Imposter Bride (41 page)

Agnes held the cup in front of her large breasts and
shot a dark glance at Sophie. “Not meaning to sound presumptuous,
your ladyship, but I come as a friend with your best interests in
mind.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I couldn’t rest, your ladyship, knowing what I
know about the Metcalfs and the Hinds. And I simply had to come
when I heard you were here—and so was she.” Agnes nodded toward
Sophie.

Involuntarily, Sophie took a deep breath and threw
back her shoulders. Agnes had never frightened her, but she was
wary of her nonetheless. She had been the object of Agnes’
vitriolic diatribes far too often.

“You mean Sophie?” Lady Auliffe remarked, looking at
her as well.

“Do you know who she is?” Agnes gasped.

“Of course. But how do you know of her?”

“I know her well. My maiden name is Preston.” She
bowed her head slightly. “I was governess to your granddaughter,
God rest her soul.”

“You were my granddaughter’s governess?” Lady
Auliffe regarded her with more interest.

“Yes.”

“But we all thought you had died in the fire!”

“Yes, well, I didn’t, your ladyship.” Agnes nearly
blushed. “I ran off to get married that night.”

“Lucky for you.”

Agnes nodded and leaned forward. “I didn’t come here
to collect the last of my salary or any such thing, I want to
assure you of that. I simply haven’t been able to rest, madam,
since I heard about Sophie Vernet and all the goings on up here. I
couldn’t sleep, I tell you.”

“And why is that?”

“I don’t know what she’s told you, or how she’s
inserted herself into your good graces, but I have to warn you,
madam, that she’s a devious little chit. I don’t care if she hears
me saying it either. She’s lazy and mouthy and devious.”

“My good woman!” Mr. Puckett sputtered, jumping to
his feet.

“Toss her out,” Ian called from his chair.

Agnes turned on Puckett like a vicious little dog.
“Aye! Come to her defense!” Agnes hissed at Puckett, who was a
better target than Ian bundled securely in his chair. “She’s
charmed you, sirrah. Anyone can see that.”

Puckett stepped toward her, his eyes blazing. “She’s
done nothing of the sort!”

“She’s just a maidservant!” Agnes pointed a stubby
finger at Sophie. “You’re just a maidservant, my girl! And don’t
you forget it! All this grand life you’ve been living has gone to
your head. Look at you, standing there in such finery, you little
hussy!”

“Really, Mrs. Lindner!” Lady Auliffe put down her
own teacup. “What Sophie has been in her other life doesn’t concern
us overmuch.”

“It should. She’ll steal you blind,” Agnes
continued. “I know her. She’ll run off with your jewelry!”

“Unlikely.”

“She pretended to be your granddaughter, your
ladyship! She can’t be trusted!”

“Sophie never pretended a thing.”

“What?” Agnes let out an unladylike guffaw.
“Pshaw!”

“Really! And should I hear any further slander of
her, Mrs. Lindner, I shall have to ask you to leave.”

Agnes gaped at her, stunned into silence.

Sophie stared at Lady Auliffe, stunned as well that
the woman would stand up for her with such vehemence.

Lady Auliffe took a sip of tea and then lowered her
cup, as unruffled as if she were entertaining her closest friends.
“I meant this tea to be a special celebration, including toasting
Captain Ramsay’s amazing recovery. In truth, I didn’t expect
company, but—” She shrugged and smiled. “—the more the merrier as
they say, as long as you can promise to be merry, Mrs.
Lindner.”

“Ma’am.” Agnes sat back, chagrined and deflated,
shocked that her words hadn’t produced the expected effect upon the
countess.

“Biscuit, Mr. Puckett?” Lady Auliffe asked, holding
the plate up to him where he still stood, too agitated to sit down
again.

“Thank you, madam.”

“And will you be so kind as to fetch that box on the
sideboard over there. By the vase of flowers?”

Puckett pointed with his biscuit in the proper
direction, Mary nodded, and he set off to do her bidding.

“First, I would like to say how happy I am that Ian
is nearly as good as new.”

“Hear, hear!” Ian raised his cup.

“A real miracle.” Sophie echoed, speaking her first
words since Agnes had burst into the parlor.

“And much to do with the excellent care he received
from you, my dear.” Lady Auliffe smiled at her, and her brown eyes
brimmed with fondness. Sophie felt herself flush. Then she felt
Ian’s hand slip around hers and squeeze it gently.

“Next,” Lady Auliffe continued, holding up a large
sealed scroll. “I have in my hand the deed to Highclyffe, delivered
only this morning by an agent of Lady Metcalf, on behalf of her
recently deceased son.”

Puckett glanced at Ian and reached out for the
scroll.

Lady Auliffe placed it carefully in his hand and
then looked at Ian. “Apparently Edward owed you a gambling debt of
some kind?”

“Yes.”

Sophie saw Ian struggle to retain his composure as
his assistant placed the scroll in his hands. Ian’s black eyes
shone brightly with emotion as he broke the seal and slowly
unrolled the parchment. Sophie watched him read the document, her
heart breaking for joy as proof of his claim to the family home
finally unfurled before him.

Suddenly and spontaneously they all began to clap,
save Agnes Lidner. Even William and a maidservant joined in, while
Ian roughly wiped his eyes with the back of one hand. Then Sophie
reached down and kissed him on the cheek.

“Oh, Ian!” she whispered, her voice brimming with
happiness.

“But that’s not all!” Lady Auliffe held up her hand.
“There’s more!”

Sophie straightened. What could be better than Ian
getting the deed to Highclyffe? This was a happy occasion
indeed.

“Sophie.”

Sophie leveled her gaze upon the older woman, as
Lady Auliffe held out another scroll.

A strange feeling twisted in Sophie’s stomach, but
she couldn’t define it as pleasure or pain. It was as if she had
swallowed a ball of wool and all the fibers were tickling her and
prickling her at the same time. Her unease mounted with every step
she took toward the settee where Mary Auliffe sat.

As if in a dream, she saw her hand reach out for the
roll of paper, grasp it, and raise it upward.

“What is it?” she asked, her voice cracking.

“Open it, my dear.”

Sophie blinked, suddenly feeling faint.

“Go ahead, Sophie, if only to assuage poor Mrs.
Lindner’s curiosity.”

“I hope it’s an official statement from you
forgiving me for my duplicity,” she answered.

“Oh tish!” Lady Auliffe rolled her eyes. “Would you
just open it?”

Carefully, Sophie broke the seal on her own document
and gently unrolled the thick paper. It was a court document with
long strings of gibberish, unfamiliar names, save for her own, a
seal, and three flourishes of signatures and dates at the bottom.
The flowery script swam before her eyes, and in her agitated state,
she could make neither heads nor tails of it.

“What is it, Sophie?” Ian asked, tilting his head
anxiously.

“I don’t know! I’m not sure—”

“It’s an official document, my dear,” Lady Auliffe
rose, her silk dress swishing elegantly. “Making you my legal
heir.”

Sophie stepped back in utter amazement. “Your
what?”

“My heir.”

“That’s rubbish!” Agnes Lidner leapt to her feet
with amazing speed. “That’s absolute rubbish!”

“No, it is not.” Lady Auliffe didn’t so much as look
back at the former governess. Her gaze was fixed upon Sophie’s
face.

“She’s but a maidservant!”

“She is my granddaughter.”

“I mean no offense, madam, but you’re suffering
under a complete misconception!”

“No. It is Sophie who has suffered.”

An eerie chill swept down Sophie’s spine. “What are
you saying?”

“I’m saying that you are my granddaughter. Just as
much as Katherine was.”

“Pardon?”

“You’re as much my blood as Katherine was. Maybe
even more.”

“How can that be?”

“Plain and simple, my dear? Through that fine
institution of adultery. My son fell in love with your mother. She
was a French woman from a neighboring island, apparently from a
highly respectable family. He told me he was going to divorce
Katherine’s mother and marry yours, that he had found true love at
last. But she died giving birth to you. The last letter I got from
your father told of his plans to take you to his sugar cane
plantation. He was confident that he could convince his wife to
take you in and raise you as her own. But he had always misjudged
that woman. She was as bitter and as vindictive as they come. I
should have known better than to believe everything was all right
with you.”

“Your son was my father?”

“Yes.” Lady Auliffe reached out and gently touched
Sophie’s arm.

“What happened to him?”

“Died of apoplexy soon afterward. That’s what they
told me. But if I know Richard, he died of a broken heart. He was
such a sensitive sort.”

“Richard Hinds was my father?”

“Yes.”

“And you knew about me?”

“Yes.”

“Didn’t you know that I was treated as a
servant?”

“I’m afraid not.” Lady Auliffe sighed. “What few
letters I ever received from Katherine’s mother were packs of
lies—saying how Sophie did this and Katherine did that—all lies, I
know that now.”

Sophie stared at the far wall, too stunned to say
anything more. For nineteen years she had been robbed of her
birthright, just as Ian had been. It was truly astounding.

Lady Auliffe sighed again and lightly stroked
Sophie’s shoulder. “You see, Sophie, it is I who must beg
forgiveness of you. I should have known better than to trust the
words of that vile woman. I should have sailed to Santo Domingo and
taken you away long ago. But it was all so complicated. And
Katherine’s mother hated me with a passion.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Sophie murmured. “I
truly don’t know what to say—”

“That’s why I rushed to Scotland when I learned you
were to elope with Edward Metcalf. I just couldn’t let you go
through with it. By the time you left London, I had established who
you were for certain and was waiting for the legal documents to be
drafted before I told you about your real identity. When I got
here, however, it was too late. You had already jumped.”

“Lord God in heaven!” Agnes exclaimed, collapsing
onto the settee and violently fanning herself.

“I’m not an orphan from the streets?” Sophie
murmured in awe.

“Hardly, my dear. And should you have any doubts
about your bloodline—” Lady Auliffe reached for the small box that
Puckett had retrieved for her. She opened it to reveal a framed
painting of a young woman. “—Look at this.”

Sophie glanced down at the painting, shocked to see
her own face looking up at her.

“That was me when I was your age,” Lady Auliffe
remarked. “Amazing, is it not, the likeness?”

“I’m not an imposter—” Sophie continued, feeling as
if she were in a dream.

“You never were an imposter, Sophie. You were always
the heiress everyone thought you were. You are rich beyond
measure.”

Mary held out her arms, and Sophie fell into them,
truly embraced for the first time by a member of her very own
family. She thought her heart would explode with joy.

“Good God!” Ian exclaimed, throwing off his lap
robe. “Does that mean Sophie could have any man in the British
Empire?”

“And beyond. Now that her betrothal is off.” Lady
Auliffe turned to him and arched an eyebrow. “Men will be flocking
to her like pigeons to buttered bread.”

“What if she never gets back to London?”

“What are you saying, young man?”

“What if she’s carried off by a Scottish
savage?”

Sophie blushed and turned his way, leaving the link
of her grandmother’s arm. “Meaning you?”

“Of course I mean me.”

“You’re in no shape to carry off anyone!”

“I’ll find the strength, lass.”

Sophie raised a brow much as her grandmother had
done and gazed at him, tapping the scroll of paper on her left
shoulder, while his dark eyes took her prisoner, as they had
captured her from the very first. She didn’t doubt for a moment
that Ian Ramsay
would
find the strength to carry her off. He
was an amazing man. A very good man. And she wanted no one else but
him.

“Then come and get me,” she teased, knowing he was
still as weak as a baby.

Ian got to his feet, his gaze locked with hers, and
began to walk across the floor to her, his lean legs never
faltering even though she was certain it took every shred of his
strength to travel such a distance. Before he’d gone halfway across
the carpet, she could stand no more of his heroics and scurried to
meet him in the center of the room.

“Ian Ramsay!” she chided, “What do you think you’re
doing? I was only teasing.”

“But I am not.” He took her hands, and she felt
herself melting. “See? I am entirely capable of carrying you
off.”

“You don’t have to prove anything to me,” she
murmured.

“Yes I do. For the rest of my life. That I love you,
Sophie.” He drew her hands to his lips and kissed her fingertips.
“As sure as I am standing here, I love you.”

She looked up at him, her eyes brimming with
love.

“Will you marry me, lass?”

“I will.” Her eyes swam with tears as she saw him
bending down. Somewhere in the distance, she heard a patter of
applause, but it was soon blotted out by the thunder in her ears as
she embraced the man she loved with all her heart.

They had both come a long, long way since the day
he’d discovered her in his coach. They’d found each other as well
as recovered their pasts. And now they could make a future
together, free and clear of the old ways and the old hurts.
Starting today they could both live whole, true lives at
last—imposters no longer.