Rules of Surrender (3 page)

”Nonsense, don’t apologize, either of you.“ Lady Ruskin’s melodious voice turned tart, and she gestured to Skeets to go on. As the carriage jolted back onto the turnpike, she said, ”Some people have more money than sense. Although truly, my lady, such incidents are rare in this neighborhood.“

”If it would please you. Lady Ruskin, I seldom use my title. Call me Charlotte in private, and Miss Dalrumple in front of the children.“

Lady Ruskin’s eyes wanned, and she took Charlotte’‘s gloved hand in her own. ”Thank you, my dear. And you shall call me Adorna, because everyone does.“

That was not at all what Charlotte meant to happen, although she suspected that in Lady Ruskin’s vicinity, matters seldom happened as they should. ”My lady, while I appreciate the invitation and the kindness that it represents, such a liberty would be misinterpreted as a lack of respect on my part, or even insolence.“

”In private, then.“

”Not in front of the children—“

”Not in front of the children, either, although I fear they will never comprehend the complexities of English society.“ Adorna sighed, a lift and fall of her generous bosom. Her spring-green brocade gown nipped in at her narrow waist and her crinolines spread wide, overlapping the smoke-gray of Charlotte’s plain gown. ”They were raised, you see, in El Bahar.“

”El Bahar,“ Charlotte repeated in awe. The country existed east of Egypt and south of Turkey, and evoked images of camels trudging across the undulating sand, of Bedouins and Arabian nights. She couldn’t imagine English children raised in such an environment, and for the first time she understood Adorna’s use of the word ”savages“ to describe her grandchildren. ”How did they get there? And how did they get home?“

”Rather, ask how my son Wynter got there.“

She looked so forlorn Charlotte ached to comfort her. So Adorna had lost her son. What a tragedy. Then the unusual name struck Charlotte. ”Wynter?“

A mental portrait rose before her, one she had not brought to mind since she’d left Porterbridge Hall. The lad Wynter at a country dance, tall and blond, so handsome the girls swooned. Aunt Piper had scornfully proclaimed,
He imagines himself a young blond Byron.
Looking back, Charlotte rather thought he had, for a hank of blond hair hung over his forehead, his odd, dark lashes and brows had set him apart from the crowd of obnoxious adolescents and his brown eyes had been alternating fierce and brooding. Twelve-year-old Charlotte had fallen desperately in love with him, but separated from her by the distance of two years, he hadn’t noticed her, and she hadn’t seen him again.

”Wynter… is your son?“ Charlotte asked.

Adorna looked delighted. ”Did you know him?“

”I suspect I once met him, yes. But I thought he had—“

”Run away. So he did. He took his father’s death badly,“ she said. ”Viscount Ruskin, you know, was my elder by many years.“

Vaguely Charlotte recalled the gossip. Viscount Ruskin had been a shrewd man of business, just the type the aristocracy scorned. But in his old age, he had done a great favor for the crown and the king, assuming such an old man would not beget children, gave him a title. A title when Viscount Ruskin promptly passed on to his son by marrying the beautiful, aristocratic, youthful Adorna.

Viscount Ruskin had been ninety at the time of his death, his marriage a perpetual scandal… yet Ruskin and Adorna had been so wealthy no one dared snub them.

”And although my husband lived a full and happy life, he left us on the day after Wynter’s fifteenth birthday. Wynter was so angry at losing him. He had a fight with some other boys after the funeral.“

Charlotte remembered that, too. Her cousin Orford, as weaselly a creature as had ever lived, had come home bloodied but smirking, and he had snickered when Wynter had disappeared.

Adorna turned to look out the side of the carriage. ”The next day Wynter was gone.“

Charlotte could see only the wing of her bonnet, but she heard the pain of loss in Adorna’s voice.

”He went looking for adventure.“ The bonnet shook from side to side as Adorna contemplated her son’s foolishness. ”He certainly found it. After many escapades, he was sold as a slave to some lowly caravan leader.“

Charlotte didn’t know whether she wanted to laugh or swoon. That young, brooding Adonis had been a slave? She paid little attention as another carriage raced past them. ”Dear heavens, my lady, did you know what had happened to him?“

”Adorna,“ she corrected absently. ”Not at all. Stewart—he is my husband’s cousin’s son—traced him to Arabia, then lost him. Years passed with no word, but I knew he wasn’t dead.“

Another carriage raced past them, and although Charlotte paid it little heed, Adorna’s brow wrinkled in concern.

Then she turned her wide blue eyes toward Charlotte. ”Aunt Jane says I’m a romantic, but I know that when someone you love dies, you sense the tearing of the curtain between this world and the next. Charlotte, I suppose you agree with my aunt.“

”No. No, I don’t agree with your aunt.“ Charlotte’s parents had died not far from this very spot, and for a moment Charlotte was a bewildered eleven-year-old again, hiding under her bed at Porterbridge Hall, flinching with each flash of lightning.

”I didn’t expect to like you.“ Adorna placed her hand on Charlotte’s shoulder. ”I feared you would be rather stiff and haughty, but beneath that you’re quite sensitive, aren’t you?“

Though Charlotte had been sensitive when she was young, she didn’t consider herself sensitive anymore. ”I believe the word you seek is ’sensible.‘ “

Adorna smiled and nodded, but before Charlotte could speak again, she saw beyond Adorna a landmark she recognized, the crossroads marker for Wesford Village.

Wesford Village. Charlotte had hoped that Adorna’s home would be at the far end of the North Downs, away from Porterbridge Hall, Uncle Shelby, Aunt Piper and her cousins. Fate, however, had ruled against her.

And if—no, when!—the gentry discovered Lady Charlotte Dalrumple had returned… ah, that would put the cat among the pigeons.

Adorna look around and saw the signpost, and assured Charlotte, ”Austinpark Manor is just ahead, so you needn’t worry you shall be totally cut off from civilization.“

”Such a thought would never cross my mind.“

Adorna lavished a smile on her, the kind of smile that would make pudding of the average male and produced in Charlotte the uncomfortable sensation of having been transparent. ”Of course not, dear. You are the type of female who finds frivolity unnecessary.“

”I… that’s true.“ So true, but Adorna made a simple virtue sound… tedious. ”But my lady… Adorna… you must tell me what happened to your son, how your grandchildren were returned to you. The children must be devastated by their loss.“

Adorna shook her head. ”They devastate; they are not devastated.“

The children weren’t devastated by their father’s death? Charlotte’s long-forgotten romanticism surfaced. Perhaps the children had been orphans for a long time, wandering the desert…

Just ahead, a carriage turned onto the road, and the coachman whipped up the horses. They drove past in a breakneck hurry.

Charlotte recognized the crest on the carriage—as if she could ever forget it!—and her face went stiff.

Adorna craned her neck to see who was within. ”How odd! That was Lord and Lady Howard.“

Charlotte managed to answer, ”So it was.“

Adorna patted her hand. ”Of course. I remember. How dreadful for you. But they were coming from Austinpark Manor, and it looked as if she were striking him with her hat! No one should be at the house except…“ Her eyes rounded in horror, and she clutched the lace at her throat. ”Tell me he didn’t invite anyone to visit while I was gone.“

”Who?“

”He wouldn’t dare. I gave him specific instructions…“

”What?“

Adorna leaned forward and said urgently, ”Skeets, hurry!“

The carriage turned between two gateposts onto a country lane. Skeets obediently urged the horses past a large and handsome gatehouse. Gravel sprayed from beneath the wheels. Adorna clutched the side of the carriage in her white-gloved hand and strained to see forward.

Charlotte was missing a very important piece of information, but what it was she could not imagine. They rolled past magnificent old trees lining the road. She caught azure glimpses of a serene lake in the distance, a marble pavilion, a trellised garden alight with bobbing flowers of gold, lavender and pink. And finally, as they rounded a curve, she saw the aged mellow blend of brick and stone of Austinpark Manor. The house blended into its surroundings, hugging the earth and rising to the skies in a celebration of man’s elegance. The classic style had been popular one hundred years before; Charlotte wondered what noble family had built it, and lost it, and why.

Then another carriage rolled toward them, and Adorna exclaimed, ”That’s Mr. Morden and his wife, and you know what a stickler for propriety she is! Oh, I hope he hasn’t ruined everything.“

The house disappeared behind a grove of trees, then when their open carriage rounded the curve, the house reappeared just ahead.

On the portico stood a man.

Even from a distance, Charlotte could tell he was tall and broad-shouldered, a monument to masculine strength. Or perhaps he could be better called an affront to English civilization.

As they drove closer, she noted that his hands, clenched in fists on his hips, were massive. His shoulders stretched broad, and the muscles on his chest couldn’t be concealed by his white shirt and sober black waistcoat. His trousers did not conceal his potency; rather, they emphasized it with a trim cut that provided the concept of straining seams and popping buttons.

He gave the impression of a man who had staked a claim, yet Charlotte didn’t understand how. Surely this was Adorna’s new husband, although she hadn’t mentioned one, or a relative. Perhaps Stewart, the distant relative Adorna had mentioned.

But Charlotte couldn’t pull her attention from the brute’s hair.

Barbarously long, his locks blew in the breeze— and they were blond. The same blond as Adorna’s.

As the carriage pulled to a halt, the man smiled. He started forward. And Charlotte saw what she hadn’t seen before. His poor disguise of refinement was not complete.

His feet were bare.

It couldn’t be, yet Charlotte had to ask, ”Who is he?“

”My son.“ Adorna glared at him as she waited for Skeets to place the step and assist her down. ”My son Wynter, back from the grave to plague me.“

CHAPTER 3

”I thought he was dead,“ Charlotte blurted.

Charlotte never spoke without thinking, and that slip should have warned her of the impact Wynter would have on her life. But she was blissfully oblivious as Adorna descended from the carriage.

As Charlotte watched, Adorna mounted the shallow steps and enfolded Wynter in her arms. ”Dear boy, what have you done now?“

He leaned down to give her a warm buss on the cheek. In an accent so faint and foreign Charlotte had to strain to hear it, he said, ”I simply told the men that they should keep their women under tighter rein.“

Charlotte’s old infatuation died a death so painless she scarcely noted its passing.

”Wynter, how could you say such a thing in Mrs. Morden’s presence? She fancies herself above reproach, and the Mordens are rich and high-placed enough that she may think whatever she likes.“

He reflected. ”Actually, it was Lady Howard who took the greatest offense. A viperous woman who flirted with me in front of her man.“

Charlotte pretended not to hear.

”Ladies are not sequestered here,“ Adorna said. ”Flirtation is allowed.“

”Is it proper?“ he demanded.

Adorna tilted her head as she considered the intricacies of English society and how to explain them to her son. ”Not when one party is married, but—“

”What
but
can there be? If it’s not proper, it’s improper.“ He turned to Charlotte as she gathered her carpetbag and descended from the carriage with Skeets’s assistance. ”What do you think?“

Charlotte
thought
any man who went barefoot, wore his hair like a woman and couldn’t manage to button his shirt all the way to the top should not be passing judgment, but her ingrained manners would not allow her to say so. Instead she folded her hands before her. ”It’s not what I think or
you
think that matters. What matters is the hospitable treatment of guests.“

”Yes. In the desert, if a guest is not treated hospitably, the sand and the sun bleach his bones.“ He looked past her as if seeing the shifting dunes and blazing sun. Then, behind him, someone cleared his throat and Wynter’s attention snapped back to the present. He moved away from the top step of the portico to allow Charlotte to ascend, and without inflection, said, ”Speaking of guests, Mother, you have one.“

Adorna faced the well-dressed gentleman standing in the open doorway. Her fingers fluttered at her throat, and she said, ”Lord Bucknell. Dear Lord Bucknell, what a surprise! Always pleasant, of course, but I had no idea… and to catch me away! But you’ve… met my son?“ Her usual husky tone held a note of consternation, yet a smile curved her lips, and she moved toward Lord Bucknell with both hands outstretched.

Lord Bucknell stepped into the sunshine, a fit, hand-some man of perhaps fifty. His hair was sprinkled with gray, his carriage erect, and he took her hands in his as if he knew better than to indulge in such a greeting, yet couldn’t resist. ”Yes, I met your son. Quite a shock, after these years. But you must be happy, Lady Ruskin. I know his absence caused you no end of grief.“

”It did.“ She gave a gurgle of youthful laughter. ”But I told you he wasn’t dead.“

”So you did.“ His solemn smile contrasted oddly with Adorna’s warmth. But perhaps Wynter’s unflinching gaze constrained him.

Charlotte stepped foot on the veranda, and as smoothly as some great-maned predator, Wynter again switched his concentration back to her. She stood still as he closed in behind her and proceeded to circle, examining her with the open curiosity he might show a zoo animal.

She did not lower herself to do the same, but neither did she turn her eyes away in a pretense of cowardice. Nothing intimidated Charlotte; the sooner he learned that fact, the less conflict they would endure.