Pirate's Golden Promise (7 page)

She didn't think any more about their early departure and climbed into the warm tub. When she finished bathing and was pulling on her calico dress of a pink-and-green print which her father had ordered for her last year from China, Lucy entered the room.

“Wynter, I'm shocked at you,” Lucy said, a catlike gleam in her brown eyes. “You've put away your mourning clothes before it's proper.”

“I'm wearing colored dresses in the house, but in public I shall still wear black. I don't think Papa would have minded. He did like me to wear pretty things.”

“Yes, he did, didn't he? But you were always his pet and must look like a princess.” Lucy flounced around the room, her green gown swishing with her movements. “How do you like my dress? I've decided to put away my black things for good. I think Father would understand, too. We never were very close.”

“You look very nice,” Wynter complimented her and realized that she did. Lucy would never be a great beauty, but she appeared charming in the green silk with slashed sleeves that revealed a fine layer of gold cloth beneath, and her red curls lay wispily about her cheeks. This was so unlike the Lucy who preferred plainer clothes. Why suddenly did she wish to look so grand?

“I'm pleased you approve. You are a lady of fashion, no matter the circumstances of your birth. Tell me,” Lucy prodded, “do I make a fetching bride?”

Wynter's fingers stiffened on the last button of her gown, and Maddie stopped her movements, picking up Wynter's discarded nightclothes.

“I don't know what you mean.”

“Oh, dear, Wynter!” Lucy put her hands to her face in mock horror. “Hasn't Adam told you yet? I can see he hasn't. Isn't that just like him? He didn't wish to hurt you until after the ceremony. We were married in the village this morning. I believe he might need to speak with you. You'll find him in the library.”

The room swam for a moment before Wynter's shocked eyes. Was Lucy playing a horrid game with her? Adam would never marry Lucy, but from Lucy's pleased expression, from the way her tongue twirled around her mouth like a cat who has leaped in midair and captured the bird, then gobbled it whole, she knew Lucy was telling her the truth.

“But why?” Wynter managed to croak out, her mouth dry.

“Why not?”

“Adam loves me, not you.”

Lucy shrugged her freckled shoulders. “Ask him.”

“I will!”

Lucy laughed in triumph as Wynter stormed from the room.

“What a naughty girl you are!” Maddie reproved her.

“Oh, darling Maddie, not even you shall spoil this day for me.” Lucy was laughing so hard that tears coursed down her cheeks. “I've finally bested her, and father can no longer help her. I've won! I've finally won!”

A silence hung over the drawing room, thicker than the fogs that swept down from the hills on cold nights. Wynter stood by the window and gazed at the tranquil early morning scene of sheep as they munched the grass below the mountain range. Within her, turmoil reigned.

She dropped the heavy damask drape she held back and faced Adam and Debra. Adam had the good grace to flush, while Debra sipped a sherry, a first for her since she hated liquor of any kind. But then today was a special day. Lucy had married Adam.

“You're to be congratulated. Both of you. I feel very foolish, very stupid,” Wynter told them and managed to hold back her tears. Rage overwhelmed her, saving her from making a complete fool of herself.

“Wynter.” Adam came towards her, but Debra's voice stopped him in mid-stride.

“Please don't make the situation more unbearable for Wynter by comforting her. After all, Lucy is your wife now.”

“Wynter deserves an explanation,” he said harshly, and Debra's eyebrow rose a fraction of an inch.

She placed her sherry glass on the desk and stood up. “Yes, I think she does. I'll leave you to explain it all to her.”

When Debra closed the door behind her, Adam leapt forward and ensnared Wynter in his arms. “You must believe I love you, that I can never love Lucy!”

Wynter pushed at him, but he refused to budge. “You married her!”

“I did. I had to, because of your father's will.”

“The will? What about it?”

Adam sighed. “I wished I didn't have to tell you, but I suppose it's better to hear it from me than from Debra. I married Lucy because of her inheritance.”

“Adam, I have an inheritance, too.”

He groaned her name, then looked levelly at her. “No, my darling, you don't. You're illegitimate. I'm sure your father intended to provide for you, but he never had the time to make out a proper will. He must not have realized how serious his health problems were and thought he'd be alive a long time. In fact, I think he probably would have settled something upon you when we married. He loved you very much.” Adam sadly shook his head. “Whatever you get will be because of Debra's charity. Lucy is your father's heir. Not you. The inheritance is the reason I married her.”

The blood seemed to drain from Wynter, and though she detested Adam's hands upon her then, she needed him to hold her up. She felt suddenly very weak. “I can't believe any of this.”

“Neither can I,” he said. “Lucy is such a plain, dull creature.”

Thoughts whirled in her head. Her father had left her nothing, not a tuppence, and Adam, the man she loved, had betrayed her with her own sister. Oh, how triumphant Debra and Lucy must be! She had nothing to call her own, not even the roof over her head. If she hadn't felt so devastated, she'd have laughed at the irony of it. She had been her father's pet, his pride and joy, the light of his life, but he had not made arrangements for her future. Lucy had gotten it all!

The anger built within her until she unleashed it, freeing her from her shocked state. “So, Adam, you married Lucy for her money.”

“I had to. The creditors are hounding me like the devil. Try to understand.”

“But I do understand!” She managed to pull roughly away from him, his touch disgusted her. “You had your choice of either of us, but you chose Lucy because she now holds the purse strings. You're a despicable human being! How could I have thought I loved you?”

Adam imprisoned her in his arms again, pleading with her. “You don't mean that, my darling. Things don't have to change between us, though I realize you're hurt. I love you, Wynter, and refuse to lose you. True, I am married to Lucy, and she must bear my children. But when we have enough children, I'll stop sleeping with her. Until that time, you can be my mistress, the woman I love. You'll have my heart.”

“Your heart?” Wynter screamed. “Why would I want such an untrue, wretched thing as that? I'll never belong to you now, Adam. I hate you, detest you! You make me ill!”

She pushed away from him, nearly stumbling in her rage. “I'll never be your whore!”

“The arrangement was good enough for your whore mother!”

If he had slapped her she wouldn't have felt such searing pain rush through her. God, he was right, there. Her mother had been her father's kept woman, no better than a London doxy. How the truth hurt! But Wynter hated Adam more at that moment than she could ever hate her father or Sara. She knew it wouldn't do any good to keep hurling angry words at him, and suddenly she didn't care about him, or Lucy, or Debra any longer. She wanted to breathe free.

She composed herself and managed a tight smile which took him aback.

“Perhaps my mother loved my father more than I ever thought I loved you, Adam. I wouldn't let you into my bedroom to polish my shoes, much less invite you into my bed. I do wish you happiness and hope you and Lucy have many years together.”

As she wrenched open the door, she heard his voice raised behind her.

“You'll have a change of heart Wynter. By God, you will!”

Wynter vowed to herself she wouldn't. She'd rather die first.

“I always knew he was no good.”

“Yes, Fletch, I know you did.”

“What do you plan to do now?” Fletch asked and stretched his legs.

“I don't know.”

The early spring breeze caressed them. Wynter's hair blew in gentle wisps around her cheeks. Large, fluffy clouds skittered across the blue sky, and from her vantage point atop the hill, Wynter felt close enough to touch them.

“You know I'm leaving soon for Virginia,” he said.

Wynter's heart contracted. She'd forgotten. Was there no end to her disappointments?

“Don't remind me. I hate for you to go.” Her voice broke.

Fletcher timidly took her hand. “I'll always love you.”

“Oh, Fletcher.” This time the tears welled up, and she found herself crying against his chest like a small child. Why couldn't Adam have loved her like this?

“Now, now, don't cry.” He playfully chucked her under her chin until she looked at him. Then with his fingertips he wiped away the sparkling tears from her face. “I think I just may have a solution to all your problems. You can marry me.”

“Oh, no!” she burst out without thinking.

Fletcher looked hurt. “Sorry. I didn't mean to insult you.”

“It's not that. It would be a great honor to be your wife,” she said hurriedly, “but I can't leave here. Part of Lucy's inheritance is mine, the estate is half mine. I must win it back.”

“How?”

Wynter hunched her shoulders. “I haven't decided yet, but I know one thing: I intend to buy the house and grounds from Debra.” They would all soon move into Somerset House, fulfilling the rest of Debra's dream. Then the McChesney estate would be unlived in if Debra didn't sell it to someone else.

“Where will you get the money? I don't know of any rich blokes from around here who'll loan it to you now that you're begging for it. The word will spread soon enough that you're penniless. No one will go against Lady McChesney or want to offend the new wife of Lord Somerset. Now, when I make my fortune in the new world, foreign place that it is, I'll be willing to give you whatever you need.”

Wynter smiled. “Thank you for caring, Fletch. But I can't wait until you work off your indenture. I need the money now.”

They sat in contemplative silence. Where was she going to get the money to approach Debra to buy the estate? She knew such a transaction would require a great deal of money. Perhaps she could marry someone, maybe one of the young men who had been so taken with her at her birthday ball. She dismissed that. No one would marry her now. Fletch was right about word spreading. Before the week was out, everyone would know she was penniless and living on Debra's charity. No, she decided. A great, dynastic marriage was out of her future.

Yet there was one man she could approach, a man who seemed to have no shortage of either money or arrogance!

“You've lost your good sense, that's what you've done. If Lady McChesney discovers what you're about—”

“She won't,” Wynter declared firmly to Maddie who sat across from her in the coach. “Anyway, what harm is there in visiting Lady Montgomery? Debra can't possibly object.”

“By now the woman and everyone else must know what's happened. Haven't you any pride, my lady?”

Wynter colored under Maddie's sharp, probing glance. “Yes, I have my pride, Maddie, but sometimes a person must put it aside for a nobler cause.”

Maddie retreated into silence and Wynter was glad of it. She had wanted to visit Lady Montgomery's without Maddie's presence, but when Wynter wouldn't tell her the reason for the visit, Maddie insisted on going and jumped into the carriage before Wynter. Wynter had made Maddie believe she would beg funds from Estelle, but in fact she would never humble herself to such a woman … a woman who might have slept with Adam, and Wynter now did believe that she had. But Wynter had no scruples against asking the captain for funds.

Even now she breathed in the fresh smell of another morning. The carriage sped past straw-colored cottages which dotted the countryside, wild roses growing alongside the houses and fields turning green in the distance. The sky was slashed a lucid blue above the vertical edge of the mountains, and the glorious beauty of the spring day caused Wynter to glow with excitement.

The deep amber shade of her gown enhanced the pale beauty of her skin and the rosiness of her cheeks. Maddie had pinned up Wynter's thick hair with golden combs. Briefly Wynter had wondered if she should wear a cloak over the dangerously low bodice, knowing full well that the captain's eyes would hover there first. She opted for the ruby necklace which was a companion piece to her betrothal ring, which now rested on her dressing table at home. Though she viewed both with disgust because Adam had given them to her, she wore the matching necklace, and now it dangled enticingly in the lush valley between her breasts.

“You shall see, dear Maddie, before this day is over I shall be the owner of my father's house.” There was no reason why she shouldn't be. Always used to having her way, she decided the captain would lend her the funds.

Entering Estelle's magnificently furnished bedroom a short time later, Estelle held out her hand to her. The swish of the woman's nightdress was a reminder to Wynter of the man who had probably removed it from her the previous night.

“I hope I haven't inconvenienced you by visiting at such an early hour,” Wynter apologized.

Estelle's eyes swept over Wynter, and a suspicious gleam glittered in their depths.

“This is quite an unexpected surprise. I've heard of Lord Somerset's marriage to your sister, and because of your father's recent death, I expected you'd be in seclusion for some time.”

Wynter shot her a challenging stare. “I'm certain, Lady Montgomery, that you above everyone realizes how propriety can be snubbed and not suffer a whit about it.”