The Bachelor's Bargain (10 page)

Her only misery came at the realization that she would die without ever helping her father, without ever marrying or bearing children, without designing another scrap of lace, without starting the lace school of which she had dreamed. She had done nothing of much use to anyone, and her conscience tormented her. Though she knew she ought to pray, she was unable. How could she focus on anything so elusive as God and heaven and the hereafter? God was utterly absent during those dark hours, and she did little but worry and search her mind for reason to hope.

Early that morning as her fever rose, she had arrived at the one solution that might save her family. As soon as Miss Watson was awake, Anne begged her to send for the vicar. But when Anne made her request, his horrified reaction had only made her more despondent. Why now had God chosen to allow the marquess to persecute her? Was she not suffering enough?

“Perhaps you will recall that Miss Webster is the finest lace designer in Nottingham,” Lord Blackthorne was telling his brother. His voice mocked her own words. “She is the best pattern pricker in Tiverton, and one of the most skilled laceworkers in England.”

Anne weakly lifted a hand and brushed it across her flushed forehead. “Is this your object in coming to my bedside, sir? To ridicule me once again?”

“I have never ridiculed you yet.” He squatted on a stool near the bed, his long legs folding up almost to his chin and his great knees spread wide. He propped his arms on them and smiled at her with satisfaction. “Indeed, Miss Webster, I have been altogether serious on every occasion of our acquaintance. And now I shall continue to speak to you with all solemnity. First, I wish you to know I have been given the unwelcome intelligence that William Green the gamekeeper may have been our assailant.”

“I saw no one in the forest.”

“Nor did I, yet I understand he may have had motive. You rejected his offer of marriage, did you not?”

“I did, sir.”

“I wonder at that. Tell me, is our gamekeeper as great a blackguard as I?”

Anne glanced at her mistress. Prudence had covered her face with her hands and seemed to be in ardent prayer.

“Mr. Green is not a man with whom I wish to link my life, though under the current circumstances, I believe that now to be of little consequence,” Anne told the marquess. “The gamekeeper is unkind, vain, and rude, but I do not think him capable of murder.”

“Why not? Surely your extraordinary beauty and keen wit merit such passion.”

“Lord Blackthorne,” the vicar cut in, anguish lifting his voice an octave. “I beg you to guard your tongue.”

“I shall not. Miss Webster is a promising young lady. Since our fortuitous meeting in the kitchen, I have been considering her situation here at Slocombe House and her obvious skill with lace. Once she is recovered from her injuries, I mean to make good use of her.”

“She means to make use of you,” the vicar muttered.

“I beg your pardon?” Ruel turned on the stool.

The vicar twisted his hands together. His round head glowed with perspiration. “Lord Blackthorne, I have been requested to tell you . . . to tell you that Miss Anne Webster . . . she accepts your offer of marriage.”

“Does she now?” Ruel slowly faced Anne again. “Well, I am dumbfounded.”

Five

Silence dropped like a thick fleece over the room. Anne looked at the marquess. Ruel stared at her. Prudence dabbed her eyes. Alexander shifted from one foot to the other and glared at the vicar. The footmen held their breath.

“Perhaps I misunderstood you, sir.” Addressing the clergyman, Ruel stood slowly. “Please repeat yourself.”

“She . . . she accepts.” The vicar blotted his chin with the handkerchief. “I tried to tell her . . . tried to warn her . . . but I do think she is dying after all, which would remove the problem, of course. . . . Yet everyone who heard your declaration that afternoon knew it was made in jest.”

“I have witnesses,” Anne said softly. “The Duke of Marston, the vicar of Tiverton, and Sir Alexander all heard your offer, Lord Blackthorne. You proposed marriage to me. I accept.”

“You said you could not like him,” Sir Alexander burst out. “I heard you say you felt no affection for him in the least.”

“Surely a nobleman such as yourself, my lord, knows affection is not necessary to marriage.”

“Abominable girl. Wicked insubordination. Ruel, say something to the wench!”

The marquess returned his attention to Anne. His gaze traced the narrow outline of her body as she lay in the bed. Her brown eyes never left his face. Again he was struck by her unwavering fortitude.

“Out,” he commanded, waving a hand at the assembly. “Everyone, out. I shall speak with her alone.”

“Do not harm Anne, I beg you!” Miss Watson stepped out from the corner, her cheeks damp. “She is dying, the doctor said so, and you must not torment her! Sir, she has waited upon me faithfully these many months, and I assure you she is altogether the most kind and affectionate companion a woman could ever hope to find. I am certain that any words misspoken just now can be attributed to—”

“Out!” Ruel pointed at the door.

“Yes, my lord.” Prudence ducked her head and hurried away.

When the door shut behind the murmuring, weeping, arguing throng, Ruel turned to Anne and crossed his arms over his chest. “You accept my proposal, do you?”

“I do.”

“Are you dying?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then why do you want to marry me, and why on earth should I marry you?”

Anne drew down a deep breath. “Because you know you will not have a wife to burden you more than a day or two. Because you can extend your mourning a year or longer and stave off your father’s demands that you wed in Society. Because as my husband, you will see to the safety of my family in Nottingham. Because I have information about you that would be most useful in the hands of an enemy.”

The corners of his mouth tipped up. “My goodness, Miss Webster, you astound me.”

“No more than you astound me.”

“Let me see if I grasp your logic.” He settled into the chair next to the bed where she lay, stretched out his legs, and propped a pillow under his shoulder. “I am to marry you because you will soon die, and I can play the merry widower. My father cannot expect me to wed for more than a year after your passing, and that should keep me quite happy and allow me to fulfill my own goals.”

“Aye, sir.”

“You wish to marry me because your family is in some sort of financial straits in Nottingham, and you believe that as the son of a duke I could do nothing less than to rescue them.”

“I would expect that of you, yes.”

He stared at the mist on the windowpane and recalled her confession that his hair reminded her of the curling shadows. For a moment, he could not think beyond it. She had lain just here, looking at this window, thinking of him.

A strange sensation slid through his chest. He turned his head and studied her. Eyes shut, she breathed in a shallow, pained manner. Would she die? Did he care?

How odd that his own mother had fallen so ill at news of the shooting that she had been unable to visit her son. Yet Anne Webster, mortally wounded herself, had managed to concoct a grand plan to save her family. From her deathbed this little woman with the courage of a lion had intimidated the vicar and everyone else into believing she meant exactly what she said. Amazing.

“About this information that would be so useful to my enemies,” he said. “Could you expound?”

As she lifted her head, an expression of pain crossed her face. “Lace machines,” she said in a ragged whisper. “Smuggling them into France. I heard your plan.”

“Good heavens. You were there. Serving tea in Alexander’s drawing room.”

A little smile tugged at her mouth. “You must learn to be more discreet, my lord.”

He studied her for a moment. How could a pair of brown eyes be so entrancing? She was a servant, nothing more. And near death. Yet the intelligence and determination that sparkled in her eyes made him feel he was speaking to an equal.

“And what will you do with your ill-gotten information about my plan to smuggle lace machines into France, Miss Webster?” he asked. “How do you propose to use it against me?”

“Blackmail is a harsh accusation.”

“Extortion, then?”

Her shoulders sagged, and she shut her eyes. “I prefer to say we shall strike a bargain of benefit to both of us. A plan that will give us . . . encouragement.”

He chuckled. “Exactly how do you mean to encourage me to accept this bargain?”

“If you do not, I shall be compelled to relay your plans to Lady de Winter, the baroness who attended my father’s church and supported his cause against the owners of the stocking mills.”

Ruel sucked in a breath. The de Winter family held Nottingham’s lace industry in the palms of their hands. They were rich and well-connected with English royalty. The baroness— a small, withered old lady who scented herself heavily with rose water—was a close friend and confidante to Queen Charlotte, wife of the mad King George and mother of the regent.

Worse, perhaps, the baroness abhorred the Revolution that had brought an end to the French monarchy. She knew every aristocrat in Paris, she had been personally responsible for smuggling vast quantities of lace into that country, and she would stop at nothing to keep England foremost in the manufacture of handmade lace.

“Trump!” Ruel said, sitting up and leaning across the space that divided them. “Miss Webster, you have played your hand like an expert.”

Her brow furrowed, as if she found it difficult to concentrate. “I know nothing of cards, sir. We do not play.”

“Ah, yes, the innocent minister’s daughter. She reads her Bible every night, wears her pelisse buttoned to the throat, and would never dream of playing at cards. Can she be the same Anne Webster who would hazard her position in order to sell lace to the son of a duke, who would boldly announce that her family’s weaving trade was equal to the calling of the nobility, who would dare to coerce a marquess into marriage—”

“You asked me!” she hissed, struggling up onto one elbow. “I had nothing to do with it.”

Ruel slid from his chair to the floor, leaned over her, and placed one hand on either side of her head. Her eyes widened.

“You had everything to do with it,” he said in a low voice. “You made a beggar child believe she was a duchess. You wove a lace that captured the essence of my homeland in springtime. You faced down my father, my brother, and the vicar of Tiverton. You very sweetly blackmailed me. And, yes, Miss Anne Webster, yes, indeed, you had everything to do with it.”

He stared into her face and was surprised to find that a pink flush had suddenly colored her high cheekbones. Though she was scowling at him, he took note that her lips were full and slightly damp. The image of kissing them took him by surprise, but he reminded himself that the prim Miss Webster would in no way welcome the action.

And then he realized that it hardly mattered what happened between them at this moment. Her body was swiftly betraying her into the hands of death, and this woman . . . this very beautiful, very intriguing creature might be lost to him forever.

Before she could speak, he turned his head and shouted at the shut door. “Alexander! Send in the vicar. I am getting married.”

Anne clutched the sheets to her neck as the door burst open and people poured into the room. Like angry bees, they swarmed and shoved and shouted, each determined to speak his mind.

Ignoring them, Ruel leaned close to the young woman’s ear. “You win this round,” he whispered. “But we have only begun our game, Miss Webster. You said our bargain must benefit both parties, and I have a purpose for you as well.”

She pressed the heel of her palm against her chest as if trying to steady her heart. “This is no time for games, sir,” she replied. “I am dying.”

He rose from her bedside and smiled as he shook his head. “I think not.”

Sir Alexander reached his brother just as Ruel turned. “Take care of the arrangements between the vicar and our father, will you, Alex? This afternoon should be soon enough for the ceremony. Have the young lady carried down into the front parlor. See that she is bathed, fed, and dressed in something suitable.”

“Ruel, you cannot be serious.”

“I am always serious.” He spread his hands to indicate a path to the door. “You must excuse me now, ladies and gentlemen. There is someone in Tiverton I must see.”

Without a backward glance at the woman to whom he had just become betrothed, the Marquess of Blackthorne walked out of the room.

The Duke of Marston studied the huge bed at the far end of the long room he had just entered. The bed’s canopy of blue and gold velvet rose almost to the ceiling. At the side of the small bed where Anne rested, Miss Watson rose from a chair of carved walnut and curtsied to her unexpected guests.

Anne was pleased to see that in the past twenty-four hours, her friend had regained a measure of her former fortitude and spirit. The shooting on the roadside had mobilized and enliv- ened Prudence—almost to the point that Anne saw hope for a complete recovery from the despondence that had plagued the young woman these many months.