A Question for Harry (23 page)

“I’ve sort of adopted Angel these past couple of years,” Fiona said, patting the horse’s neck
. Her slim hands were encased in simple black leather gloves quite unlike what he had grown used to seeing on her. Thankful for the distraction, Aylesbury admired the snug fit of her black riding habit. The double-breasted jacket fitted about her tiny waist before flaring out over her hips with just a splash of her red brocade waistcoat peeking from the bottom and at the simple tie banding her white high-necked blouse. She wore black leather boots and a simple satin-banded top hat similar to his own.

Neat and severe as
usual, but a breeze lifted the hem of her skirt. The sight of riotous red satin floral embroidery blooming up her black stockings filled him with pleasure. “You look lovely, Fiona.”

Fiona blinked at the softly spoken compliment and shifted uncomfortably in her saddle before responding with a simple thank you
. “Are you all right, Harry?” she asked again with open concern. “I saw you speaking with Miss Langston.”

He hadn’t seen her in several days believing she would be harboring even more ill will toward him than ever
. Caring he had not expected, but it was there, readily apparent in her bottle green eyes. “Do you think I’m a fool?”

“Often.”

Aylesbury smiled at that. She pulled no punches.

“Did you find out anything at all
?” When Aylesbury shook his head, her lovely eyes dimmed and she reached across the space between them, squeezing his hand, perhaps the first open sign of caring she had offered since coming to London. Certainly the first touch she had initiated. Sorrow, for him. “I’m sorry, Harry.”

“I didn’t expect anything really
.” Turning his hand over, Aylesbury allowed his fingers to curl around hers, then entwine through them. He looked down their tightly laced fingers. Their gloved hands melded together, one. Fiona’s eyes followed his and with a blush, she pulled her hand away. Much to his surprise, she didn’t leave him abruptly but rather lingered.

“What became of Piper
? After your father banished her mother, that is?”

Though it was clearly not the topic he had been expecting, Aylesbury answered, “Father kept Piper with us
. She was ours and we both loved her so much. She brought a light into our lives that had been absent since Mother’s death. When Father died, he made me her guardian, not her mother, Gretchen. But I was a young man, a bachelor with no other close female relatives and no notion of how to raise an eleven-year-old on my own. To my eternal regret, I brought her mother to town and bought them a house not far from mine so that I could visit Piper. And I did, daily. And wrote just the same when we were apart. I know Piper would have rather been with me and I felt the same, but I didn’t feel as if I had another option. I certainly wasn’t going to have Gretchen back in my home though she waved the banner of her title around town enough. It will be my extreme pleasure to take it away from her, perhaps someday quite soon?”

A not
-so-subtle hint, but Fiona didn’t take the bait.

Instead she thought about Piper Brudenall who had lost a father and never truly had a mother
. Fiona, too, had lost her parents very young. Her mother had died just days after giving birth to her.  Though her father had gratefully refrained from remarrying as rashly as Harry’s, Alexander MacKintosh had done little else in life before following his beloved wife into an early grave before Fiona’s third birthday. Thankfully Francis, even though he had been just eighteen when he had become guardian to them all, had never considered sending her off to live with Granny, their only female relative.

Being raised by ten older brothers had been wonderful
, but as a result she’d had few feminine influences in her life. Other than her nannies and the rare governess, there had been no women about Glen Cairn – other than Francis’ damned wife who everyone agreed did not count – until Richard had married Abby when she was twelve. Even then, the pair had been wrapped up in each other and their new baby.

But if there was one thing Fiona did learn about during her unusual childhood, it was men
. She knew them at their worst. How they were when they were among themselves and how they were when women were about to prompt their finer manners. And as one by one her brothers had wed and found love, she knew how men acted when they loved a woman.

When Harry had come along years before, he hadn’t displayed those actions toward her
. She could admit that honestly now. But he hadn’t done so with Moira either as he courted her.

No, his heart had
not engaged but at seventeen and eighteen, Fiona had determined that it would be. With her. She had failed miserably then but that didn’t mean it couldn’t be now.

“What are you thinking?”

Fiona shook her head. “Nothing. Just about your sister.”

With a sigh, Aylesbury shifted in his saddle
. “Ah, Fiona. You hide your feelings from m… from your family. You think they are too much to bear, but you don’t realize what it might be like to lose your loved ones, to long for them. You don’t know what you have until it’s gone.”

Yes, she did
. In more ways than he might think and more than she would admit to.
“Is that when you realized it?”

Aylesbury met her eyes so intently that for a moment Fiona wasn’t sure if he were any more certain than she whether they were speaking of siblings or themselves
. The past or the present. “How much she meant to you?” she clarified.

“I will tell her one day,” he said
. “When I find her again, I mean.”

Fiona watched with a frown
. “I’m sorry, Harry, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“You didn’t.”

“I know you see women on the street and think it might be Piper, but you do know that she wouldn’t just be walking around London like that, don’t you?” Fiona bit her lip, knowing her question was more than a little cruel. Life had taught her that the truth often hurt, though.

“I know deep down that is
true. Still, I see her everywhere, everywhere I turn, like a ghost lingering at the corner of my eye. I cannot help but try to find her still. You see, it’s hope that drives me, Fiona. Hope for better days. Hope that I might right the wrongs I so thoughtlessly made in the past.”

He looked at her then, his eyes probing hers once again and Fiona had to wonder who and what he was really referring to
.

“You can’t spend the rest of your life chasing ghosts, Harry.”

“Neither can you.”

And Fiona suddenly realized that she didn’t want to.

It seemed there was still some measure of hope alive in her as well.

“I’m glad to see that you didn’t come out without an adequate escort but you know when I said anyone was better than Ramsay, I’m not sure if I meant Harrowby,” Aylesbury said quietly
. “Is he now in the running?”

Fiona realized that she had completely forgotten about the company she had been in
. Twisting around in her saddle, she studied the quartet trailing along behind. Though Vin and Temple were in deep conversation, Connor and Harrowby were flirting with all the passing ladies, flashing deep dimples and oozing charm.

Both Temple and Harrowby were entertaining, handsome
, and enjoyable company though Temple was – as Ilona said – oftentimes too serious in temperament for Fiona and Harrowby even more lighthearted than Aylesbury could have ever been accused of being. She liked them both very much but they just weren’t … Harry.

“Perhaps,” Fiona told him softly
. “I’m willing to wait and see what happens.”

“I hope that’s true.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

From the diary of Lady Fiona MacKintosh – May 1895

A thousand times a fool and now a thousand more. Will the humiliations never end?

If there is anything quite as terrible as finding out that you were wrong about something, it is finding out that everyone other than you knew of it.

“Francis
?” Fiona tapped cautiously on the half-opened door to the private parlor her brother shared with Eve. It never served to walk into a room unannounced in this family. One never knew what degree of intimate congress they might be interrupting – open door or not.

“Come in, Blossom,” Glenrothes called and Fiona peeked tentatively around the corner before entering
. While it wasn’t a romantic setting she was intruding upon, it was still an intimate one. Her brother in his shirtsleeves and open collar sitting on the floor, building block towers with Preston and Lela while Eve sat nearby in her dressing gown nursing Alice.

It wouldn’t be the first nor the last such scene Fiona would ever see, but as she had told Eve and Ilona, it was getting harder and harder to witness something she didn’t have.

And might never have if what Aylesbury had said about Ramsay was true.

“I’m sorry to interrupt, Francis, but might I have a word?” Fiona missed the look the adults exchanged as she bent to hug Preston as he ran over
. Lela tried to stand once, then again before crawling over as well. Fiona scooped the toddler into her arms. “I wanted to talk to you about Lord Ramsay.”

“Would you like me to leave?” Eve asked but Fiona shook her head.

“That’s not necessary. I suspect what I have to say will come as no great surprise to either of you, but first,” she frowned at Glenrothes. “We had a bargain, you and I.
I give you the Season here and in turn, I was to be free to wed where I please. But that wasn’t it at all, was it? I was free to wed but only with your approval. I would like to know, Francis, what was your plan for the end of the Season if I didn’t meet another gentleman?”

“Fiona
…”

“No, Evie
! We had a bargain and if I am to hold up my end, Francis had bloody well be prepared to hold up his! I did not come here … I did not endure what I have these past weeks only to have my compensation for it all. What would you have done if the end of the Season came about and I still preferred Ramsay?”

“Hauled you back home kicking and screaming I suspect,” he answered dryly.

“I’m not a child to be coddled, Francis,” Fiona told him. “You’ve all been quite vocal against Lord Ramsay without – I believed – just cause.
Why didn’t you simply tell me the truth, Francis? Why did you feel so compelled to enact this farce?
Wasn’t there anyone who thought I was adult enough to handle it?”

“What truth is that?”

Fiona threw up her hands. “Even now? Aylesbury tells me that Lord Ramsay is nothing but a fortune hunter. That his uncle is looking to bypass him as his heir by remarrying. Is that true? Did you know?”

Glenrothes sighed and pushed himself to his feet, holding out a hand to her before dropping it to his side
. “In truth, I did not trust your temper, Blossom. I feared in a spurt of anger you might run off with him and be wed before common sense prevailed.”

“Instead
I was nearly to the point of eloping with him just to assuage my anger with all of you
, Francis,” Fiona said, shaking her head. “You put me in a position I didn’t want to be in, something I would have avoided at almost any cost. Only my pride forced me to come along. All of this could have been avoided. All of it.”

“We didn’t want to see you hurt, Fiona,” Eve said gently.

“Hurt?” Fiona turned to her sister-in-law. “What hurts me is that my entire family would go behind my back to pull this ruse without ever thinking to trust me to do the right thing. You knew I didn’t love him.”

“Don’t blame, Eve, Blossom,” Glenrothes said, protecting his wife as usual
. “Perhaps it wouldn’t have broken your heart but it would have been a blow to your pride, which we all know is as brutal as a January blizzard. It’s true we didn’t want to see you hurt in any way. None of us did.
Not by one fortune hunter or the next who might follow him. I thought if I could force you into a situation where you would meet some men who were more eligible, your infatuation with Ramsay might fade away before it was fully bloomed.”

“I am not hurt by Ramsay’s intentions but I am infuriated by yours, Francis,” she said sadly
. All she had seen in Ramsay was the pleasant heir to an earldom. A man she liked well enough and seemed to share enough common interests with. A man who played her very well and promised her the escape she needed. “Is that why you hit him when he went to see you at your club?”

“Aye, especially after the bastard said he’d marry you with or without my permission
.”

That would explain Ramsay’s persistent pleas to elope
. “Why would he do that?” Fiona asked. “My dowry was at your discretion. He needed your approval to have my fortune even if it came after the fact. I assume you made it very clear that he wouldn’t have it?”

“I did
, but somehow he knew about the rest of it,” Glenrothes said, running a hand through his hair. “I still don’t understand it.”

“The rest of it,” Fiona asked in confusion. “What rest of it?”

“You are Granny’s heir, Blossom. Her sole beneficiary, and you will have the fortune Father set aside for you as well. It will all be yours to do with as you will when you turn twenty-one.”

“Twenty-one!”

“Father did not believe his daughter should have to wait any longer than his sons for what would someday be hers,” he added. “Somehow, Ramsay knew that. If he got you to the altar, it would all be his.”

It took a moment for Fiona to absorb it all
. How utterly humiliating to be taken in so easily by a man with such ignoble motivations! Talk about a blow to her pride. “Yes, I can see that very clearly now. Thank you. I suppose I must be thankful then that I learned the truth before yielding to his requests.”

“Yes, thank God,” Eve agreed
. “I’m sorry, Fiona. I did want you to know. Vin, too.”

“Out
-numbered, were you?” she jested. “I know well how that feels. Well, that is that, I suppose, unless there is anyone else’s intentions you’d like to revile now before I take a liking to them?”

“Are you still open to finding another match here this Season then?” Eve asked, smiling with pleasure
. “With the fortune that will soon be yours, you do not have to marry.”

Even if he weren’t the best solution to her problem, Ramsay had been the easiest and most expeditious
. Fiona doubted another would come along that quickly. “If I did not wed straight away perhaps I could stay here in London with Granny.”

Fiona cringed even as she said it
. Not only the contrary sentiment to her choice already made but the alternative as well. Stay in London indeed! Not only would she place herself within constant reach of the sharp end of her grandmother’s fan but she also would throw herself into constant contact with Harry. There was no saying which would be more painful.

Thinking back over the previous
days, the confessions that tore at her heart and the passion that had overtaken her good sense, Fiona knew the answer. She didn’t fully trust him yet.  She could not bear seeing him again and again, knowing she might have him.

Fearing she never truly would.

The thought was beyond bearing.

Yet so tempting.

It would be so easy to throw her reservations to the wind.  To have the only man she had ever really wanted.

“Or travel,” she rushed to offer an alternative. “Yes, the Continent perhaps. A Grand Tour of my own like the lads all enjoyed. Though I know ladies aren’t traditionally allowed them, but Francis, surely you would not object? Connor could accompany me. Perhaps I might meet a foreign prince.”

Glenrothes laughed. “A prince in Europe is far preferable to a snake in Scotland.”

With a sigh, Fiona negated the options herself. “No, it wouldn’t do. I still want a family of my own so I suppose I really have no choice unless you would like to have me follow in Miss Pearson’s spinsterish footsteps.”

Glenrothes grunted at that
. “I would not. I would rather you wait for a man you can love, as I said before.”

“It’s not that easy, you know
? Not everyone finds what you lads have in a marriage. Perhaps it is simply not out there for everyone.” But her brothers couldn’t understand that. Each of them had found real, lasting love in the past couple of years. Love that Fiona had thought to emulate but instead had been able to do little more than envy. “I’ve accepted that and am content to move on without it.”

Glenrothes
caught her eye and held it, and Fiona could see the caring and sympathy in his muddy green gaze. He loved her; she knew that. All her brothers did but it was that sympathy she saw in all of them that was becoming too much to bear.

Eve was the one to speak up
. “You’ve used that word before, Fiona. Content. Do you really want to lie in the same bed each night with someone you are merely content with?”

Picturing herself in such a situation with Ramsay sent an unidentifiable shudder through Fiona
. If she were honest with herself, she knew she hadn’t thought so far ahead as to what her day-to-day life might be like as Ramsay’s wife.

Picturing herself with Aylesbury was an entirely different matter.

To Eve, she said only, “Most married couples do not share a chamber every night.”

“The ones in this family do
. We do because we want to, because we want to feel that bond, that intimacy. It’s like saying most mothers only see their children for an hour each day. Is that the kind of life you want for yourself?”

“No
, and I promise I will take more time to consider the ramifications of my choice in the future. And speaking of my choices,” Fiona considered her options. “How about Harrowby? He’s a nice enough fellow. Can I count on him to look at me without being taken by visions of a fat bank ledger?”

“Very possibly,” Glenrothes nodded
. “But what of …”

“Perhaps Lord Temple?” Fiona interrupted
. “I believe he might see me as something more than an heiress of untold wealth. Indeed, given his long standing with our family. If he knew and cared enough for my fortune, he would have been pressing his suit long ago.”

“Lord Temple is a fine man,” Glenrothes agreed
. “But Lord A–”

“What of that fellow
… oh, what was his name, Eve? Finley? Friendly? Or some such?”

“You do not even want to take consideration of Aylesbury, Blossom?
” Francis cut in firmly, brooking no other interruptions. “His indefatigability in the face your persistent disrespect is impressive.”

Fiona rolled her eyes
. “I’m sure he’d find that statement any more flattering than I do.”

Glenrothes chuckled
. “Face it, Blossom, you’ve met your match in Aylesbury. He will never back down no matter how hard you push. He’ll never give up. Never surrender.”

“And I’m supposed to like that?”

“Don’t you?”