Regina Scott - The Heiress's Homecoming

Chapter Three

Will would have preferred to have put the lovely Lady Everard from his mind. Unfortunately, Jamie’s attitude at breakfast the next morning prevented that. The lad’s cheeks and mouth sagged, his shoulders slumped over his coddled eggs and salmon. His responses to Will’s attempts at conversation consisted of grunts and questionable movements of his head.

“Oxford,” Will announced, keeping his gaze on the freshly baked bread he was slathering with butter. “Fine school. I think it will do very well for you.”

“Oxford?” The silver-rimmed china clattered as Jamie set down his cup.

Will glanced up to see that he had his son’s attention at last. “Oxford. Divinity school. With all these martyred sighs I thought perhaps you were planning on being a man of the cloth.”

Jamie’s mouth turned up as he shook his head. “I don’t think I’m cut out for Holy Orders, thank you, Father. And you said I didn’t have to return to school if I didn’t wish it. You never attended Oxford.”

He hadn’t, and now that the title had come to him, he wondered if his earlier choices had been wise. But at eighteen, he could not have imagined the road he would travel. “So you still plan to stay here with me, learn more about managing our estate, our holdings.”

Jamie nodded, hands braced on the damask tablecloth. “I’d like to understand my duty better, yes. But I intend to take a little holiday before jumping in.”

Will raised his brows. “Planning to go on a Grand Tour of Europe, are you?”

Jamie grinned, pulling back his hands. “Nothing so elaborate. I’d just like to fish, ride, visit neighbors. That sort of thing.”

Will set down his butter knife. “Neighbors like the Everards.”

Jamie colored as if he’d been caught with his fingers in the sugar bowl. “Lady Everard is our neighbor, so yes, I planned to visit her as well as the Gileses, Mr. Ramsey our old vicar and others who knew me before I went away to Eton.”

“Very...neighborly of you,” Will managed.

Jamie raised his chin. “I thought so.”

Will watched as the boy attacked his eggs. Jamie might protest all he liked, but Will was certain more than a friendly nature motivated him to pursue Lady Everard. He had to find a way to break through to his son.

“Perhaps I’ll come with you,” Will ventured. “I feel in an uncommonly neighborly mood as well.”

For some reason his son did not seem amused by the prospect. But he finished breakfast and excused himself, promising to rejoin his father after Will’s morning ride.

Will hoped that ride would at least clear his mind of his concerns. Nothing like pounding across the turf to remind him of the reason he was born. He was a Wentworth, and this estate had belonged to his family for ten generations. He glanced back at the hall as he wended his way through the boxed hedges for the stables behind the house.

A sturdy brick edifice four stories tall, with squat wings clinging to the center, Kendrick Hall had been built for his great-grandfather. The numerous high-arched windows capped in white, and white stone columns marking the center block, managed to give the place a look of elegance in keeping with the current age. But though the house was newer than its neighbors, Wentworth blood had defended the grounds from Scottish tribes over four hundred years ago.

And now it was Will’s turn to defend it from the rising debts. He nodded to his head groom as he mounted Arrow, his favorite horse. He knew others whose heritage had been stolen by a father who gambled, a brother who invested unwisely. That was not the case with the Kendrick estate. His father had been a good if unenlightened manager. But times were changing, and the Evendale valley, so close to the fells of Cumberland, was struggling to keep pace.

Will set Arrow to a canter and guided him out around the house for the front. There he could see snatches of the oak woods to the north and the lone line of oaks flanking the long drive to the road. He had only to move beyond them, and he could see all the way to Dallsten Manor.

So he could not fail to notice the other rider pelting across the green pastures between the two houses. Even if he had doubted the identity, the flash of sunlight on golden hair would have given her away.

The gelding beneath him tossed his head as if wishing to follow. Will felt a similar desire to give chase. He knew Arrow was swift enough to catch her. But he wasn’t sure he wanted the conversation that would follow. Neighbors or not, the less time he spent in Lady Everard’s company, the safer he’d feel.

But would Jamie be any safer if Will let her be? Jamie had no understanding of the female mind; Will had met enough ladies on his travels to have some familiarity. Lady Everard had implied last night that she would be more interested in him than in his son, a fact that had refused to leave his thoughts for much of the night.

Should I keep an eye on her, Father? Try to understand why she’s here, what she hopes to gain?

Something inside him jumped at the idea. Still, Will hesitated, watching her. She certainly had no concerns about her own safety. Though she had crossed onto his lands, she had forsaken a groom or lady to attend her. Her horse galloped across the field, sheep scattering before them, and approached a low hedge that separated the patches of grass so the flocks could be rotated among the pastures.

Surely she’d slow; surely she’d stop. He found himself rising in the stirrup irons as if he could hold her up by sheer force of character.

The horse sailed up and over the hedge, and Lady Everard flew up and out of the saddle to land on the ground.

Will felt as if his breath had been knocked from him as well. Arrow was moving before he realized he’d directed the dappled gelding. Down they went, through the trees, over a stream. Every length Will sent up a prayer that he would find her unharmed. He galloped to the hedge and leaped from the saddle.

She had managed to raise herself into a sitting position and was gazing about her as if dazed. Will crouched beside her. Her tall-crowned hat had fallen, her curls hung free about her shoulders, and her cheeks were bright. She blinked at him as if surprised to find him there.

“Lady Everard,” he murmured, tightening his fist on the reins to keep from touching her. “Are you all right?”

She wrinkled her nose and puffed out a sigh. “I am remarkably disappointed. I’ve taken that hedge any number of times. Why was today any different?”

He wasn’t sure whether to hug her to him in relief or shout at her for risking her life. He settled for rising and going to fetch her horse, which was waiting for her a few yards away. When he returned with the black-coated mare, Lady Everard had retrieved her hat and was struggling to take another step, the skirts of her blue riding habit heavy with the mud of the field.

“Easy!” He dropped both reins and reached for her, but she held out her free hand to prevent his touch.

“I’m fine,” she said, straightening to her full height, which still put her under his chin. She took a hesitant couple of steps and nodded. “Yes, quite fine.” She dimpled up at him. “But thank you for your concern.”

Will shook his head at her cavalier attitude. Didn’t she know she could have broken her neck? “You’re certain?”

“Reasonably. Though I could use your help to mount.”

That was it? He couldn’t think of a lady of his acquaintance who would take such a fall so calmly. His Peg had refused to ride, saying the great beasts frightened her, and he’d felt distinctly manly at the time that he was so comfortable in the saddle. In his travels he’d met any number of women who rode or drove wagons pulled by horses, donkeys or oxen, but those women had never been among the aristocracy.