Mary Brendan - Dangerous Lord, Seductive Miss

‘Was the culprit brought to justice?’

‘It was reported that a fellow nicknamed Snowy fired off the gun that fatally wounded Edmund.’ A glaze appeared in Deborah’s eyes as she recalled the awful time. ‘Snowy was later murdered,’ she resumed huskily. ‘The smugglers would sooner kill one of their own than have the dragoons snooping about in the villages looking for a suspect.’ She sighed. ‘There was no proper trial … save the one his colleagues put on. One cannot be sure that it was Snowy who was responsible for Edmund’s death.’

‘Did you meet your fiancé in London?’

Deborah shook her head. For a moment she remained silent, for she was tempted to tell him to mind his own business. But if she divulged a little of what had occurred to her in the intervening years, perhaps he might tell her what he had been doing; she knew she had a curiosity to know it. ‘My stepfather was a sociable sort of chap. When the militia were billeted close by he would offer hospitality. Occasionally he would hold small parties for neighbours and the officers. It was at such an event that Edmund and I were introduced.’ Her voice tailed away and she looked at him. ‘And you, sir?’ she asked with an admirably neutral tone. ‘Have you a fiancée or a wife and children?’

‘No …’ Randolph said quietly. ‘Once I thought I had met the right woman, but I was mistaken. Now I’m happy to remain a bachelor.’

‘I see,’ Deborah said in a stifled little voice. ‘How very sad for you.’

‘Indeed, I’m deserving of your pity … let’s talk about something more cheerful,’ he suggested silkily. ‘I had the impression that your mother would like to visit town.’ Randolph had placed down his cup and saucer. He relaxed back in to his chair and a booted foot was raised to rest atop a buff-breeched knee. Idly he splayed long brown fingers on a Hessian’s dusty leather. ‘Do you go to London very often?’

‘Unfortunately not. But you’re right; my mama would love to frequently visit town,’ Deborah answered him automatically, although her mind was in turmoil. She knew very well what he’d hinted at. Once he’d believed he’d wanted to marry her, but then he’d gone away and discovered that he’d found it easy to forget her. A burning indignation roared in her chest. Yet of what could she accuse him? He’d never told her he loved her, neither had he promised to marry her. And he certainly hadn’t forced her to kiss him. She’d been a very willing participant in that! The most she’d had from him were compliments and complaints that she was a seductive little miss who could drive him wild with desire. It was probable she’d had a lucky escape. Had he not gone away when he did she might have let him properly seduce her. The consequences of that didn’t bear thinking about. But she was determined not to let him know that any of it bothered her.

‘It is my mama’s greatest wish that we return to town to live.’ Her voice sounded shrill despite her attempt to keep it light and level.

‘Are you also keen to return there to live?’

‘I certainly miss the gaiety and the friends I had there,’ Deborah answered, more composed.

‘If you returned to London, you’d avoid the necessity of living amongst the likes of the Luckhursts.’

‘I shan’t allow them to drive us away,’ Deborah retorted with a defiance that made him cock a dark brow at her. Had he told her he found her attitude immature he could not have made his opinion plainer. ‘We have some friends here,’ she continued doggedly. ‘Harriet and her brother are nice people. So are Mr and Mrs Pattinson. Not everybody hereabouts is in league with the smugglers. Evil will triumph if good people are too cowardly to combat it.’

‘Certainly,’ he agreed drily. ‘But a lot of decent folk don’t consider contraband a bad thing, but a benefit.’

A defeated little grimace was Deborah’s acknowledgement of the truth in that statement. Her stepfather had been a good man, yet he had happily paid to have his cellars stocked illicitly.

‘Why do you not return to London to live?’ Randolph asked. A few brown fingers curled to rest close to his narrow mouth as he waited for her reply. After a silent moment he prodded, ‘Is there more to it than a battle of wills with the smugglers?’

Deborah got to her feet and collected the cups to put on the tray. She spun about to face him, feeling an odd unwillingness to admit that she—once an heiress with a magnificent dowry—now could not afford to live in London. Yet she had nothing to be ashamed of. She had not squandered her inheritance; it had been taken from her. Again she had an inclination to tell him that he had no right to ask. But then that would imply that she cared what he thought. And she didn’t.

‘When Papa died the whole estate was entailed on the next male heir. I have no brother, as you know. There was no close relative on the paternal side who might have felt morally obliged to treat us generously. A distant cousin—a gentleman we haven’t met who resides in a castle in Scotland—took the title and estate. Mama was very well provided for in my father’s will, and my inheritance was held in trust. Unfortunately it was one that could be breached.’ She shrugged, clattering crockery.

‘When your mother remarried her assets became Mr Woodville’s,’ Randolph guessed.

‘Indeed,’ Debbie muttered, her fingers tightening on the edge of the table until the knuckles showed bone. ‘And Mr Woodville had a son and a strong belief in primogeniture.’

A silence ensued and whilst Debbie stared fiercely through the window Randolph watched her.

‘You have enough to live on?’ he eventually asked quietly.

‘Oh, yes. Mr Woodville left Mama enough to carry on living here comfortably, if we are careful. When she has passed away the house and estate will go to his son, Norman. In order that I would not be left destitute, he also left me a bequest of a few thousand pounds to tempt a prospective husband. It is not quite the sixty that my father had wanted me to have.’ She turned with a smile on her lips. ‘Well, as we have finished tea, sir, shall we now take a stroll in the gardens?’

Once in her chamber Julia went directly to the small anteroom where her writing desk was positioned close to a window. When seated in that spot she had a splendid view of the rosebeds and lawns that flowed in an undulating emerald swathe to a stream edging an area of deciduous woodland. The trees were a beautiful sight to behold, garmented in shades of gold and red. At present the charming view did not lure Julia’s interest, rather her desk did. She sat down before it and got from a pocket in her grey gown a key. She used it to open the bureau, then, having found the little spring with a finger, she put pressure on it until a secret compartment came open. Gravely she gazed at the contents within. An unsteady hand trembled forwards to withdraw a few letters tied with ribbon.

‘Oh … Gregory, he has come,’ she whispered. ‘He seems angry with her, too, despite his courtesy. But I think he still wants her. We should not have done it,’ she murmured to her beloved first husband. ‘Our Debbie did not make the excellent match she deserved. Nice Edmund Green is lost to her, too. She is a spinster … soon to be twenty-five. A beauty still, indeed she is, but past her prime.’ She pressed pale fingers to her watering eyes. ‘Now you are not here and I alone must decide what to do. What shall I say if she asks if letters arrived for her? Must I deny it all? Shall I burn them or hand them over with excuses?’ She dropped the unopened letters back whence they came. ‘Will they think the letters were innocently lost and accept it as fate’s way rather than our way of telling them their love was not to be?’