A Proper Mistress (27 page)

The squire threw his arm out and pointed to the doorway. "Well, then take your damn horses and go if you've not come home to reform your disgraceful behavior."

Terrance stiffened, but Theo stepped forward. "We are not all going to go through this again. Father, you know full well that you want to disown him about as much as you wish to cut off your foot. And Terrance, if you turn sullen and walk out, I swear I'll follow you and hound you until you turn and face your responsibilities!"

The squire and Terrance both turned to stare at Theo as if he had broken out in green spots and a tail. Molly gave a silent cheer. Finally, someone in this family talking sense instead of yelling.

Mouth opening and closing, the squire's face reddened, and he sputtered, "And you, you—bringing home a...a...a whatever she is, playing your May games! You may consider yourself no longer part of this family either!"

Theo's mouth thinned, Terrance turned on his father and looked ready to do him physical harm, and Molly's temper snapped. She had had enough.

Stepping into the middle of the three Winslows, she put her hands on her hips and glared at them. They all seemed surprised to have her in the midst of them, almost as if they had forgotten her presence.

"Look at yourselves. Just stop a moment and look! A father throwing his sons away—brothers who'd as soon pummel each other as draw a breath—and all of you, tearing what ought to be a family into no more than ill-feelings that are just hateful. I'm an orphan, and you make me glad of it! For when I came here, I thought this a fine house and those inside it rich. But you live in poverty, the lot of you. For there's more love to be squeezed from sour lemon than from any of you."

The squire started to mutter, but Molly rounded on him before he could say anything, coming up to him and standing before him, her face pushed close to his.

"You—if you want your sons' respect, then show them some. They aren't boys. They aren't lads. They're grown men. And they have feelings that can be hurt—worse by you than by anyone. So isn't it time you stopped feeling sorry for yourself for how you were left alone—for you're not. You've two sons who need and love you."

That drew a snort from Terrance, so she turned on him, her face still hot and her veins singing. He held his ground as she advanced toward him, but his chin dropped and he gave her a sullen look.

"And don't you think yourself better than your father," she said. "You're just like him in that you think only of yourself. Only that's not made you happy, now has it?"

He started to answer, but she cut him off, ruthless and furious still. "Of course it hasn't—happiness isn't about drinking 'till you rot your guts with it, and you won't find it by taking everything and giving nothing. No, you learn fast on the lowest of London's streets that taking leaves a hole inside you that only makes you want to take more—only this life is about giving. Even a beggar in India knows that much!"

Breathing fast now, she turned to stare at Theo. What did she say to him? That it should not matter if she was a prostitute or a cook for a house of them? That what ought to matter was that she loved him.

Yes, that truth was out before her now, stark and bare.

But there was only one hope for it. One faint hope. It was a slim one, and a risk to try this cold dash of truth over their heads, but if they couldn't see that truth…well, that wouldn't be her fault. And maybe she'd be best off with her own eyes open wide.

This was still the hardest thing she had ever done. To do what was right and true—and take this chance and trust.

Oh, why did she have to be born for a reckless life? And a reckless man, she hoped.

Turning around, she glared at the three men, now sulky and silent.

"You're all throwing away the most precious gifts—each other. And maybe that's what you need to do. Maybe you need to feel how empty the world is with no one to love you, or to love. Maybe you'd rather have your hard pride and your cold anger. I'm only a cook in a bawdy house, right enough, but I've nothing but pity for the lot of you!"

Head up, she walked out.

She had to stop at the door for a last glance at Theo. "I always knew I wouldn't do for you." She looked at his family and back to him. "And this won't do for me, either!"

She strode up to her room, threw her clothes into her trunk, and yanked on the bell pull, her stomach churning. No one came to stop her. Theo didn't come after her, not liked she had hoped he might. The hall was empty as a footman carried her trunk to the front door.

She stopped there, the hall quiet around her.

Simpson came forward. "I brought the shooting cart round for you."

She glanced at him, her eyes stinging.
God, don't let the tears spill now, please
, she prayed. She nodded, glanced up the empty stairs and swallowed the hard lump.

"Thanks—-ducks."

He bowed. "A pleasure, Miss Sweet. We'll miss you."

That did for her. She could bear with scorn, with hard words, with anger—she had done that all her life. But she had come to like these people, and even to respect the stiff, proper Simpson. Now, the softening in his glance, the sympathy in his voice, the regret that mirrored her own caught at her.

She tried not to sniffle; tried to keep some dignity and her already faltering hope. But she couldn't do that and meet his stare.

She couldn't say anything as she turned and found her way to the cart. No one protested her leaving. No one came to tell her she'd been right, and to offer apologies or anything else other than one of the footmen who gave her an open umbrella. She hunched under it as rain pelted down. This had to be for the best. And, still, he might see his way past his pride. But she knew better than to hold to fantasies. One had to look ahead in this life.

As the cart moved forward, she did not look back at Winslow Park.

She had not looked back from the ship at India, either.

What did a disowned son do?
Theo wondered. He could ask Terrance he supposed, but just now he didn't want to talk to Terrance. Didn't want to talk to anyone.

From upstairs, he had watched Molly drive away in the shooting cart—a slight figure, a flash of red hair and stripped dress, and then she disappeared into the rain and dimming light.

Should he ride after her? Should he not?

Blazes, but she'd heaped nothing but scorn on them all—and they had deserved it.

Only a cook. He'd give a good deal just now to be only a cook and not damn Winslow.

But he was—or at least he was in name, if not by rights. Or he had been.
Oh, blazes take it all!

Settling back in the straw of his favorite hunter's stall, he nursed a swallow from the bottle of brandy by his side and let it go hot and stinging down his throat.

After watching Molly leave, he had fled the house. With his jacket collar turned up and his head aching and feeling numb inside, he had gone to the stables where the horses didn't ask question or do more than nudge a pocket, looking for a carrot or sliver of apple. He didn't need the brandy he had brought with him for more numbness. No, he was hoping it might instead clear that fog that swirled in his head.

What does a disowned son do?

What did he do about Molly?

George stirred in the stall, snuffled the brandy and turned back to his hay. Theo let out a frustrated breath.

Truth was, it had been something of a relief to hear that she never had sold her body. He had known, in a way, that she wasn't a real harlot—or at least he could tell himself that. But blazes, couldn't she have told him before today? And why the hell did it rankle so much? Why did it still dig into him deep enough to keep him from going after her?

Or was it those last words of hers?—
this won't do for me, either.

He glanced at the brandy and rubbed his thumb across the brown glass. The harsh fumes mixed with the sweet scent of straw.

It wouldn't do for her. Well, she didn't have to settle for a life here. A disowned son might marry a cook—might he not? But which of his friends would welcome him after such a mésalliance?
And how did he take her with him to the gambling hells he'd once thought would support him? Oh, devil take it, she didn't even want him.

And he could see why she wanted quits from this family.

He almost did himself.

Grimly, he smiled, for he half-wished he could blame this all on Terrance. However, Theo knew he had put himself firmly into this disaster. He'd hired her in the first place.

He'd lost his head over her.

The stable door creaked and Theo glanced up, wondering if one of the grooms had seen the light of his lantern and come to check. He saw his father and he started to scramble to his feet.

"Sit down, la—sit down, Theo," the squire said, and Theo sat, a little shocked by the deep lines on his father's face. And even more so when the squire sat down in the straw next to him.

George came over and snuffled the squire's hair, and the squire reached up to pat the gelding's leg.

Not knowing what else to do, Theo offered the brandy.

The squire glanced at it and shook his head. "No, I came to say something to you and that'll only make me forget it."

Theo nodded as if this actually made sense. Was this where his father tossed him from the Winslow lands and told him not to come back? If so, his father seemed remarkably reluctant. And quiet in going about it.

That left Theo uneasy.

"Quite the spitfire, your...your..."

"My cook?" Theo suggested, the words bitter, though he had not intended them to come out so harsh.

The squire glanced at him and frowned. "Your Molly."

"She isn't mine. She has wisely taken herself back to London—or at least Simpson said she'd asked to be driven to the nearest posting house or stage inn." Theo raised the brandy. "To Molly in London, and her happiness."

The squire scowled. "Are you drunk?"

"I wish I were." Theo let out a sigh and met his father's stare. "We put on quite a show for her, did we not?"

Glum, the squire nodded, and he sat straighter. "I'm not used to some slip of a girl shaming me with her words—maybe I ought to be. I have thought of you as my boys—my lads. For too long, it seems. I...I don't think I wanted you grown up and going off to live your own lives."

"So you send us away?"

The squire grumbled and plucked at the straw underneath them. He looked up. "Better to send you than have you walk out. Like your mother did."

Theo sat very still. Had he drunk too much brandy? "My mother?"

Twisting a slip of straw, the squire nodded. "She...well, she didn't die. Not physically, least that I know. But she left me. So I buried an empty box. Told me she couldn't stand my temper. And I...I let my pride hold me, let it keep me from swearing to her that I'd change, and I vowed not to instead. Hard, your Molly called it. It's that and more—unbearably hard. And letting her go—it's been the regret of my life."

Theo stared at his father and tried to take in what had just been said. His mother hadn't died. She'd walked out on all of them. Nearby, George munched his hay, a soft sound. The rain beat on the cobbles in the stable yard and drafts of cold air slipped from the outside with a reminder that the warmth inside came from the horses.

Frowning, Theo finally managed to ask, "So she's alive?"

The squire shook his head. "To my shame—I don't know if she is still. She left me to live with her people, and I...I could not show my face to them. She may be. I never divorced her. Never would, though she wrote me once to say she'd not contest it."

He sat silent a moment, staring at the old hunter who shared the stall with them. "I still miss her."

Theo leaned back against the wood of the stall, comforting and solid behind him, for the rest of his world spun in his mind as if he had drunk the entire bottle of brandy. His mother. Alive. She had left her boys and her husband. Blazes, but life must have been worse than terrible for her to do that.

He glanced at his father, at the ragged lines worn into his face and the droop to his mouth and the hurt clouding his eyes.

What did one say?