Sattler, Veronica (38 page)

"Ashleigh!"
he
shouted, even as he rushed forward to sweep her into his arms. "Ashleigh,
darling,
is it really you?"

Ashleigh
couldn't speak as the old familiar arms enveloped her. Mutely, she nodded into
her brother's chest as sobs began to shake her slender frame.

"Ah,
God in Heaven,
I
cannot believe it!"
cried Patrick, his own
voice threatened with tears. "Little one... oh, little one, I knew I'd
find you.... Oh, thank God!"

Brett
and Megan stood beside them wordlessly, although, by the expression on their
faces, it was difficult to tell which was more thunderstruck by the events of
the past several seconds.

At
last Patrick broke his hold on Ashleigh, but only long enough to place her at
arm's length while he perused her tear-streaked, laughing face. Then, his
laughter joining hers as a roomful of guests looked on, he drew her boldly to
him again, lifting her off the floor as he swung her about in a joyful embrace.

Ashleigh
was alternately laughing and crying as she cried, "Oh, Patrick, I thought
you were dead! Oh, I love you so
much!"

"I
love you, too, sweet, darling sister!" Patrick's big voice boomed, tears
running unashamedly down his rugged cheeks. "I never gave up hope, did you
know that?"

At
last he set her down in front of him, taking a moment to let his gaze wander
completely over her fragile form. "You've become a beauty, little
one," he said softly at last. "Every bit the beauty that was the
promise of your youth."

Suddenly
Patrick's gaze flickered to Brett, and when it returned to Ashleigh, he
questioned, "But how is it you've come to be here, at Ravensford Hall? I
was just a few days' short of tearing London apart, looking for you."

Ashleigh
stared into her brother's deep blue eyes—eyes so much like her own. How could
she begin to explain how it was she'd come to be here? In her childhood there'd
never been anything but total honesty and truth between them, but the
circumstances of her coming to Ravensford Hall were far more complicated than
the childish fears and confidences she'd shared with Patrick all those years
ago. Time... she needed time to think on this, but, seeing the expectant
expression on Patrick's face, she knew she couldn't dodge his question entirely
at this point, and so she decided to give him the safest part of the truth for
the moment.

After
a glance in Brett's direction, she returned her eyes to her brother's.
"Patrick," she smiled, "you'll be happy to know I am currently
Brett Westmont's ward."

Patrick
heard her words and remained stone still for several seconds as he digested
their import. Then his features went rigid, and a moment later he turned a cold
blue gaze on the man who'd been his lifelong friend.

"Your
Grace," Patrick said quietly, an undercurrent of steel lacing his softly
spoken words, "I think I shall have to kill you."

Ashleigh
sat in the blue velvet armchair in her chamber and thought. She was very still.
As it had for a good while now, her mind tripped desperately over the facts
that had been lodged there, one by one, since the fateful moment, the night
before, when her beloved Patrick had come back from the dead.

First,
there was the excitement that had erupted among the amazed dinner guests when
they witnessed the emotional scene of recognition between Patrick and her. But
it was an excitement that gave way to puzzled, sidelong glances and hushed
whispers after Megan suddenly coaxed Patrick and Brett out of the drawing room
following a few low-spoken words between the two men, for it left only Ashleigh
and a grim-faced Lady Margaret to see everyone through the rest of the evening.

That
dinner party had been one of the most difficult events of Ashleigh's adult
life. Hour after hour, she had somehow managed to play the perfect hostess,
making small talk, seeing to the efficiency of the serving staff, forcing a
smile she did not feel, while the minutes ticked by with her heart racing and
her brain in a turmoil, wondering what was happening in another part of the
Hall, expecting at any moment to hear the sounds of a violent quarrel, or
worse, a duel taking place.

Adroitly,
she had sidestepped and parried the barrage of questions directed her way. How
long had she been an orphan? How had she come to believe her brother dead?
Could she account for the variation in the spellings of their surname that had,
perhaps, made it difficult for Patrick to locate her? How did it feel to
realize she was now the
Honourable
Miss Sinclair, and how was it she had
not taken the title earlier, even in her years in the orphanage?

On
and on, the questions had come, but somehow, Ashleigh had managed, until at
last the hour had grown late and the dancing began. Then the dancing had ended,
and there had still been no word from upstairs; still no Patrick, still no
Megan, still no Brett, duke of Ravensford. Finally, when it became apparent
that His Grace had inexplicably deserted them—for the one question their
rearing and manners forbade their asking had to do with this apparent rudeness
on the part of their host—one by one, these polite members of the
ton
had
taken their leave, this accompanied by sympathetic looks directed at Ashleigh,
Lady Margaret and Lady Elizabeth, until at last, the three women had found
themselves alone.

Of
course, that had set the stage for the following scenes: Elizabeth's tirade
over her "insufferable humiliation" as she raced upstairs to seek
Brett out; Margaret's tight-lipped anger as she followed; and finally, the
discovery, by all three women, of Brett and Patrick in the library with Megan,
where the duke, white with suppressed anger, had just completed the signing of
a document of betrothal—to wed, as a somber-faced Patrick put it, "the
girl he has wronged, my sister, Ashleigh St. Clare!"

Now,
as she sat in the chair, Ashleigh felt herself wince as she relived that
mind-wrenching moment. She remembered feeling the blood drain from her face as
she gazed at her brother in disbelief, even as Elizabeth Hastings's shriek of
denial rent the air, followed quickly by Margaret Westmont's gasp of outrage;
and then the older woman had actually
smiled
when Elizabeth resolutely
marched forward and struck Brett across the face!

Immediately
afterward, Ashleigh now realized, much that happened became a blur. She vaguely
recalled Brett ordering Margaret to remove herself "and that screeching
harpy" from the chamber, faintly recalled Megan and Patrick rushing to her
side as the room began to spin, and then, suddenly, all had gone black.

That
had been late last night, when she had fainted and been carried to her
chamber—here, where she'd chosen to remain, even after Megan and Patrick had
summoned Hettie Busby and they'd revived her with salts and cold compresses.
Pleading shock and weariness, she'd succeeded in sending Megan and her brother
away, saying she needed time by herself... time in which to rest... and to
think....

But,
of course, the morning had come, and with it a solicitous inquiry from Patrick,
saying he was concerned for her health and thought they ought to talk. And talk
they did, with Patrick giving her a quick summary of his time away, the amnesia
that kept him from locating his past, the prosperous years in America where he
now made his home, and his use of an earlier spelling of their family's name
when beginning his seafaring venture, in a youthful effort to be his own man,
to avoid capitalizing on the fact that he was a baronet's son and scion of a
family that, although no longer wealthy, had one of the oldest and most
respected names in the peerage.

Then
it was her turn, and Ashleigh haltingly went over the significant details of
her life during the past twelve years, culminating in the awkward series of
events that had led to her final arrival and position at Ravensford Hall.

Then
had come her heartfelt pleading with him to cease this madness to have her wed
to Brett Westmont. She had seen the anger in Brett's face, read the fury in
those turquoise eyes as they'd briefly fallen on her when her brother broke the
news; Brett Westmont was as opposed to this marriage as others in the household,
and they both knew the severity of
those
forces of opposition! Why
couldn't he see that this would constitute a grave mistake?

But
Patrick, for all his loving, gentle looks, had been adamant, and no amount of
pleading could persuade him to change his mind; Brett Westmont might be his
closest friend in England, but either he would do the proper thing by Patrick's
beloved sister, or Patrick would see him dead.

Seeing
the resolution in her brother's eyes, and recalling all too well the mind-set
that had always made him a determined man once he set his will to something,
Ashleigh had at last relented. She felt she had no choice; she certainly didn't
want a man's death on her conscience, nor did she relish the thoughts of the
consequences to Patrick, should this occur. Of course, neither did she wish a
marriage to a man who, given the temperament she'd witnessed from time to time,
would probably come to despise her for it... but she wished for the
alternatives even less.

So
now, as she sat here trying to piece together the incidents that had led to
this unhappy state of affairs and make some sense out of them, she also awaited
the arrival of Megan. She'd sent word to her friend that she would be happy to
see her sometime after the dinner hour, although Ashleigh had taken her meal in
her chamber, on a tray, and then had only picked at the food, pushing it about
her plate as she'd mulled everything over in her mind.

As
if her thoughts of the tall redhead had summoned her, at that moment there came
a soft tapping at the door, followed by an Irish brogue saying, "Ashleigh,
are ye there?"

"Yes,
Megan, please come in."

The
door opened and her friend entered, a gentle, questioning smile on her face.
She moved quickly toward the chair from which Ashleigh rose, and bent to give
her a fierce hug.

"Ah,
macushla,
it breaks me heart t' see ye lookin' so sad! There, there, it
cannot be as bad as ye think... ye'll see! We'll see a way yet t' make lemonade
out o' the lemon we've been handed!"

At
the sounds of her friend's words and the feel of her comforting arms about her,
Ashleigh at last gave way to the tears that had hovered all day. Suddenly,
great wrenching sobs began to shake her small frame, ushering in a torrent that
seemed as if it would never cease.

And
all the while Megan held her, letting her cry out her heartbreak, her doubts,
her confusion. Megan had a long acquaintance with those things; she'd been
there before... many times.

After
some time the weeping ceased, dwindling down to small, hiccoughing sobs that
finally ebbed as well, fading into a long, shuddering sigh. Here Ashleigh
raised her swollen, tear-streaked face to her friend, saying, "Oh, Megan,
help me, please. What am I to do? How am I going to make it through all of
this?"

Megan
gently smoothed back from her forehead some of the strands of hair that had
fallen over her face and gave Ashleigh a small, promising smile. "Ye'll
make it, just as ye've managed t' make it through the last dozen years or so,
darlin' girl—by the pluck o' yer heart and the grit o' that fine spirit ye were
born with. Ye'll see." Suddenly Megan's eyes narrowed and grew hard as the
emeralds they favored. "There be some in this house that think His Grace
has found himself saddled with a guttersnipe fer a duchess. But ye, me lass,
are about t' prove them wrong. Unless I miss me guess, they're shortly t'
discover His Grace has found himself a queen!"

"You're...
resigned to this match for me, then, Megan?" Ashleigh kept her eyes raised
to her friend's face as she allowed her to lead her toward the bed.

Megan
sighed as she turned down the coverlet and began to help Ashleigh undress.
"'Tis what yer brother wishes fer ye, darlin', and I'm after thinkin' 'tis
not the time t' be doubtin' him. Ye've been without family fer so long, 'twould
be a mistake, I fear, t' be disregardin' the blessed miracle that brought the
protection and guidance o' one back into yer life." She removed the gown
she'd finished unbuttoning and turned toward the chest of drawers where
Ashleigh's nightclothes were kept. "I'm thinkin' 'tis time t' turn yer
cares over t' someone who has yer own best welfare at heart.

"Lean
on yer brother, Ashleigh," she said as she returned with a delicate
pink-and-white dimity night rail. "He's lived far more than either o' us,
and t' me way o' thinkin', the man knows what he's about. Ye could do far worse
than heedin' Patrick St. Clare!"

A
small smile found its way to Ashleigh's lips as she viewed Megan's face in the
growing darkness. "You're... impressed with my brother, aren't you,
Megan?" she queried.

An
unusual glimmer of emerald light danced in Megan's eyes before the tall woman
hurriedly turned and began making an extraordinary fuss over tidying up the
clothes Ashleigh had discarded. "Well-l-l," she said at last, after a
too-long silence, "he
is
a fine, upstandin' figure o' the best his
sex has t' offer, and he certainly handled that rogue, Ravensford, in short
order, and he obviously loves ye more than his own life and limb... aye, I find
all that impressive...."