The Bride Says No (2 page)

“And what sort of man will you love?”

“I don’t know yet,” Aileen said happily. “That is the adventure of it. I know he won’t be like Father. I don’t want a gambler or someone selfish.”

Tara nodded her head in agreement.

“But I know he will love me as completely and passionately as I love him.”

“Will he be handsome?” Tara would put forth such a question. The shiniest bauble always caught her eye.

“Handsome to me. He will also be noble and brave, and very well respected.” Aileen had thought long and hard about this man of her dreams. She knew what she wanted.

“How will you be able to tell amongst the men you meet if you have found the right one or not?”

“Oh, I’ll recognize him,” Aileen answered. “A voice in my head will say,
He’s
the one
, and he shall be.”

“The
one,
” Tara repeated, as if beginning to understand.

“And then I’ll bring my husband to Annefield and we shall take care of you,” Aileen continued with a touch of pride. “There is so much to life we are missing, Tara. But now the door is opening. For both of us.”

“But I shall miss you,” Tara said, the sadness returning.

“You needn’t fear not seeing me. I’ll return soon. You will see. All will be well. We are sisters. Our bond is forged in blood.”

Before Tara could reply, a footstep sounded at the door, followed by a hurried knock. “Lady Aileen,” Mrs. Watson said through the door, “Lord Tay says if I don’t bring you down immediately, he shall leave without you.”

“I will be right there,” Aileen said. She looked to Tara. “I will return. Soon,” she promised.

Tara nodded. Tears were welling in her eyes again, but the fear was gone. “Go, Leenie. I’ll think about you every day. I know you will find love.”

“And someday you will as well,” Aileen said.

Tara shook her head, but Aileen wasn’t going to let her dodge her future. “It may seem overwhelming now, but one day, you will want to do what I’m doing. Even if it means leaving people you care about.” She hugged her sister close. “Please look after Folly for me.”

“I’ll ride that silly mare every day.”

“Thank you. And, Tara, we shall see each other soon.” With those words, Aileen gave her a squeeze, then released her hold and rushed from the room. She knew too well the earl didn’t make idle threats. He would leave without her.

Moments later, with the crack of a driver’s whip and the turn of the coach’s wheels, Aileen was on her way. Tara stood on Annefield’s step, waving as hard as she could. The tears were gone.

Aileen would sometimes remember this moment of departure as the happiest of her life. She’d been full of anticipation. Her intentions were good, her expectations great.

Only later would she realize how naive she’d been that day. How simple.

She had thought all would be wonderful.

Instead, she lost it all.

Annefield
August 26, 1816

I
once believed time was linear, that one event followed another. One action; one consequence. However, now, I sometimes, no, almost always have the sense that everything, all that I know, believe and experience happens in a great swoop of chaotic activity like the tumbling of dice in a cup.

For example, I am here at Annefield, but all too often, my thoughts return to London, to moments best forgotten and, hopefully, forgiven, if it is at all possible.

I can literally see myself sitting in this chair at my desk in the library, marking my journal, but I also sense myself stepping out of the coach for the first time onto Mayfair’s hallowed streets or attending the Countess of Churnley’s ball and being introduced to Geoffrey Hamilton. Dancing with him and feeling my father’s greedy eyes upon us. Ah, yes, it is the past because I realize the portent of such moments now.

When they happened, I was blessedly oblivious.

I experience other occasions as well. They come to me in dreams, in my imaginings, in any unguarded thoughts. I see my mistakes and am powerless to call them back, and yet the question of why I should destroy myself remains. I cannot explain my own actions, because I do not fully understand them.

No, that is a lie. I know too well why I made the decisions I have. I’ve faced my demons. I let them believe I betrayed my vows because I needed to survive. Peter saved my life, for his attention to me spurred Geoff to divorce.

Such maudlin thoughts! Encouraged, no doubt, by the knowledge that Tara marries in three days’ time. I shall not be there. My appearance at the wedding breakfast would be
decidedly
uncomfortable. A divorced woman is not included in polite society, not to say that any society in London is polite.

In truth, it is not terrible to live beyond their approval. I am content in a fashion. I accept.

I wish Tara well. I hope she is happy. I worry as a sister who knows too well the danger of expectations.

And I pray that at some time in my life, I shall find peace in all that has happened and that I can stop dodging the shadows of my past. Or, at the least, time returns to its proper form when there is the here and now and nothing matters beyond this very moment.

A
ileen jabbed the pen back into its place on the inkstand and stared at the words she’d written.

She sounded like a lunatic. If anyone read her journal, they would believe her ready to be locked up, and sometimes she agreed.

Oh, yes, too often she feared she was losing her mind.

She closed the journal and shoved it into the desk drawer. She kept this drawer locked. It contained Annefield’s ledger of household accounts and the precious diary she’d started writing upon her return almost three years ago. She’d arrived and, in the same day, Tara had been swept away by their father to try her own hand at the London Marriage Mart. He’d undoubtedly wished to keep his youngest away from Aileen’s poisonous presence, or at least that was the impression he’d given.

For Aileen, however, life wasn’t terrible in the valley. There were those who ostracized her, but the majority accepted her. London was a good distance away, and what did loyal Scots care for English opinion?

However, the Scots did take pride in Tara’s spectacular success on the Marriage Mart. She was about to wed Blake Stephens, the catch of the season and the duke of Penevey’s illegitimate son. They called him the Bastard, a simple, direct title—although everyone knew that the powerful duke favored this son over his legitimate ones, presumably because the Bastard was rich. Stephens was said to be very clever when it came to investments and had become extremely popular in the way only wealthy, handsome men could be.

“I pray she is happy,” Aileen murmured, closing her eyes. “Please, God, save her from the hell I endured.”

Images rose in Aileen’s mind: Geoff’s shouts, the burst of pain, the anger of society, the moment when another man’s touch gave her hope—

She opened her eyes with a start. Even her pulse had picked up its pace. She stared at the room’s comfortable furniture, torn between fear and desire. She need no longer be afraid. What had happened had been a long time ago.

But what of her deepest yearnings and the craving for affection that were part of every woman’s soul? Those she fought by grounding herself in Annefield’s blessed peace and the daily list of duties that kept her occupied.

And self-pity, her constant companion if she allowed it to linger, could only be staved off by a bit of exercise.

Aileen rose from her chair and left the room, but her thoughts as she walked away were on Tara. Good, sweet Tara.

Out of all that had happened over the last nine years, losing her half sister’s trust and affection had hurt Aileen the most because she knew her own culpability. She’d gone to London in search of love while turning her back on the one person who had loved her most of all. Why, she hadn’t even written Tara over all those years of separation. In the beginning, she’d been too preoccupied with her own life and then, later, too ashamed.

Aileen fetched her gloves and a wide-brimmed straw hat from her room and went downstairs into the front hall.

“Going for your walk, my lady?” Ingold asked. The butler was a huge, hulking man with a thatch of blondish gray hair on his head and a cold manner when he wished it.

“I believe I shall,” she answered.

And after I take my walk, then what? My life is empty.

The cynicism of the thought threw her out the door. She needed to stop this nonsense. It was what it was. A Davidson never complained. That was one thing her father had taught his daughters—

Her thoughts were interrupted by the sight of a lad wearing a misshapen hat pulled low over his eyes boldly striding across the front lawn straight for the front door.

As she pulled on her gloves, Aileen frowned. Something about this boy caught her attention. He seemed familiar . . . but she couldn’t place how, since she was certain she didn’t recognize him.

His clothes were a size too large and had seen better days. The shirt was filthy, and the jacket had tears at the sleeve seams. The boots were so tall they were well over the lad’s knees, but the leather was thin and worn in such a way that the height didn’t hamper his movement.

The lad carried a huge portmanteau that appeared half his size.
That
was made out of good, expensive leather and was out of character with the way the boy dressed.

Perhaps a neighbor was having him deliver something to Annefield?

Aileen knew her neighbors and their servants. This boy was not one of them.

And if he was and she was wrong, the lad should have better sense than to approach the front door. Annefield was one of the premier estates in the Tay Valley, and servants used the side entrance.

Catching sight of Aileen watching him, the boy stopped at the edge of the front drive. He dropped the portmanteau on the ground with the finality of someone who had reached the end of a long journey and could not take a step more. A smile split his face, a smile that made Aileen’s heart stop in its familiarity—

No, it couldn’t be.

“Hello, Leenie,” the boy said. He spread his arms. “I’m home.”

Aileen stared hard, her mind rejecting what her eyes were seeing.

The lad realized her confusion and laughed as he came toward her. “I imagine I’ve surprised you. It has been almost three years. The bag is full of dresses. Who would have thought they could weigh so much? I almost tossed the whole lot a time or two before I reached Annefield. But I would have been sorry, as well you know.”

He was no lad.
He was her sister
.

Dressed as a boy.

In
smelly
clothes. The wind carried a whiff of their odor right to Aileen. And she was more confused than before.

Lady Tara Davidson, feted as the “Helen of London” because of the number of hearts she had broken, would not be strolling around the Scottish countryside carrying her own luggage and wearing clothes bearing someone else’s body odor. From everything Aileen had heard about her, Tara would just not countenance such a thing.

And then Tara solved the matter once and for all by pulling the hat off her head. Her hair had been braided and coiled around her head, creating the odd shape. Now her braid fell past her shoulder in one long, thick rope of honey red hair.

Aileen almost collapsed in shock.

Tara had the grace to blush even as she moved forward to embrace her older sister, but Aileen held her off with a raised hand.

“I believe you are to marry come Saturday?” Aileen said. “In London?”

The smile vanished from Tara’s face. “I don’t believe I shall be there.”

“Does the bridegroom know?” Aileen feared the answer.

Tara’s vivid blue eyes shifted to the row of firs bordering Annefield’s lawn. A rook flew away and her gaze followed it a moment, the line between her brows deepening before she faced Aileen and said, “He should have an idea by now.”

“You
jilted
him? And the earl?” Aileen asked, referring to their father. “Did you tell him?”

Tara’s jaw hardened. “What do you think? Would you have told him?”

“Oh. Dear.” Aileen found it hard to breathe. “Please, Tara, don’t tell me you have run away.”

“Very well, I won’t.”

Aileen didn’t know how to respond.

At her shocked silence, Tara said, “I don’t know why you seem so put out. After all,
you
weren’t invited to attend.”

“That has nothing to do with the matter,” Aileen said. “You are about to jilt the son of one of the most powerful dukes in England—”

“His
illegitimate
son,” Tara emphasized. “There is a difference.”

“Not much since Penevey has recognized him.”

Tara made an impatient sound. “Recognize him? Yes, he did—as his
bastard
. And all the
chats
of society may flatter me to my face, but I know what they say behind my back. I’m Scottish, a gambling fortune hunter’s daughter. They are happy for this marriage because it saves their precious sons from me and their whey-faced daughters from Mr. Stephens. Not that I care. Not anymore.” She started to move into the house, but Aileen blocked her path.

“There will be the devil to pay for this, Tara—and don’t think that because you are
here
you will escape it.”

Tara’s shoulders straightened. A flash of fire came to her eyes, but in the next second, huge, luminous tears filled them. Aileen was caught off guard by the sudden change. “I thought if
anyone
should understand,
you
would,” Tara said. “I can see I was wrong—”

The front door behind Aileen opened. Ingold said, “Lady Aileen, is there a difficulty? Is this lad giving you—”

His voice broke off and his eyes widened as he had a good look at exactly whom Aileen had been speaking with. “Lady Tara?” he said in wonder. Tara had always been his favorite. Aileen was respected, but Tara had always been favored by all the servants at Annefield.

Tara’s tears disappeared. “Yes, it is I, Ingold. I’m home. Home at last.” She bounded forward, moving past Aileen. “I need a bath. These clothes smell terrible. Tell Mrs. Watson to have one prepared for me. Oh, and the bag on the lawn is full of dresses. They must be aired and pressed. I’m heading for the kitchen, I’m famished.”