A Stolen Heart (32 page)

Therefore, she was greatly disappointed when their hackney disgorged her and Sebastian in front of her house, and they entered to find that not only her aunt was waiting for them, but also the Countess, Penelope and even the redoubtable Lady Ursula. Alexandra let out a groan when she walked into the drawing room, followed by Sebastian, and saw the group sitting there.

“Alexandra!” Aunt Hortense jumped to her feet, a broad smile of joy spreading over her face. “My darling girl!”

She hurried to Alexandra, laughing and crying all at once, and pulled her against her substantial bosom for a long, hard hug. “I was frantic about you!”

“We all were,” agreed the Countess, who had risen from her seat and followed Aunt Hortense at a slower pace. When at last Aunt Hortense released Alexandra from her embrace, the Countess took her hand and leaned in to press her cheek against Alexandra’s. “It is such a relief to see you alive and well.”

“Thank you. I am very glad to be here, I can tell you.”

The Countess turned to Sebastian. “Thank God you were with her. That is the only thing that kept me from worrying myself into an early grave—or, perhaps, not such an early one, but not a place I wish to be, nevertheless,” she added with a wry smile. “It is good to see you, Sebastian. It would appear that the two of you have had quite an adventure. You must sit and tell us all about it.”

“Yes,” Aunt Hortense agreed. “I’ve already rung for tea. I am sure you must be in need of refreshments.”

Alexandra sat on a chair near Penelope, resigned to not being able to escape for another few minutes. “First I want to hear what happened to the fellow who attacked me.”

“Oh, Bucky and the others took care of him,” Penelope assured her, her eyes shining. “The balloonists tried to hold the man, but he tore away. Bucky—that is, Lord Buckminster—came up just at that minute, though, and he planted the fellow such a facer that he fell to the ground.”

“Penelope, such language!” her mother remarked with a frown. “You know I hate it when you use pugilist cant. I lay it at your brother’s door, but a girl should know better than to use such words in polite company.”

“Yes, Mama.” Penelope subsided, the excitement in her eyes dimming.

“It sounds to me as if Lord Buckminster was quite a hero,” Alexandra said, hoping to revive Penelope, but she offered only a wan smile at Alexandra’s remark.

“I’ve always thought those exhibitions were not the thing,” Lady Ursula announced. “That’s why I never allowed Penelope to attend one before.” She fixed her daughter with a stern gaze and added ominously, “And never again, I must say.”

“I really doubt that the balloons had anything to do with that ruffian attacking me,” Alexandra retorted. “Doubtless he had been following me, waiting for an opportunity. It could have happened right outside the front door, I suppose.”

Lady Ursula looked shocked. “I’ve never heard of such a thing. Why are these people attacking you, that’s what I wonder,” she went on darkly, her tone implying that the attacks were somehow Alexandra’s fault.

“If I knew that, Lady Ursula, I wouldn’t be as worried.”

“I, for one, am certain that it has something to do with who you are,” the Countess said. “If I needed any further proof that you are my granddaughter, that is it.”

“Now, Mother, that doesn’t follow. Just because someone tries to steal her purse or something does not prove that she is
our
Alexandra.”

“It was scarcely a purse snatching, Ursula,” the Countess commented mildly. “Thieves do not try to kidnap you. And while they may climb in windows, they don’t knock people over the head or try to strangle them and take absolutely nothing with them.”

Lady Ursula, for once, looked slightly abashed and lapsed into silence. Aunt Hortense seized the opportunity to ask a question. “What happened to you two? I was afraid you’d been blown out to sea or some such thing. I presume you must have landed.”

“Yes. Quite far from here,” Sebastian replied dryly. “It took us all day to get back to London on the mail coach.”

“The mail coach!” Lady Ursula looked shocked. “Are you serious?”

“Very much so. It was not an experience I care to repeat.”

“We spent the night at a highwayman’s hideout,” Alexandra added, aware of an impish impulse to shock Lady Ursula again.

“What!” The woman’s bulging eyes were ample reward.

Alexandra hid a smile. “A highwayman. He very kindly gave us a meal and a bed—beds.” Color rose in her cheeks at her mistake.

“Yes, and took my purse for his trouble,” Sebastian added, but his words could not divert their attention from Alexandra’s embarrassed face.

“Lord have mercy!” Aunt Hortense exclaimed.

“Indeed.” Lady Ursula raised her brows. “I shouldn’t spread the fact around if I were you. There is already quite enough scandal regarding your little trip.”

“It’s scandalous to be nearly abducted and escape?” Alexandra asked coolly, giving the older woman a level look.

“Probably,” the Countess replied. “In the
ton,
everything is food for scandal. But the real problem, of course, is the fact that you and Sebastian spent two days and a night together, unchaperoned.”

“It was scarcely something we could avoid,” Alexandra protested.

“That doesn’t change the fact of it,” Lady Ursula said flatly. “I am afraid your reputation is in shreds, Miss Ward.” Her voice expressed extreme satisfaction at the idea.

“Don’t be absurd, Ursula,” Sebastian told her, his voice hard. “Miss Ward and I will be married, of course.”

Alexandra’s jaw dropped, and she turned to Sebastian. Her stomach felt as if it had suddenly been tied into a thousand knots. “I beg your pardon?”

Sebastian gritted his teeth. Damn Ursula for bringing the subject up, anyway! He had been unable to say a word to Alexandra about marrying him on the ride home, for they never had a moment alone for private conversation. He cursed himself for not having broached the subject early this morning. Now, because of Ursula’s heavy-handed glee at the scandal they were in, he had had to blurt it in front of everyone, without even asking Alexandra first.

“I said that we will be married,” he replied, meeting Alexandra’s gaze.

“I think you are getting a little ahead of yourself, Lord Thorpe,” Alexandra told him acidly. “There is such a thing as asking for a woman’s hand before one declares that one is marrying her. Or is that not a practice followed in England?”

“Of course it is. But, dammit, I haven’t had a moment alone to talk to you about it. There was always someone there—that portly woman going to visit her daughter, or that couple with the screaming baby, or—”

“You needn’t enumerate them. I am quite aware of our fellow passengers. That hardly excuses your taking it upon yourself to say that we are going to be married.”

“But, Alexandra, dear, you must be,” the Countess put in, her forehead creasing. “Ursula is right. So is Sebastian. You have to marry, or your name will be ruined.”

“As I don’t even live here, I hardly see how that matters.”

“Think of poor Sebastian. He will be considered a cad and a roué if he doesn’t wed you after this.”

Alexandra shot Sebastian a flashing look. “I doubt it will ruin him. I’m
not
marrying him.”

She rose to her feet, her arms rigid at her sides. Sebastian stood so abruptly he almost turned over his chair. He glared at Alexandra, his jaw set in as mulish an expression as hers. “Devil take it! You
will
marry me, my girl.”

Alexandra faced him, her eyes blazing. She felt as if her heart was breaking. How could he tell her she was going to marry him, and only because of a stupid scandal? She was so furious that she had to clench her fists to keep her hands from trembling.

“I wouldn’t marry you if it was the only thing that would save me from hanging!”

Alexandra whirled and strode out of the room, leaving the others staring after her in consternation.

A
LEXANDRA INDULGED IN A GOOD
bout of tears that night and woke the next morning puffy-eyed and headachy. She thought dispiritedly that she had probably thrown her life away with both hands the night before. But what else could she do with Sebastian asking her to marry him for all the wrong reasons? No matter how much she wanted to be with him, she knew that it would be hellish, not heavenly, knowing all the time that he did not love her as she loved him, that he had married her only because it was the gentlemanly thing to do. Moreover, she thought, just to drive her spirits a little lower, he probably would not have done that if she had been just Alexandra Ward, not someone the Countess of Exmoor thought was her granddaughter.

She rang for the maid and dressed listlessly, then went down the hall to check on her mother. Willa Everhart was sitting beside Rhea, embroidering, and she looked up at Alexandra’s entrance and smiled.

“Good day, Miss Ward.”

“Good morning. But you must call me Alexandra.”

Willa smiled again. “All right. Alexandra. And I am Willa.”

“How has she been?” Alexandra walked to the bed and stood looking at her mother, who lay motionless, her eyes closed. Except for the slight rise and fall of her chest beneath the sheet, she might have been dead. A shiver ran through Alexandra at the thought.

“Physically, she is doing as well as can be expected,” Willa said. “The maid and I prop her up and manage to spoon some gruel down her a few times every day. We get her to take a little water the same way. But she is losing weight, of course.”

“Doubtless.” Alexandra leaned against the post of the bed and asked wistfully, “Do you think that she will ever awaken? Will she live like this the rest of her life?”

“I don’t know. The doctor doesn’t seem to, either. He will only say he’s known of some that have awakened and resumed normal lives after days, even weeks and years. But then he’s known those who have died, too. He says to keep turning her to keep away the bedsores and try to feed her and just wait for what happens.”

“Not a very cheerful prognosis, is it?” Alexandra pulled up a chair beside Willa and sat down. “I don’t know if I have thanked you for coming here to help. I am sure I haven’t thanked you enough.”

Color rose in Willa’s pale face. “There’s no need to thank me. I am happy to do it. It pleases the Countess, and that makes almost anything worthwhile.”

“You are very fond of the Countess, aren’t you?”

“Yes, very much. She took me in when I had nowhere else to go. She didn’t have to—I am only a distant cousin to her. But she is the kindest of women. She has fed and clothed and housed me for almost twenty-five years now, and never a word from her of my obligation to her, never an unkindness or a cut.” Tears sparkled in her eyes. “There’s little I wouldn’t do for her. But this is an easy task. I rather enjoy looking after people. I looked after my father for years before he died. He was an invalid. That was one reason I never married—that and my lack of a dowry.” She gave a small self-deprecating smile.

It seemed to Alexandra that Willa’s life had not been easy—penniless, spending her marriageable years taking care of an invalid parent. But she seemed quite content with her lot, even grateful that it had not been worse.

“You must have been quite young when you came to live with the Countess.”

“Twenty-four. It was in 1789.”

“You were with her, then, when her son and his family were killed.”

Willa nodded. “It was a terrible time for her. First her husband died suddenly—it was his heart, they said. She sent for Lord Chilton, but Paris went mad with revolution. The whole family was killed, every one of them.” She cast a quick, embarrassed glance at Alexandra. “I’m sorry. I mean, that is what we all thought then.”

“It’s all right.” Alexandra smiled at her. “I am still not convinced that I am the Countess’s granddaughter.”

“Her ladyship was terribly distraught. Practically all her family lost in one fell swoop.” Willa shook her head. “Of course, there was Lady Ursula. I am sure that the Countess loves her daughter, but, well—the truth be told, I suspect the Countess always loved Lord Chilton best. The Countess took to her bed for weeks when she heard the news, wouldn’t see or talk to anyone. She was inconsolable. It was all I could do to get her to eat. Some nights she would walk the floor hour after hour. I would sit up with her, and she would talk about Chilton and his childhood and—oh, it was a terrible time. Thank God she eventually came out of it all right.”

“I am sure that a good part of that was due to your care.”

“It’s good of you to say so.”

“It’s only the truth.”

Alexandra insisted that Willa go down to eat breakfast and take a break from her duties while she sat with her mother. After Willa had left, Alexandra edged her chair closer to the bed and took her mother’s hand. Rhea’s hand lay flaccid in hers, limp and unresponding. Alexandra talked to Rhea, telling her about their adventures in the balloon and with the highwayman, making it all sound like a great lark. She wondered if her mother could hear anything she said. The doctor seemed to doubt it, but Alexandra thought there was no harm in assuming that she could. She talked to Rhea as much as possible, hoping that some word would reach her mother deep in her sleep and bring her back.