Fool for Love (Montana Romance) (23 page)

Amelia studied her for a moment, so gentle and free for a woman in her position, before noticing that Delilah was staring at her.

“Sarah’s ma died of a fever when she was eight,” Delilah explained as though the young woman wasn’t in the room with them.  “Her father was a drunk and disappeared when she was fourteen.  She made a living for herself the best way she knew how, did what she had to do.”

“Uh… I… Oh,” Amelia fumbled.  Her hands shook, so she painted with shorter strokes.  She stole another peek at Sarah.

“She’s a sweetheart and keeps herself clean and doesn’t indulge in strong drink.  She’s got a couple of regular clients who are good to her and she helps out at the saloon when she can.  She’s a good girl, so Paul Sutcliffe, who owns the saloon, is real protective of her.”

“I… I see.”  Amelia’s skin prickled.  How could Delilah discuss something so dangerous in the open.

“My contract is up in November,” Sarah added, happy as could be.  “I told Mr. Sutcliffe that I would keep working at the saloon, cleaning and serving and stuff but not entertaining, as long as he pays me a fair wage.”

“And I said I intend to hold him to that deal if he makes it and to tell every one of his patrons that he waters down his whiskey if he doesn’t keep up his end of the bargain,” Delilah added.  She smiled at Amelia, so slick and knowing that Amelia couldn’t hold her gaze. 

“We look after each other in the Ladies’ Auxiliary,” Delilah went on.  “No matter what it is anyone else out there tells you we do.  When women stand together, there ain’t no one out there that can stand against us.”

“Oh, I see.”  Amelia hid her flushed cheeks by crossing to the table to dip her brush in the paint can.  She wondered what her mother would have to say about Mrs. Delilah Reynolds.

“From what Eric tells me, London is a damn-sight different than Cold Springs,” Delilah made conversation.

“It’s quite different,” Amelia replied.  Astoundingly different.

She crossed back to resume painting.  The afternoon sun streaming into the room was warm.  Between that and the paint fumes her head was a shade too light to be comfortable.

“Who are your people, honey?” Delilah asked.  “That accent makes you sound like you’re the queen’s niece or something.”

“Ooo!  Are you?” Sarah squealed.

“No, no, no!”  Amelia blushed.  It was so hard not to like the woman, in spite of who she was.  “Although father always used to say that he was second cousins to Robert Cecil.”

“Huh?”  Sarah scratched her head, dripping paint across her nose.

“He’s the prime minister of England, honey,” Delilah filled her in.

Amelia was as surprised that Delilah would know that as she was mortified to have made a snob of herself.  “So father said.  But to be quite frank, not much of what he said could be believed.”

Delilah’s all-knowing expression returned.  “I take it he’s gone to his great reward then?”

Amelia hesitated, loathe to think what reward was waiting for him.  “Yes.”

“And your mother?  Any siblings?”

Amelia held her breath, staring hard at the wall she was painting.  She could evade, hide the truth.  She could even lie.  But lying had never come easily to her, particularly when faced with someone she would have staked her life on already knowing the truth.

“Sarah, honey, you’ve put more paint on yourself than you have on that wall,” Delilah told the young woman, a distinct twitch to her lips.  “Why don’t you go clean yourself up a bit.”

“Yes, Mrs. Reynolds,” Sarah beamed, returning her paintbrush to the table then spinning toward the door.

“And see if you can find us a nip of tea while you’re at it.”

“Yes, Mrs. Reynolds.”

Sarah sent Amelia one last wholesome smile before fluttering out of the room.

Delilah followed her and closed the door behind her with a distinct tap.

A thick silence followed.  Amelia’s face burned.  She put all of her energy into painting.  Delilah’s footsteps clicked closer behind her.

“Look, honey, I’m not one to beat around the bush,” she said.

“Oh?”  Amelia’s voice trembled.  She lowered her paintbrush.

“Uh-huh.”

Amelia turned wary eyes to meet Delilah’s.

“I like Eric,” Delilah went on.  “I’ve always liked him.  I’ve always said that there are just four men in this town with any sense to rub together, and Eric’s one of them.”

“Yes, of course,” Amelia agreed.

“Michael West is another.”

“Yes, he is.”

“And if there’s one thing Michael West has taught me, it’s to ask questions before you open your arms to a new friend.”

Amelia was certain the room dipped somehow.  Her head swam with more than just heat and paint fumes.

“Is that so?”  She swallowed, fiddling with the handle of her paintbrush.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Delilah went on.  “I love Charlie like she’s my own daughter.  Who wouldn’t?  She’s a spitfire and exactly what Michael needed to walk into his life.  But she came in carrying twice her weight in secrets and it didn’t do anybody any good in the long run.”

“But … things worked out between them.”  Amelia squirmed.  “They’re about to have a baby.  Anyone can see they’re very much in love.”

“Honey, you can always tell when someone is very much in love, even when they try to pretend that they’re not.”

Delilah’s eyes were penetrating to the point of being unbearable.  Amelia felt naked under their perceptiveness.

“Yes, I suppose that’s true.”

“It is absolutely true.”

Delilah motioned for Amelia to follow her to one of the room’s open windows.  Amelia put down her paintbrush and joined her to sit on the unpainted window ledge.

“So tell me about your family,” Delilah asked.

Amelia took a deep breath.  The balmy breeze blowing in from the meadow gave her courage.

“I have a mother.”  She rushed to spill what couldn’t be contained.  “A mother and two sisters, Eve and Olivia.  They live in … in the East End.”

“Do tell?”  Delilah crossed her arms and leaned back against the window frame.

“Yes,” Amelia scrambled for a way to save the situation.  “They….”

What could she say?  They haunted the theaters?  They used her father’s connections in the basest of ways?  They sold themselves for the right to buy a silk dress?  That something visceral in
her burned to be one of them?

“They keep themselves busy.”

“I see.”  Delilah nodded.

“My father gambled and drank away all of our money,” Amelia dropped her gaze and went on.  “We lost our country house first, then our townhome, and after that the creditors came knocking.  My father … chose the coward’s way out.  The police found his body, a bullet through his brain, in a back alley.”

“I’m sorry,” Delilah said, laying a hand on Amelia’s shoulder.  “So what caused a cousin of the prime minister who has such a pretty accent to take a position as a governess in a tradesman’s house?”

Amelia took a breath, stomach roiling as she reached the moment of truth.

“My mother also took the easy way out, although not with Sarah’s grace.  It was a way I suspect was already familiar to her.  She said it was in order to pay the bills and to continue to enjoy what she called the finer things in life, things she couldn’t live without.  She coerced my sisters into that life with her.”

“But not you?” Delilah asked.  Her voice h
ad dropped to a motherly alto.

Amelia shook her head, forced herself to meet Delilah’s eyes.  “I had too much pride, or so I thought.  Not all of my father’s friends were predatory.  I found gainful employment with Mr. Hamilton, if not in Mayfair then close enough.  I considered myself lucky.”

“And that’s where Eric found you,” Delilah filled in the details for herself.

“Yes.  Eric is….”  She hesitated.  The ever-present well of emotion that she had lost all control of threatened to choke her words off entirely.  “Eric is the most generous man I’ve ever met.”

“You won’t find me disagreeing with you,” Delilah said.

“He rescued me from a … a terrible situation.”

“Did he now?”

Amelia’s heart quivered on the edge of a precipice.  “I was dismissed,” she admitted, weighing her words carefully.

“What did you do to warrant that?”

Amelia pursed her lips, wet them as she searched for the right words.  “I was dismissed for causing a scene at a ball that the Hamilton’s were hosting.”

“You don’t seem like the sort who would cause a scene at all.”

“I ….”  She took a deep breath.  “I called out a gentleman, my … my lover, for getting me with child and leaving me flat.”

The sum total of Delilah’s reaction was to arch one fine eyebrow.

“I take it this lover was not Eric.”

Amelia shook her head, lowering her eyes to stare at a ladybug on the windowsill.

There was a long pause before Delilah said, “So you were dismissed as governess and Eric offered to, what, marry you so you could save face?”

If she was going to tell the truth then she would have to tell the whole truth.

“Eric offered to bring me to Montana so I could start a new life.  I still intend to start that new life, as soon as possible.  Eric did not….  We … are not married.”

When the silence that followed the admission grew too long Amelia cheated a peek at Delilah.  Delilah sat staring at her, stunned.

“You’re not married?”

Amelia shook her head.

Delilah laughed.  “Well,
honey, you coulda fooled me!”

“We’re not married, I can assure you.  But I must confess, we have been … involved.”

“I’ll say!”

“I keep intending to put an end to it,” she rushed to explain, “but I … I can’t seem to stop myself.”  Tears stung at her eyes.  “It’s my curse, the horrible sin that I can’t ever be free of.”

“What is, sweetheart?”  Delilah smoothed back a lock of her hair, sinking Amelia’s heart lower.

“These wicked instincts!  This shameful longing to lay with a man!”  She raised her eyes to plead with Delilah.  “I adore it!  I live for it!  My body betrays me, subverts everything in me that wants to be good and honorable.”

“Who says you’re not good and honorable?”

“I do!”  She blinked incredulously.  “With my every waking breath, every wicked thought I have about Eric.”

“Oh, I think we’ve all had wicked thoughts about Eric.”

“But I act on them!  I can’t stop myself.  I couldn’t stop myself with Nick either.  I’m … I’m no better than my mother.”

“Why?  Because you like getting your nightly exercise with a man?  With Eric?”

“Yes!”  Her heart seemed to burst in her chest.  It was a relief to speak her sins aloud, but it didn’t make her feel them any less.  “And it’s wrong, Delilah, so wrong!”

“It’s wrong to feel hot for the man you’re with?” Delilah asked.  “A man who went to great lengths to take you out of a bad situation and keep you with him.”

“Yes.”

“A man who has stars in his eyes every time he looks at you and tells all his friends you’re his wife.”

“It’s wrong.”

“Given the fact that you think it’s all a ruse.”

“But it is.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

The tension in the room was broken.  Delilah wiped away Amelia’s tears and stretched to kiss her forehead.  Her silver curls glittered in the sunlight as she settled against the window frame once more.

“Lordy, and here I thought Eric was a fool to listen to that rat of a cousin of his and go to London,” Delilah said with a sigh.

Amelia straightened.  “Wasn’t he?”

“Honey, I’m as shocked as you are that Curtis Quinlan had even a single good idea in his lifetime.”

Amelia’s heart raced for a whole new reason.  “You don’t trust Curtis either, I take it?”

“I never trusted that boy as far as I could throw him,” Delilah admitted.  Her eyebrow went up again.  “So you don’t trust him, eh?”

“Not a bit.”  For the first time since making Delilah Reynolds’s acquaintance, something other than anxiety over her past filled Amelia.

“Smart girl.”  Delilah smiled.  “At least about some things.”  She leaned closer.  “You said that you thought Eric was the most generous man you’ve ever known and I can find a dozen people around here who would agree with you in five minutes.  But the man has more kindness than sense.”

“I know.”  Amelia lowered her eyes.

Another silence followed, and when Amelia looked up Delilah was shaking her head at her.

“Yeah, I’ve seen one too many girls like you in my day.”

A flush of shame washed through Amelia.  “I’m sorry?”

Delilah leaned back and crossed her arms.  “Girls who took the wrong path and don’t think they have a right to backtrack and start over.  People think our Sarah is touched in the head, but she’s a damn-sight smarter than you are at the moment.”

“I….”  She took a breath.  “You misunderstand me.  That’s exactly what I came to America to do.  I’m here to start a new life.”