A Scarlet Bride (3 page)

This man was as subtle as a snowstorm in July. The urge to slap that arrogant smile off his face was strong, but she resisted. She didn't want or need the attention a slap would surely draw.

She ought to lead him on,
then
give him the cold shoulder just to teach the rake a lesson. But she didn't have time for such games. She had a game of her own to play that certainly didn't include another man breaking her heart.

The music ended and Alexandra came to a halt. "I do believe I've danced quite enough, Mr. Manning."

"Would you care to take a stroll outdoors?" he asked.

"No, thank you." She noticed a host of sidelong glances falling in their direction. "It seems I've created enough of a stir without a saunter in the garden with you."

Connor laughed. "Let them talk. It's something I've come to expect."

"Perhaps, but as you well know, it's different for a woman." Experience was sometimes an unkind teacher, as Alexandra had been the center of gossip before and very likely would again.
But not tonight, and not to ease this man's curiosity.

They reached her aunt's side, and Alexandra turned to Connor. "Thank you for the dance."

He lifted her gloved hand to his lips. Alexandra stiffened as he kissed the back of her hand.

"My pleasure, Mrs. Thurston.
Don't fill up your dance card. I will be back."

"I'm sorry." She smiled an innocent curve to her lips. "My dance card is full," she lied sweetly.

Her dance card was completely empty, which he undoubtedly knew, but she really didn't care. The rake could take his insinuations elsewhere. The only thing she felt he was qualified to train was an ass.

"Maybe another time."
He bowed slightly with his head, turned, and walked away confidently.

No, men hadn't changed in the five years since Gordon had divorced her. If anything, they were bolder than before. But she was no longer the meek, innocent young girl easily deceived by men's devious ways. She was a grown woman now, too wise to submit herself to a man's whims.

Especially a man like Connor Manning.

Connor scooped a handful of dirt, bringing the soil to his nose. The pungent odor of earth filled his nostrils and retrieved memories of his father performing this same ritual. After four generations of
Mannings
, the soil seemed exhausted and lacking in richness. Not unlike the family fortune.

Nate, his overseer, walked up beside him, his boots sinking into the soft red clay. "What do you want to do, Mr. Manning? Do we let this field go fallow?"

Pulling his hat from his head, Connor ran his fingers through his hair. Fallow was a costly word, one he couldn't afford right now. "I need every acre productive, Nate."

"Times are hard, but this land
ain't
going to produce much cotton. It's tired and worn out, just like me."

Connor glanced back toward his family home in the distance. Six wooden columns stood tall across the recessed front gallery where chairs invited family and friends to enjoy the evening breeze with a glass of lemonade. The hipped roof had suffered considerable damage in a hurricane two years ago, and six dormer windows had since been replaced.

The old homestead was full of memories.
His mother singing to him as a child, his parents sitting around the fire, his sister's birth and his mother's subsequent death.
Birth and renewal, death and dying.
For four generations his family had lived and worked on this land. They'd survived the
great war
, the worst hurricane of the century, and boll weevils, but all had taken their toll.

Still, he'd be damned if he was going to be the Manning that lost River Bend to the county.

There had been a time when he had thought he too would raise a family here.
A time when he had felt as worthy as his father.
Those days were gone, stolen by a woman's traitorous kiss and
his own
insane moment of weakness.

Next to him, Nate scratched his
grayblack
head. "We've planted fifty acres, but we'll be lucky to get a single bale of cotton from each."

Shoulders slumped, Connor walked toward the house. "It's not enough, Nate."

Between the workers wanting their share and the bank looking out for its interests, Connor wondered if he'd ever get ahead without selling at least part of River Bend.

So far he'd been able to hold the creditors off, but this year's crop could not fail or he and his sister would find themselves without a roof over their heads.

The thunder of hooves brought his head up just as Suzanne, his
seventeenyearold
sister, and one of his prized stallions jumped the fence and raced toward him across the pasture. Her blond hair streamed wild and free as she laughed and urged the horse to greater speed.

Nate walked up beside Connor and watched the young woman."My Leona says that girl needs a woman around. When you
gonna
get married and settle down?"

Connor glanced at his employee, a frown upon his face.

"Is that the talk in the fields? When am I going to come to my senses and get married?"

Nate shuffled his feet.
"No, sir.
Just
us
old folks who've watched you grow up. We wonder if we're going to get to see your
young'uns
."

Connor shrugged. "Who knows? First I have to have a home to offer a wife."

But Connor doubted he would ever marry, not since Georgiana had tricked him into betraying his best friend had he wanted a permanent entanglement.

"Better make it quick," Nate said. "The Lord could call me home any day now."

Connor grinned. "You'll still be around when I'm ninety."

"Dear Lord, I hope not."

Suzanne pulled her chestnut quarter horse to a stop in front of Connor. His sister's golden hair hung loose, curls tangled, her young face flushed from the ride.

"Hi, Connor," she gasped, trying to catch her breath. Swinging her leg over the horse like a man, she dismounted. With a toss of her curls, she handed the reins to a young man standing nearby, flashing him a brilliant smile.

"Please take my horse to the stable and have him groomed," she told the boy.

"With pleasure, Miss Manning," the gangly youth replied.

Connor watched the young man's chest swell. Dear God, she was already having an effect on men and she was still a child. How was he going to take care of this young girl who was rapidly changing into a woman?

"I don't like you abusing my horses," he scolded, releasing his frustration on his sister.

"Jackson loves to run," she explained. "I didn't think you would mind me giving him some exercise."

"I don't mind you riding the horse. It's the way you ride I find objectionable. You're seventeen and should be making your debut into society. Yet you still act like a child just out of the nursery."

She raised an eyebrow, reminding him of their mother. "I refuse to act dead, like so many of those society women. Men have the freedom to do as they please. Why shouldn't women?"

"They just don't. I didn't make the rules and I don't want my only sister to have the reputation of breaking them."

The standing argument between the siblings always left Connor torn between letting her
be
as free as the wind and correcting her wild ways. But he knew the path ahead of her. It was past time she learned the social graces expected of a gently bred female. But who would teach her? Unfortunately, he knew everything about seducing a lady and nothing about raising one.

"Rules were meant to be broken. Otherwise, why would we have them?" she asked, a bored expression on her childish face.

Nate chuckled, until Connor shot him a sobering glare that silenced the old servant, though his shoulders still shook.

"That's one of the reasons I'm searching for another governess," Connor said.
"One that won't be afraid of your antics.
One that will teach you why it's important not to break the rules."

"I don't need a governess, nor do I want one. I'm too old."

"You need a woman's influence. You need a governess's guidance," he insisted.

"I promise you, she won't stay."

Connor took a deep breath, trying to squelch the irritation his sister evoked. "Get in the house and practice the piano or something ladies do."

"Will that make you feel like you're bringing me up properly?" she challenged him.

The glare he sent her made her scurry toward the house, her young hips swaying.

God, she knew just how to provoke him. Worry creased Connor's forehead as he watched her saunter away. When had she grown up? When had young men started to notice the soft curves of her body? What was he going to do with her?

Nate looked at Connor and smiled. "That girl's the
spittin
' image of your mama. The spunkiness she inherited from your papa, just like you."

"I know, Nate, and it worries me. How do you turn a rebellious
seventeenyearold
into a lady some poor boy will want to marry? Men want a wife who is quiet and gentle, one that's seen and not heard."

The old man walked away shaking his head, mumbling under his breath, "No wonder you
ain't
married."

The image of Alexandra Thurston came to mind. Not exactly the kind of woman he had imagined for a wife; then again, someone like her could definitely warm his bed at night.

Suzanne's offer to forgo the governess was tempting, as the extra money would certainly be welcome. Yet he'd put off her coming out as long as possible, hoping he'd pull the plantation out of its slump.

Without a debut into society and a dowry, Suzanne's chances of making a good match were slim to none. And he had promised their father she would have the best. But how did a man go about explaining the proper rules between a man and a woman when he'd spent so many years ignoring them?

Connor sighed, and the memory of Alexandra descending the stairs the night before came once again to mind. She had the refinement of a lady down to an art, even if society ignored that fact.

***

Alexandra sat in Aunt Clara's parlor, listening to her father lecture her on why she should have returned to New York, instead of Charleston. She sighed. James Halsted III had arrived on Aunt Clara's doorstep early this morning, demanding to see his daughter.

The years of separation had not changed him. His hair was a little grayer, his waist a little thicker,
his
heart still cold and detached.

A chasm the width of an ocean still lay between them, and she had no reason to cross that great divide. He would never concern himself with what she wanted or needed, so she would tolerate his lectures until the day she could support herself. The proceeds from the book she'd just sold and the small inheritance she had received from her Aunt Matilda in England would give her a quiet life.

Through the window, she watched a hummingbird dive at a flower in her aunt's
rose
garden.

"Alexandra, are you listening to me?"

"Yes, Father." She heard the words, the tone of his voice, but refused to acknowledge what he was saying.

"Five years have passed since your divorce. The law will now permit you to remarry. It's time."

"What?" Alexandra asked, drawn back from the garden, totally unprepared for his announcement. As far as she was concerned, marriage was no longer an option. There was no reason to ever remarry, to subject
herself
to a man's dominance again.

"I'm searching for you a new husband," he informed her. "Though I daresay the task will be difficult with your wicked reputation."

Resentment sped through her. "I do not wish to marry again."

Rising to her feet, she rubbed her hands up and down her arms, suddenly chilled. Why did she let her father upset her and disrupt her life?

"Don't be ridiculous," he said. "You are my only child and I want grandchildren, heirs for the bank. You must remarry."

Memories of her childhood flashed through Alexandra's mind. Her father had always been too busy to spend time with her, except when he wanted to present a front to company. The formal, stiff man only saw her as a commodity.

"I am quite capable of making my own decisions," she declared. "I do not wish to marry."

"For God's sake, you are a woman. As your father, it is my responsibility to see you taken care of. You have already shown you are incapable of sound judgment."

Alexandra took a deep breath, trying to calm the anger and hurt her father always evoked. She couldn't refrain from asking, "Have you ever considered that I might have been innocent of Gordon's accusations?"

Her father looked at her as if her mental capacities were of little value. "You were convicted. Your husband divorced you."

All the years of rejection seemed to culminate at that moment, pushing her toward the edge. She wanted to tell her father to take the first train back to New York and never return. "The courts could never be wrong, could they, Father?"