“Very well,” he said. “She can stay. And I will find her a husband immediately.”
“I don’t want to get married!” Jane cried.
Both heads whipped toward her. Matilda was furious, the earl surprised. His surprise faded to what appeared to be amusement, while Matilda became threatening. “What you want is of no concern,” she hissed. “Be quiet!”
Jane opened her mouth to protest—and met the earl’s intense gray stare. She swallowed her denials. She knew, in that instant, that what she wanted did not matter in the least. The earl would have his way—with them all.
4
Matilda had left.
Jane suddenly, abruptly, felt alone and abandoned. She managed a bright smile for the servant who had carried up her bags, and then he too was gone, closing the heavy rosewood door behind him. An immediate, heavy silence descended.
Jane felt it, the stabbing of hurt, of grief, of aloneness and homesickness. She swallowed the lump choking her and walked past the four-poster, silk-canopied bed to one of the crystal-paned windows. She looked outside.
The lawns stretched away in perfect lush harmony. The drive glittered like diamonds as it snaked through Dragmore, catching the reflection of the sun piercing through the heavy drizzle. Rolling hills, slick and wet, studded with sheep, cows, waving corn and wheat, undulated to the gray horizon. Heavy clouds scudded above. She could see the glimpse of a steeple—the chapel at Lessing, perhaps? And she wondered how much of all of this was Dragmore.
She was not going to get married.
She was going to become a famous actress, like her mother.
Jane turned away from the window, only to notice the black dust covering her hands from where she’d leaned on the sill. She frowned. He had an army of servants, she’d seen them, but what did they spend their time doing? Of course, it was no business of hers, and they had arrived suddenly, barely with any warning.
Had he really killed his wife?
There was a knock on the door, and Jane felt her spine stiffen, her heart freeze—thinking it was he. She was assailed with an image of his dark, harshly chiseled face and his pale, pale eyes, and then a maid poked her head in, smiling. “Hello, mum, I’m Molly. He says you’re to take your meals with Chad and Randall in the nursery.”
A hot flush swept her. He would resign her to the nursery, would he? “And where is it?”
“It be just down the end of the hall.” The pretty, plump maid pointed. “Jake is bringing you some hot water for a bath and fresh tea. They be eatin’ at six, mum.”
Jane nodded. “All right, Molly, thank you. Please forget the tea, and bring me some coffee.” Molly’s eyes widened, but she nodded and backed out. Grimly Jane turned to face the full-length mirror standing in its walnut frame in a corner of the room. Did she appear such a child, then? She stared at herself, the crimson still staining her cheeks.
Jane was of less than average height and very petite. What she saw was her tiny figure and a white, triangular face that could have been that of some little lost urchin. Her cheekbones were high, her nose small and tipped, her lips too full for her small face. Her eyes were huge, wide now, and the bright blue of bluebells. In her plaid high-necked dress, which she wore without the customary bustle, and the blue bonnet, she looked like a twelve-year-old. Jane yanked off the bonnet and threw it onto an overstuffed chair. Piles of waving platinum hair the color of champagne spilled down her back. There was too much hair for her small frame.
And she still looked twelve.
There was no denying it, and Jane felt a sudden, intense frustration. She pictured him—the earl. The darkness, the intensity, the power. She could almost feel the heat of his presence behind her, and Jane hastily darted a glance over her shoulder. But of course the room was empty, of course she was alone. Yet she could still see him, still feel him, and something Jane could not define swept her. A frisson. Of fear … or excitement?
She turned to the mirror again. There was a bright flush upon her cheeks now. She stared. This was how he had seen her, in the frowsy, childish dress with the small, childish body. But she wasn’t a child. She was seventeen.
And suddenly it became of overwhelming importance that the earl should see her as a grown woman.
The earl paused on the landing to the third floor. The rich, bell-like sound of a woman’s laughter rang out merrily, deeply. Jane Weston. His response was instant—a tightening of every fiber in his body. He heard his son’s childish giggle in response. His surprise died. He had, after all, ordered her to the nursery. But, he thought as he approached silently, Governess Randall had never laughed like that.
Nick paused in the open doorway, without a sound. He was purposeful in being quiet. He had been raised on a ranch, and his father was half Apache; his mother had been a Mescalero squaw. Derek had also been a captain in the Texas Rangers, and he had taught all his children, even Nick’s sister, to track and hunt and to move soundlessly. It was a part of their heritage, Derek had always said. And one day, maybe such skills would save their lives.
The earl felt the old, old stabbing then, an anguish so deep and intense that if he didn’t cut it off immediately he wasn’t sure what would happen—he would cease to be a man. He did cut it off. And he corrected himself, silently, with a bitter twisting of his lips in the mockery of a smile.Nothis father. His father hadn’t raised him, his father was dead. Killed violently by the man who had raised him and called himself his father—the man Nick had adored as his father his entire life. Until he had learned the truth.
He shook it all away, but he could not shake the self-hatred and self-disgust. It was all one big joke. He was not Nicholas Bragg, Lord Shelton, the Earl of Dragmore. He was nothing more than the grotesque product of a violent rape.
He was glad Derek had killed his real father, the Comanchero Chavez. Because if he hadn’t, Nick would have.
His stunning, dead wife’s image loomed. Her face was white, so carefully painted that it appeared natural. Rich blond hair was coiled atop her head. Her expression was one of horror.
He hadn’t even shared the terrible secret. He had started to. He had only gotten as far as confessing his Indian heritage. And she had recoiled …
Abruptly he shoved his morose thoughts away. And saw his son. Nick softened.
