The Bachelor's Bargain (24 page)

“Lady de Winter,” Anne said quickly, “your role has been anything but small. I shall never forget that you preferred my father to the parish before anyone ever dreamed the ensuing events might lead me to such a station in life as this.”

“Quite true.” The elderly lady’s face folded into lines of pleasure. “Such happy, happy events.”

Ruel studied Anne, wondering if she would be able to maintain her composure in front of her mother. She appeared ready to throw herself into the woman’s arms and confess the entire contrivance. A dire event indeed, were it to occur.

Moments before entering the drawing room with Anne that afternoon, Ruel had reminded her that the baroness was a formidable force in the handmade lace industry of the Midlands, and that she would oppose his scheme. She had directed her employees in smuggling ventures undertaken with great derring-do. These had included exporting her contraband wares to France in coffins, their lifeless contents luxuriantly swathed like lacy Egyptian mummies. The baroness had even sent dogs wrapped in lace across the forested border from Belgium into France, where the smuggled wares were removed and sold to the aristocracy. Lady de Winter’s coffers boasted the rich results of her success.

With fervor, he had warned Anne not to mention his own plans for smuggling lace-making machinery into France. Further, he had cautioned her that the impression she made on the baroness—more than on any other person in Society— would count toward his success or failure. No matter that her own mother would be in the room, Anne was not to drop for a second her facade of true love for the marquess.

“You may recall,” Anne was saying now, “it was you, Lady de Winter, who sent a letter of recommendation to Trenton House on my behalf. Without your backing, I should never have earned the friendship of Mrs. Locke and her two dear sisters. Nor would I then have traveled to Slocombe House, where I met the Duke of Marston and his charming . . . gallant . . . generous son.”

Ruel let out a breath of relief and took one of Anne’s hands in his. “Indeed, we are eternally grateful to you, Lady de Winter. My marriage to this beautiful woman has made me the happiest of men.”

“And you, Anne . . . Lady Blackthorne,” Mrs. Webster asked softly. “Are you happy?”

“My goodness . . . well, of course.”

She tried to smile as she looked into her mother’s brown eyes, a mirror of her own. At the sight, Ruel knew another rush of alarm. Clearly his wife was a terrible liar, and her every emotion was written plainly on her face.

“Your daughter and I have a great deal in common, Mrs. Webster,” he spoke up quickly. “Though it is true we come from different stations in life, we immediately discovered threads of similarity in our interests and avocations. Did we not, my dear?”

“Yes,” she fumbled. “Of course.”

“Really?” Mrs. Webster was staring at her daughter. “I cannot imagine that. What sorts of things do you have in common?”

When Anne failed to respond, Ruel filled in. “We are both fond of the out-of-doors. Anne has told me of the quaint prospect from her window in Nottingham. Hedgehogs scurrying through the knapweed. Wood pigeons and blue tits in the hawthorn tree. Curly moss on that . . . that . . .”

“On that gray stone. You know the one, Mother?”

“Near the oak tree?”

“The very one!” Ruel said with a triumphant grin. “The gray stone near the oak tree.”

Mrs. Webster laughed in relief. “I almost feel as if you have been there, Lord Blackthorne.”

“As do I. Your daughter has such a way with words.”

“And what else?” Anne’s mother asked. Ruel shifted in his chair. Did the woman’s eyes appear to narrow as she questioned him? “Do tell us the other things you enjoy in common.”

Ruel frantically searched his mind. “Food,” he blurted out. “We have similar culinary likes and dislikes. Neither of us can bear eels.”

“Eels?”

“And . . . and two lumps of sugar in our tea. We both like that, though Anne will not drink coffee, and I never go without it in the morning. She prefers blue, and I like green, but what of that? They are only colors, are they not?”

Mrs. Webster stared at her daughter. “You both like the out-of-doors and despise eels. Anne, have you made a marriage on nothing more substantial than this?”

“Not only those things, Mother.” She squeezed Ruel’s hand. “My darling husband and I both adore . . .”

“The Bible,” he said.

“The Bible!” The baroness dropped her spoon. “Lord Blackthorne?”

“I have become an avid reader.”

“He can quote entire passages,” Anne put in.

Ruel looked up with what he hoped was a humble expression. “I flatter myself, I have become quite the scholar.”

“I am happy to know that.” Mrs. Webster stirred her tea. “Anne’s father will be more than pleased when I write to him. My husband has been most . . . most distressed at the turn of events.”

“Distressed? Mrs. Webster, my wife is a marchioness, a ranking of no little power, wealth, prestige. What better circumstance could you and your husband wish upon your daughter?”

“We are grateful, of course, for your assistance in all our affairs. But you must understand that our daughter’s happiness is of utmost importance. Our Anne is . . . well, Anne is special.” Mrs. Webster lifted her chin in exactly the manner of her daughter. “Lord Blackthorne, if I may be so bold as to ask . . . do you know anything of my daughter’s talents in the design and making of lace?”

“Anne is a genius. I am deeply in awe of her skill and artistry.”

“Is that so?”

“Indeed. You might like to know that I carry a bit of her work with me at all times.” Ruel slipped his hand into his pocket and drew out the panel of lace Anne had hoped to sell to his brother. “Can you see the family crest in the center? My wife designed this as a gift for our wedding.”

Anne sucked in a breath as he turned the lace this way and that. The delicate scrap shivered as she reached for it. “My dear husband, may I see that?”

He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and tucked the lace back into his pocket. “Anne is always thinking how she might rework it. But I consider this lace a masterpiece, and one cannot improve on perfection.”

“How lovely,” the baroness said, beaming. “How very sentimental and charming of you, Lord Blackthorne.”

“I hope you will not try to keep Anne from her dreams,” Mrs. Webster said softly, “as you keep her from that lace. You do share Anne’s dreams, do you not?”

“Some of my dreams have changed, Mama.” Anne removed her hand from Ruel’s and leaned toward her mother. “Things are very different for me now. You must try to understand.”

“But you always had so many dreams—a head filled with them! You dreamed of a lace school of your own. You wanted to teach others your patterns and your techniques. You spoke so often of marrying a man you could love forever, as I love your father. You wanted to live with him in a small stone house with a fireplace where you could sit and make your lace. Dear Anne, have you given up those dreams for grand palaces and ornate furniture?”

“Oh, Mama, I—”

“And what of children, Anne? Has that hope changed, too? Do you no longer ache for little ones dancing across the hillsides, playing in the primroses, and picking pails of blackberries? You wanted them to run in bare feet . . . swim in a farm pond . . . stand under a thatched roof in the rain . . .”

Mrs. Webster wiped her eyes. Her voice was a throaty whisper when she spoke again. “Oh, Anne, did you give it all up? Did you make this marriage . . . for the sake of your father?”

“Nonsense!” the baroness pronounced. “Lady Blackthorne can have anything she likes. As her husband said, she is a marchioness now and one day she will be a duchess. What woman would want barefoot children and lace schools when she can have silk slippers and private tutors?”

“Anne did.”

“Mama, please try to understand. I am very, very happy with Lord Blackthorne. I admire my husband so much. Our future is . . . is . . .”

“Bright and wonderful.” Ruel took her arm and pulled her back until he had her securely tucked against him. “We shall have handfuls of children, and they may all run as barefoot as they like. Dear Mrs. Webster, please be assured of my undying devotion to your daughter and all her dreams.”

“Anne?” the woman asked, her eyes on her daughter.

“My wife’s happiness is my entire focus,” Ruel said. Concerned that the tea party would end up with both Webster women dissolved in tears and all his plans exposed before the baroness, Ruel rose. He kept Anne’s arm pressed firmly under his as he gestured at the table. “Would you like another cup of tea, Mrs. Webster?”

Sniffling, Anne’s mother gathered up her reticule, stood, and shook out her skirts. “Thank you so much, my lord. I must be getting home.”

“Indeed,” the baroness added, rising. “Mrs. Webster’s furnishings arrived yesterday morning, and things are at sixes and sevens.”

“We do appreciate the house, Lord Blackthorne,” Anne’s mother said, “and all your efforts on behalf of our dear daughter.”

After interminable farewells, the baroness and Mrs. Webster were seen from the drawing room by a waiting footman. The moment the door shut behind them, Anne flung herself at Ruel.

“Give me my lace this instant, you beast!”

Twelve

Anne reached for Ruel’s pocket. “I want my lace, and you have no right to it. Give it to me!”

He grabbed her wrists and braced his feet to hold her back. “And have you racing back to Nottingham so you can buy a little stone house and marry some farmer who will give you lots of barefoot children? Not a chance.”

“What do you care how I live?” She lunged at him, barely missing his face with her nails. “Your little ruse is never going to work! The baroness saw through you instantly. The Bible!”

“Eels!” he scoffed, pushing her down onto the settee.

“Hedgehogs in the knapweed.”

“Stop fighting me!”

“Give me my lace!”

“Never. What else do I have to hold you?”

“You have
me
. I am your prisoner! Bound to do as you tell me, or you will throw my family to the dogs and let my father be executed or sent away on a convict ship.”

“Bound to do as I tell you? But you are failing miserably at that! You cannot bring yourself even to pretend to like me.” He pressed her down into the cushions as he mocked her voice. “‘I am very, very happy with Lord Blackthorne.’ You might as well have told her I am torturing you on the rack.”

“You are!”

“How?” he exploded, straightening and setting his hands at his hips. “Any other woman would be ecstatic to be married to a marquess—to have countless properties, the prospect of Seasons in London and winters in the country, the finest gowns from the best seamstresses, shoes and jewels and scores of bonnets. What do you want?”

Her brown eyes darkened, but she said nothing.

“Do you want stone houses?” he demanded in frustration. “I have stone houses enough for ten wives. This is a stone house, blast it! Slocombe is a stone house. You can have them both. They are yours. You want to make lace? I shall import two thousand bales of silk thread to keep you and fifty lace schools busy for a hundred years. Why can you not be happy? What do you want?”

“What do you care if I am happy or not?”

“I care. I need you, Anne.” He caught himself, aware he had said far more than he meant . . . more than he should. He took a chair across from her. “I need your help. And if you are miserable, you are likely to go racing back to Nottingham or blurting my plans to Lady de Winter. You are important to the success of this entire venture. You are . . . you are an ingredient in the recipe. A cog in the wheel, so to speak. Why is it so difficult to pretend to care for me?”

“Because I do not know you.”

“This again? What do you want—a recitation? I loathe tongue, I like the color green—”

“Those things are not you. Any number of men might recite the same litany.” Her eyes searched his face. “How am I to go on pretending to adore you when it is clear to everyone that we share nothing of the heart? The things that matter in a marriage are not a taste for the same foods or an affinity for the same colors. What counts is a common purpose in life, shared dreams and hopes, a united faith in God.”

“That is romantic nonsense, my dear lady. My parents have been married for forty-two years, and they share few interests beyond entertaining acquaintances and playing whist. They have no common purpose other than getting through life in the most comfortable fashion possible. As to shared dreams and hopes . . . I cannot think they have spoken together long enough at one time to address the subject.”

“Do they love each other?”

He paused for a moment, pondering. “What difference does it make? Love has nothing to do with the reality of marriage.”

“Does it not?” Her expression softened. “My parents taught me by example that when two people are anchored in Christ, and when they sacrificially place their love for each other above all worldly concerns, they do far more than get through life in the most comfortable fashion possible. They have a deep and abiding love, an unending enchantment, a bond that nothing can sever.”

Ruel looked into Anne’s depthless eyes as she spoke, and he knew she believed completely in what she said. She had witnessed such true love. She possessed utter faith in the reality of such love. And she had committed herself to sharing that love someday with a man.