No Choice but Seduction (42 page)

“Stop and think about that before my fist helps you,” James interrupted. “You do realize that had any of that played out differently, you never would have met and married Roslynn. Then you wouldn’t have two other daughters to be comparing this one to, would you? Judith and Jaime would never have been born, would they?”

Anthony dropped his head back against the wall with a sigh. “I might have overreacted.”

“Might?” James snorted.

“It’s just—why would she even want me for a father at this late date? She’s a young woman of means. There is nothing that I can give her that she can’t give herself.”

“Yes, there is. A family. It would take her an entire lifetime to produce a family the size of the one you’re going to hand her due to a quirk of fate.”

Chapter Forty-Six

T
HE TWO
M
ALORYS
had been gone too long. It wasn’t unreasonable to think they might have forgotten about her. So it wasn’t unreasonable for Katey to risk defying James Malory’s order. Besides, it had been an incredibly eventful day. She was due for a good, long sleep, if she could get out of her mind those hours she’d spent with Boyd
before
the pirates showed up.

But the two men hadn’t actually gone that far off, she found as she tried sneaking out of the cabin unnoticed. They noticed, both turning their heads her way when the door opened, so she innocently inquired, “Is everything all right?”

“Certainly. I was merely contemplating tossing my brother overboard,” James said drily as he let go of Anthony’s jacket and pretended to be merely dusting off his lapels.

“And I was explaining to this arse why he shouldn’t,” Anthony replied cheerfully, and shouldered his way past James to usher Katey back into the cabin.

She sighed as she took her seat again at the dining table. What about her could Anthony be so interested in, that it couldn’t wait until morning? She should just be rude and say she was exhausted. She wasn’t. The day had been too invigorating. But they didn’t know that. Maybe if she faked a yawn…

“Now where were we?” Anthony said.

He didn’t take
his
seat. He was back to pacing, and he didn’t look all that cheerful now, either. That had no doubt been feigned.

“You were about to get to the point,” James prompted him.

James didn’t return to the table, either. He sat sideways on the edge of his desk, just enough to have one leg comfortably dangling. His crossed arms looked rather menacing, though, so Katey took her eyes off him. Anthony ignored him altogether.

“Ah, yes, I was about to ask if you had a happy childhood, despite all that drudgery?”

James groaned.

Katey frowned. “What drudgery? If you mean my chores, I never minded them. It was time I got to spend with my mother, and later, with Grace. Besides, cleaning our house, growing and cooking our food, that was just a part of my life. There was no one else to do it. Everyone in Gardener saw to themselves. I know you might find that appalling. You come from a different way of life. But for us, it was simply normal.”

Anthony winced. “I haven’t thoughtlessly insulted you, have I? That certainly wasn’t—”

“Not at all,” Katey assured him. Then a memory came to her that caused her to chuckle. “It’s funny. Your daughter had exactly the opposite reaction to my chores when I mentioned them in our conversations. She complained she never got to help with any!”

“Judy did?”

“Indeed. You might want to give her her own garden before she gets much older. Children happen to like growing things, at least I did.”

“But—she’d get dirty.”

Katey felt he was teasing with that appalled look on his face at the mention of dirt. She grinned at him. “I know, but playing in the dirt can be fun. It smells good and it makes wonderful mud pies!”

James rolled his eyes. Anthony returned her grin and said, “Can’t recall ever wanting to muck around in the dirt m’self, but I can say without a doubt that our eldest brother would probably agree with you.”

“Ah, yes, the gardener. I enjoyed meeting him and walking through his gardens.”

James practically spit out a laugh over the way she’d referred to Jason. She glanced at James and added, “I know, someone already told me I probably shouldn’t call him that. But he is a gardener, you know. It might just be his hobby as he called it, but I’ve never seen so many beautiful flowers and in so many varieties. Judy warned me I’d be impressed, but seeing Jason’s handiwork firsthand truly amazed me.”

Anthony cleared his throat to draw her attention back to him. “I believe we’ve gotten a bit off topic.”

Katey frowned. “Why so much curiosity about my past?”

“I knew your mother—well.”

“Ah, of course.” Katey smiled, beginning to understand. “She lived close to Haverston before she met my father, and you grew up there, didn’t you?”

“Indeed, though truth to tell, I was full grown and merely home for the holidays before I really got acquainted with her. But I suppose I just wanted to know if you and she had led a normal life in America.”

“Normal for Gardener, yes.”

“That bears some significance?”

She smiled. “It was a very small village of old people with no industry other than a few farms on the outer edges. I was the last child born there, and the few other children left were nowhere close to my age and soon gone. No one ever moved there anymore, other than people looking for a quaint, quiet village to retire in.” She chuckled. “We were definitely quiet. Nothing ever happened of interest. No one ever entertained. The highlight of every day was someone reading aloud from the Danbury newspaper in our shop. Old Hodgkins rode over to the larger town twice a week to buy up a few copies just for that. Gardener was, without a doubt, the most boring place you can imagine.”

“Good God, so you had a horrible childhood?”

“I didn’t say that! It was just boring—for a child. My parents didn’t seem to mind. They had things to keep them busy. Myself, I groaned each day my tutor sent me home. Really, I did. I would have much preferred to stay with him and talk about the world!”

“Why didn’t your parents move somewhere more lively or at least to that bigger town nearby?”

She shrugged. “I heard them talking about it once. Shopkeeping was all my father knew how to do. In Gardener, he never lacked for customers with his store being the only one in the village. In Danbury, or some other larger town, he would have had to compete with already established shops, and with a family to feed, I think he was afraid to try that. After he died, I was hoping my mother would move us, but she jumped feetfirst into running the shop herself. She actually enjoyed it.”

“But your mother had money, didn’t she? Isn’t that what you inherited?”

“Yes, and quite a bit of it, but she refused to touch it herself. It came from her father when he died, and she despised her family for disowning her. She wouldn’t even talk about them. I didn’t even know how many Millards were left until I came to England.”

“They disowned her?”

“You didn’t hear about it back then? It was because she eloped with an American who was in trade, or that’s what she implied.”

James interjected, “And an excellent time to get to the point, Tony—before I die of old age.”

Anthony shot his brother a cold look. “
You
weren’t invited, so why don’t you go to bed.”

“I can’t, dear boy. It’s my bedroom you’re dragging your feet in.” Anthony flushed slightly with that reminder, but James wasn’t finished. “Katey, what my brother—”

James was finished this time. Anthony leapt across the space between them and knocked James backward with enough force that they both tumbled over the other side of the desk to the floor.

Katey shot to her feet. Incredulous, she demanded, “Are you both insane?”

James’s head came up first as he stood back up. “Certainly not.” He gave his brother a hand up.

“Apologies, Katey,” Anthony said as he came back around the desk, running a hand through his hair to straighten it. “Unfortunately, that was nothing out of the ordinary in our family.”

“You mean between us, don’t you, dear boy?” James added with a pointed stare. “You won’t find the elders knocking each other around, so don’t frighten her by implying all Malorys are like you and I.”

“Quite right,” Anthony agreed with an abashed look. “James and I are just more—energetic. Call it brotherly competition if you like.”

Still a bit shaken from their burst of—energy, Katey said, “Having had no siblings of my own, I’m afraid that’s a bit hard to comprehend.”

“Perfectly understandable. Perhaps it would make more sense to know that we’re both avid pugilists. Exercise for us has always consisted of a good round in a sporting ring several times a week.”

“You still do that?”

“She’s not calling us too old to exercise, is she?” James said drily.

Katey blushed despite the grin he offered her to imply he was only teasing.

Anthony sighed in exasperation. “We’ve gone far from the mark again. So let me be blunt for a moment, Katey. You never actually answered my question about a happy childhood, if you had one. Is that significant? There are no painful memories you’d prefer not to discuss?”

She rolled her eyes at him. “If there were, I wouldn’t be discussing them, would I? The fact of the matter is, my childhood wasn’t very memorable, but it wasn’t miserable, either. I was happy enough living with my parents and then, just with my mother after my father died. When I got old enough, I could have left Gardener like all the other young people did as soon as they could, but it never even occurred to me to do so until my mother died. The main thing I didn’t like about my childhood was simply the sheer boredom of it from a child’s perspective. But that
is
why I decided to travel for a few years to see the world, before I consider marriage and children of my own. I was hoping for the excitement I missed as a child, and some adventure. I’ve been finding a little of both.” She grinned.

“Have you ever wished you had a larger family?”

She almost pointed out that wishing about the past was irrelevant, but held her tongue, mainly because she sensed his nervousness over the question. She found that quite odd, but even James seemed tense now, waiting for her reply. What the devil was wrong with these two tonight?

Hesitantly she said, “I am beginning to suspect that you’re leading up to something I may not find palatable. So perhaps as your brother suggested, it’s time to get to the point, Sir Anthony?”

He sighed and took his seat across from her again. “I said I knew your mother, but not just as an acquaintance. I was courting her before she left England, and my intentions were honorable. I wanted to marry her.”

Katey stared at him hard, trying to assimilate that, but it just didn’t make sense. “I don’t understand. You’re an exceptionally handsome man. And—”

“Thank you.”

“—to be frank, my father wasn’t. He wasn’t ugly or anything like that, but between you two, I can’t imagine my mother picking him over you, and yet you’re saying she did? Did you do something that turned her against you? Are we talking about a tragic romance?”