asked friends in Paris what they thought of the match. They wrote me how happy you were, how positively radiant, how Lord Cameron treated you like a queen.” Patrick chuckled. “Better than a queen treated you, actually.”
Ainsley stifled surprise. Patrick rarely criticized anyone, even obliquely, and especially not the Queen of England.
Patrick shrugged. “Bless her, she’s Hanoverian. Not even a Stuart. I rather agree with Hart Mackenzie that Scotland should be independent, although I’m skeptical at his chances to put it that way.”
Ainsley looked at her brother, her heart full. “Then you forgive me? Or at least understand?”
“I told you, there’s nothing to forgive. You followed your heart, and this time, you were wise enough to make the choice with your head as well. I would like to meet Lord Cameron before I fully make up my mind, but I trust you.” Patrick let out his breath. “Now, what the devil is this crime you want me to help you commit?”
“Not a crime. Merely a little deception.”
Before Patrick could answer, Angelo came out on deck, followed by a diminutive woman dressed in soot black, her head covered with a scarf. She peered from the deck to Patrick and Ainsley with vibrant eyes.
“Well?” she said in a loud, heavily accented voice. “Why are they just standing there? Help them on you lazy louts!”
The man with the pipe sprang to his feet and vaulted over the side to pick up Ainsley’s valise.
“My lady,” Angelo said, teeth flashing in a grin. “And sir. My mother.”
The woman reached for Ainsley as Ainsley stepped across to the deck. “Welcome, my dear. Goodness, your hair is very yellow. It ain’t dyed, is it?”
Patrick gave her a shocked look. “It’s pure Scottish gold, madam.”
“Humph, I thought Scottish gold was whiskey.” Her look softened for Ainsley. “You’re quite beautifu
l, my dear. His lordship has come to his senses at last, I see. Now you come over here and sit down with me. I’ve made a nice space for you to settle while you watch the world float by.”
Patrick stuffed his handkerchief into his pocket as he followed Ainsley and the woman across the deck. The Romany with the pipe carried Ainsley’s and Patrick’s valises below, and Angelo cast off the ropes.
“I hope it doesn’t rock too much,” Patrick said as he sat down, the children eyeing him with curiosity. “You know how deucedly sick I get on boats.”
When Ainsley’s coach stopped, a week later, at Waterbury Grange in Berkshire, the carriage door was wrenched open for her by none other than Hart Mackenzie.
“Your Grace,” Ainsley said in surprise as Hart reached in and swung her to the ground. “What are you doing here?”
“Looking after the family.” The duke nodded at Patrick, who remained in the coach clutching his hat. “Where’s Angelo?”
“Following,” Ainsley said. “Where’s Cam?”
“Snarling at all and sundry.” Hart fixed Ainsley with a sharp stare. “You haven’t written him. Not lately.”
Ainsley reached for her valise. “I couldn’t. First, I’ve been living on a canal boat, and we never stopped near enough to a village where I could mail a letter. Second, I have a surprise for Cameron, and I knew I’d never contain myself if I wrote him. My pen would betray me.”
Hart clearly didn’t believe the last part, but he led her to the house without further admonishment. Patrick, assisted by a footman, climbed down and followed, and servants swarmed to the coach to unload their baggage.
Ainsley broke away from Hart when they reached the house and its wide front hall.
“Cam,” she shouted, dropping her valise. “I’m home.”
She heard a squeal as Isabella ran out of the parlor, arms outstretched. Isabella was nicely round with her pregnancy, so soft to hug. Mac came from the parlor after her, and Beth, also pleased and plump, hurried down the stairs with Ian and Daniel.
The Many Sins of Lord Cameron Page 27
