Suzanne Robinson (3 page)

Glancing around the sitting room brimming with dust-catching lace and flounces, Kate sniffed in disgust. To Sophia, the daughter of an English Gentleman, the only proper places for young Ladies were rooms like this, in England.

Ever since Kate could remember, Mama had talked of her English heritage as if it were second only to saintliness. She would tell stories about how she was a Maitland. She would natter on about the Maitland Heritage and Maitland House, near Castle Richfield in Sussex. To Mama, all that was refined and noble was epitomized within the confines of Maitland House. Her brother, his wife, and their daughter Ophelia inhabited a fairy-tale world called Society.

Kate suspected Mama should never have left Society, because not a day went by that she didn’t mourn some aspect of her life that wasn’t at all what Society would require. Sometimes, when Mama was droning on about Maitland House and Society, Papa would look so sad. Once they became rich, Mama’s lament took a new turn. She began insisting that Kate be sent to England, to her brother’s family. Kate resisted, and the battle was joined.

One victory fell quickly to Kate because Papa and she loved to read. Once Timothy gained wealth, he resumed the lessons with his children he’d begun long ago. Robbie and Zachary suffered through them. Kate fell in love with them. She immersed herself in Voltaire, Aristotle, Herodotus, and Euclid. Together she and her father devoured books faster than Robbie gobbled up apple pie. Then Timothy discovered how time-consuming being rich was. Kate watched him struggle under the burden of managing the family wealth and offered to lend a hand. They became business allies, their partnership a natural consequence of their shared interests.

Yet what seemed a sensible solution to their difficulties was anathema to Sophia. Timothy was burdening their daughter with tasks that could strain her delicate female constitution. Kate pointed out that her delicate constitution had survived the Rockies, the deserts, and the goldfields. Mama dismissed this argument with a wave of her lace handkerchief. Kate grew to hate that handkerchief. Every time Mama found something of which to disapprove, the handkerchief was waved like a banner on a battlefield.

Unsteady footfalls beyond Kate’s sitting room door signaled the progress of her great aunt Emeline down the hall for her morning nap. For Kate, breakfast had been another trial, what with Aunt’s light-mindedness and Ophelia and her mother’s tizzies about the ball that night.

She dropped her book on the floor. She must count herself fortunate to have escaped being Ladyfied for so long. If it hadn’t been for Mama discovering her friendship with Patience, she wouldn’t be in England now.

A Fallen Woman, that was what Mama had called Patience. Kate had known the girl for over a year, so she understood that Fallen Woman meant whore. She didn’t care. Patience had saved her from being raped when she’d wandered down the wrong street in San Francisco, and there was nothing that would make Kate give up the girl’s friendship.

Besides, she learned so many interesting things from Patience. Like why men jumped on a person for no reason, and how babies were made, and why men didn’t seem to have any discipline below the waist. In return Kate taught Patience to read and gave her advice on how to save some of the money she earned. But it was the discovery of Patience that lost her the small war she’d been carrying on with her mother for so long.

“Hellfire.”

Kate caught her lower lip between her teeth and
looked around. Good. No one was there to hear. That was another thing she had yet to accustom herself to, the surplus of people who felt obliged to do things for her. More so than in America, the English had people to do for them. There were persons to open doors, persons to take one’s cloak, persons to conduct one hither and yon, persons to help one dress and undress. There was someone to make up fires, someone to fetch water, many someones to prepare and serve meals. No wonder this small country was so crowded.

She should write Mama. She’d promised to do so once a week, but every time she took up her pen, Kate realized how much she missed her mother. Mama might nag and fuss, but the pestering was all due to love. And Kate did enjoy some of the Lady things she’d had to learn, like dancing and music.

If only she weren’t so nervous. She was to go to a ball that night. Cousin Ophelia said it was a disgrace that Kate was almost twenty and hadn’t come out or been to a ball. The affair that night was just the thing to introduce Kate to the intricacies of the dance. Ophelia was adamant that Kate couldn’t possibly be presented during the London season in the spring without a few practice balls to break her in.

And etiquette. How was she to remember the proper forms of address, the rules of precedence? Kate got up from her chair, nearly tripping over her skirt in the process. She lifted the yards of material above her ankles—something she knew she shouldn’t do—and walked to the window. Her room overlooked the front entrance, and she spotted a carriage pulling up. It was one of the prettiest she’d ever seen, all shiny black with polished brass and colorful gold, red, and white armorial bearings on the side. Ophelia would jump out of her corset with excitement at receiving a call from such a noble visitor.

Kate placed her elbows on the windowsill and pressed
her forehead to the glass. She’d allow herself a few minutes looking out the window, then she’d study cousin Ophelia’s list of important people who were to be guests that night.

As she rested her head on the windowpane, Kate saw the occupant of the carriage alight. Her rooms were in the east wing of the house, so she looked down at an angle upon the visitor. From her vantage she could see him clearly, though, for she was only one floor above him. Whoever he was, he must be important, for the butler was out to assist him, and so were two footmen.

The visitor stepped toward the house and removed his hat. The sight of him made her press close to the windowpane and flatten her hands against the glass.

It was impossible to put into words a feeling she’d never before experienced. Kate knew a great many serviceable words. Her collection of words was so large, in fact, it frightened the young men to whom she was introduced. Yet upon seeing this man, she couldn’t call up a single one to help her understand her own reaction.

If he hadn’t removed his hat, she never would have known. But he did, and she saw him and the very air around him suffused with magic. It was impossible for her to say why it was so, but it was. For the first time in her life she wanted to touch a man.

Perhaps the magic was his physical beauty, for indeed there was plenty of it. Glorious black hair. The contrast between his skin and sunlit hair made the black locks brighter than any fair color could ever be. His face was a set of Euclid’s wonderful angles, but his lips curved in a low arc that made Kate purse her own for a reason she couldn’t identify. Before she could do more than take in the fluid movements of his body, he was gone. With him he took the magic.

Kate looked down at her hands. They were clasped together, damp and cold. Without thinking, she raced
from her room and along the hall to the corner of the landing to peep down into the entry hall. She couldn’t see him. He was already being led to a drawing room, but she could hear his voice. Faint as it was, the sound shot arrows of fire and ice through her body. She could feel them strike with each word he spoke. Then a door shut, and she heard no more.

She walked back to her bedroom. Going to one of the armoires, she reached up high and brought down a heavy book. It was full of engravings of the works of Michelangelo and da Vinci. Her cold hands turned the pages, one after the other, until she came to the last. She snapped the book closed. Just as she thought. Those elegant clothes concealed a mighty fine set of muscles, if either artist was at all accurate in his portrayal of the male anatomy.

Still, there was no explanation for her own behavior. She’d seen men of great beauty before. But none of them made the air brighter by coming near. None of them made her skin tingle merely by speaking. It was a wonder; there was no doubt.

As he had threatened to Fulke and Val, that morning Alexis waited on Ophelia Maitland with the intention of offering marriage. The drawing room at Maitland House was bright with sunlight and the sprinklings of Ophelia’s accomplishments. Accomplishments were necessary to young women. They were the epaulets and badges of rank by which a Gentleman could recognize a Lady.

He picked up a piece of intricate embroidery from the settee and tossed it aside. He wandered to the piano where he leafed through works by Chopin and Mozart. Ophelia was indeed accomplished, but what recommended her to Alexis was that she had neither the rank nor the wits to make his past an obstacle to an alliance.

But that wasn’t all that recommended her, he admitted. Though he’d never say as much to Fulke or anyone else, he actually
liked Ophelia. As soon as that thought formed, a burning lump settled in his chest, born of edginess and fear. What if he was in love and didn’t know it? After all, Ophelia, in spite of her pretensions, exuded a lighthearted goodness and humor that gave him hope. He needed hope, and the idea of losing it scared him as nothing else could.

He might as well confess his real reasons for being there, if only in his thoughts. In spite of the distrust with which he protected himself against females who wanted him only for his position or for his appearance, Ophelia’s goodness had drawn him. For if Ophelia was good, and Ophelia loved him, then was he not also good? If she wanted him for himself, he might be able to fight the demons, build a life with Ophelia, and find peace. He might even be able to give his love again.

Who would have thought he’d find redemption in a Maitland? The Maitlands were social athletes. Since their rise from obscurity a few generations ago, they had climbed the social ladder with all the tenacity of mountain goats and the agility of monkeys. They grasped at each rung, each niche and rock of respectability with agile claws and toes.

The Maitlands’ ambitions were well known to the de Granvilles. For almost two centuries the Maitland holdings had sat in the middle of the Richfield domain like a gap in the battlements of an otherwise secure castle. One of Alexis’s ancestors had been convinced by a Maitland to sell the lands. On those lands sat Tower Richfield, the original fortress of the first Baron Richfield. Its loss festered into a canker upon the family breast. Ever after, the de Granville seller had been vilified by his successors.

Year after year the de Granvilles watched the Maitlands scratch off a little more of the mud of plebeian descent while slowly marrying their way into gentility. Alexis didn’t mind having people near him who claimed weavers
and tanners as forebears; he minded like the devil having a hole in his battlements. For over five hundred years the de Granvilles had lived and fought at Richfield, and he considered it his duty and his honor to guard the family heritage.

His family had fought with the Yorkists against the Lancastrians in the War of the Roses. But they’d twisted and wormed their way into the affections of Henry VIII and Elizabeth the Great, and survived Cromwell to reclaim their titles and lands during the Restoration. The place where this fight for greatness started was in the keeping of people who might tear it down to put up a pinchbeck castle of their own in their ceaseless hopping from social rock to crag of rank.

Ophelia, however, had not devoted herself to the family occupation. He detected nothing of the mountain goat in her. It was Alexis who had first sought her out, and he who had pursued the girl. He liked the way she made friends with anyone who seemed out of place. He’d seen her take a plain girl under her protection and turn her into a success during the course of one dinner party. And—since he was being so bloody honest—he might as well admit that if he hadn’t thought he might love her, even the possibilities of obtaining redemption and regaining the Tower wouldn’t have brought him here. Yes, he had hope, for the girl had made it clear over the past year that she loved him.

He was imagining the fury of his mother and Fulke’s wife upon hearing of his offer, when Ophelia was ushered in by her mother. The two looked as if they would burst from the effort to hide their excitement, and it took little inducement to get the mother to leave. The inanities of conversation took up a few minutes, and as he waded through them, Alexis tried not to expose his impatience.

“It is so kind of you to call upon Mother, my lord,” Ophelia said.

“It is my honor,” Alexis said.

“And we look forward to seeing you tonight as well.”

He’d had enough. Slipping from his chair, he crossed the room to the settee and sat beside Ophelia. He paid no attention to her scandalized look. She’d let him come a lot closer on several occasions. Ophelia wasn’t a prig, and he’d become more and more familiar with her over the last weeks. He took her hand and kissed the palm, then pulled back her cuff and brushed his lips across her inner wrist.

Letting his tongue slide over her white flesh, he whispered, “Do you know what I want?”

He silently cursed the idiotic question. He couldn’t believe his courage was failing him at the last moment. He wanted to be poetic.

“Of course I know.” Ophelia was breathing rapidly, and her neck and cheeks were flushed. Pleased by her obvious delight, he prepared to make his declaration, but she chattered on.

“Oh, my lord, this has been my greatest wish, and—and think of it!”

“Mmmm. What I wished to say was—” He stopped, noticing that her gaze was directed at a point over his shoulder.

“Plain Ophelia Maitland and the Marquess of Richfield,” she said. “Why, a marquess ranks above every peer except a duke.”

Alexis glanced down at their joined hands, then looked up and found the girl biting her lip and watching him. He closed his eyes against the apprehension he saw in her face. The small sparrow of hope that had been fluttering inside him caught fire and burned to ashes. Feeling empty except for those ashes, he opened his eyes.

“Agile claws and toes,” he murmured to himself.