The Legacy (18 page)

“And this is important to you because …?” Peter inquired.

Wolf paced in front of him while he sorted out his response. “At some point shortly before her death, Sabina’s mother amended her bequest. Since the money was a part of Marie’s bride portion, and therefore not her husband’s property, it was hers to do with as she wished. The amended bequest added a provision stating if Sabina became betrothed before her twenty-fifth birthday, the amount would be converted to a dowry for her future husband.” He paced back again. “If, however, Sabina took vows and remained in the convent, on her twenty-fifth birthday the amount would go directly into the coffers of the abbey to which she belonged, to provide for her upkeep and daily needs. The same provision applied if she died—the money would revert to the Church.”

“Ah,” Peter said with understanding.

“Yes, you follow the logic. Her mother must have feared after the scandal, Sabina would be unable, without a proper dowry, to find a suitor. Not to mention being in danger of the baron pillaging any funds she might inherit.”

“Given what you’ve told me of the man, it was a good gamble he would never have made provisions for her either way,” Peter observed.

Wolf nodded. “This way, the baron couldn’t keep the money for his own use once Sabina reached her majority.”

Peter nodded approvingly. “Her mother was a wise woman.”

“Not wise enough.” Wolf gazed into his goblet again while Peter stared at him with an inquiring look. He dipped his finger into the Brandywine and drew it along the rim, watching the wet trail it left behind. “She didn’t count upon the motives of her daughter’s betrothed.” He raised stricken eyes to Peter. “Effectively, the legacy became mine the day I married Sabina. Mine to do with as I will. Because of her father’s deception, Sabina doesn’t know. She thinks she’s still set to inherit it.”

“And I assume it’s not going to happen,” Peter said, his tone disapproving.

Wolf felt defensive, though it was his own guilty conscience abrading him. “I must return the legacy to the baron or all is lost. Everything our grandfather fought so hard to achieve. Everything Papa worked for years to attain. I’ve no other choice.”

“When do you plan to tell her?” Peter cut to the significant matter in one skillful jab.

“I thought to immediately, at first, but now …” Wolf’s voice trailed away, and he absently swirled the Brandywine in his goblet.

“But now? Wolf, you cannot start a marriage based on lies. If you have any hope of wedded bliss, surely you must realize—”

“That’s just it. I didn’t.”

“One of us is not making sense.” Peter peered into his goblet. “Perhaps it is the Brandywine.”

“I mean I didn’t have any hope of a successful marriage at all. At first I thought to file for dissolution after the debt had been paid, return her to the convent, but now …”

“On what basis?” Peter asked.

Wolf looked up. “What? Oh, non-consummation of the union.”

Peter laughed, actually laughed at him. He doubled over, slapped his knee, and howled. Finally, he wiped his eyes, which were tearing with mirth. “Oh, certainly. That will work. I give you two days, perhaps three, before you have her flat on her back counting the beams in your bedchamber ceiling.”

Wolf frowned. “Don’t be vulgar.”

“If you make it that far,” Peter continued, wagging his finger. “I heard about your antics by the river, you know. Talk about being vulgar,” he said with obvious amusement.

It was all Wolf could manage not to squirm. “It was an unguarded moment. I didn’t intend for it to happen.” He narrowed his gaze suspiciously. “Who told you?”

“Never mind. I have my spies.” Peter smiled slyly. “Besides, if you don’t wish to become the subject of gossip, you shouldn’t engage in such doings out of doors.”

“It won’t happen again,” Wolf said blackly.

Peter sat back in Wolf’s chair and crossed his ankles on the desk. His eyes twinkled. “My dear brother, I would wager money against those odds.” Then he grew serious. “What do you think she’ll do when the gold doesn’t materialize?”

Wolf knocked Peter’s feet off the desk and sat down in their place. “There is my problem. I must give up the money, but if I do, I suspect I’ll lose any chance of convincing her to stay with me.”

“Is that what you want? For her to stay?”

Wolf didn’t immediately answer. However, he’d known since their encounter in his study he would be damned if he let her walk out of his life now. “I have been thinking … perhaps I should delay telling her anything, until we’ve had more time to come to know one another, and then—” he stopped when he saw the astounded look on his brother’s face.

“You plan to seduce her before she learns the truth? God’s wounds, Wolf, do you think that’s fair? Shouldn’t she have the right to make that decision, too, under the circumstances?”

“She’s already my wife.” Wolf couldn’t help the note of possessiveness that crept into his voice. “The decision has been made.”

“But she was coerced. By all rights, it makes the marriage invalid,” Peter pointed out.

Wolf stood and paced. “Only if one of us challenges it. I have no intention of doing so.” He stopped. “No one else had better challenge it either.” The look he shot Peter was intended as a warning, one Peter received with a clenched jaw.

Wolf waited, muscles tensed, until Peter tilted his head in a reluctant nod of agreement. Wolf relaxed and resumed pacing. “I find she … suits me. I didn’t expect to wed, but that doesn’t mean we cannot find a way to be amenable to one another.” He stared thoughtfully at the wall. “Now I just need to make her see things the same way.”

“Do you love her?”

“What?” Wolf spun around to face Peter, taken aback by the quiet query.

“You heard me. Your behavior might make sense if you were in love with her, but—”

Wolf cut him off impatiently. “This has nothing to do with love.”

Peter leaned forward in his chair. “Doesn’t it? What would Sabina say?”

Wolf looked away, a vague sense of guilt and unease pervading him. “Love will not be mentioned. I don’t wish to give her false hopes. Besides, I’m not certain I can ever fall in love again. There is too much risk in it.” He looked over at the portrait of Beth.

“Wolf,” Peter said gently, “you have to move on.”

“I don’t know how,” Wolf confided abruptly. He still felt the anguish of Beth’s loss as though it was a fresh wound. He went to the portrait, traced a finger across her smile.

“Sometimes,” he said, his voice soft, “I think we were connected at the heart, Beth and I, like those conjoined twins we once read about in your medical book. When she died, I felt as if half of my heart had been torn away.” He looked at Peter, willing him to understand. “I can’t go through it again.”

Peter rose and rested a hand on Wolf’s arm. “If you cannot overcome such feelings, mayhap it would be better to let Sabina go and allow her to find someone who can love her as you cannot.”

Stung, Wolf jerked his arm away. “Never,” he snarled.

They stared at each other, both startled by his outburst.

Peter sat back down in the chair and steepled his fingers together, gazing at Wolf over them. “Ah, so that is the way of it, is it? You don’t love her, but you don’t want anyone else to have her, either.” He shook his head. “God, you’re like a dog with a bone.”

“What of it?” Wolf demanded. “I have a right to this bone.”

“It seems to me,” Peter mused, “when dealing with love, rights have very little to do with it.”

“It’s not love!” Wolf slammed his goblet down and heard it crack. He stared at it in surprise as the amber fluid slowly leaked out of a minute fissure in the bowl. He tried to collect himself, setting the goblet carefully aside and drawing out another. He splashed more of the Brandywine in it, taking a deep swallow.

“She stays,” he said finally. “That’s all there is to it. Besides, she’ll have no resources now, not without her inheritance. She’s better off staying with me. I owe her that much. It is a matter of economics, if anything.”

Wolf was lying, and they both knew it. The sour tang of jealousy invaded his mouth at the very thought of another man touching Sabina, and he drank what was left of the Brandywine to rid himself of it.

Why did his fine drink seem to have suddenly lost its taste?

S
abina tucked the bedclothes around Gisel’s squirming little body. The child stared up at her with unabashed admiration, and shyly touched a lock of hair trailing out of Sabina’s braid.

“Pretty,” she said.

Sabina smiled and stroked a finger down Gisel’s cheek. Though her relationship with Wolf was now so much more awkward, her relationship with his daughter had blossomed. They had spent the past days together, and after her dinner tonight, the child had begged Sabina to tuck her into bed. It had surprised her, but not as much as it surprised Wolf, since he was normally in the habit of doing it. He had allowed it, but she got the distinct impression he felt shuffled aside.

Sabina had avoided being alone with him. They had managed only politely stilted conversation with one another ever since he had thrown her affections back into her face. Though she would catch him staring at her from time to time, he would casually turn away, leaving her to believe the naked hunger in his gaze was just her imagination. There were no more shared secrets, no more careless laughter, no more passionate embraces.

He had made it obvious to her, her past was more of an obstacle than she had suspected. Every man wants a virgin for a bride, she supposed, even those men who dallied willy-nilly with every wench they could lay their hands upon. Did they never realize each of those women was someone’s daughter, sister, friend?

Well, she could not change what she was, no matter how much she wished it. All she could do was look toward her future.

She had her pride. She would not allow her emotions to get out of control again the way they had in the study. She knew perfectly well how a man could use a woman’s traitorous heart to lay claim to what he wanted, and then simply toss her aside. She would not be fooled again.

Therefore, she would set her mind to other matters. Such as her haven, for instance. She must begin to make plans. Perhaps she could enlist Dr. Luther’s aid in finding residents for it.

She glanced down at the little girl again. In a way, Gisel reminded her of herself. She was a lonely thing, surrounded by adults all day with very few playmates. Yet, Sabina saw the child’s fierce determination to overcome all obstacles to her desires as a mirror of her own.

So, was Sabina no more than a child at heart?

“Are you my new mama?”

The softly spoken question brought her sharply out of her musings. Was Gisel dreaming? No, the child stared directly at her, wide awake.

“What?” Sabina asked, pretending not to understand.

Gisel touched Sabina’s cheek. “My new mama,” she said again.

Sabina sat back, flabbergasted. The child of course must have concluded, as her father’s new wife, Sabina was now her stepmother. Still, to call her such, so soon … she had no idea how Wolf would feel about it, but she had a suspicion it was highly premature.

“Perhaps you should just keep calling me Lady. It can be your special name for me, and no one else’s.” She leaned over and hastily kissed Gisel’s downy-soft cheek while the little girl thought about that. “Now, you had best go to sleep, or you will be tired and irritable tomorrow.”

Sabina rose from the bedside, picked up the candle, and was nearly out the door before she heard a little whisper from the bed.

“Goodnight, Mama.”

A pang of longing went through Sabina so sharp, she put a hand to her breast. Her throat closed up. Common sense said she should refuse to allow this. She should put a stop to it right now.

“Goodnight, sweetheart,” she crooned, and quietly closed the door behind her. She leaned her head against the cool wood and burst into tears.

That was how Wolf found her.

“Sabina? Are you well?”

She straightened and furtively wiped her damp face, forcing a tremulous smile.

“Of course. Why should I not be well?” she managed.

He lifted a brow. “I can’t imagine. Perhaps it was the sobbing that made me think otherwise.”

“I was not sobbing,” she snapped, and marched briskly away. She would not for all the world reveal to him how his beautiful, precious, sweet little daughter had made her cry for pure joy, something she had never in her life had a reason to do.

He followed her down the hall and stopped her by the simple expediency of stepping in front of her. Going around him would be like trying to go around a mountain, so she did not try. He lifted his candle until the light spilled over her face, and touched a finger to her cheek. It came away wet.

“This says you were crying.”

“I had something in my eye. Would you please step aside?” She took a step to the right, but he matched her.

“I came to get you for supper.” His thumb brushed her cheek, and he wiped her tears away. She felt a weakness flood her knees, but resisted it with determination.

“Good, I am hungry,” she said.

He went still. “So am I.”

She looked at him for the first time and knew he was not speaking of food. His eyes roamed over her, and she heard the slow breaths he seemed to force himself to take.

She would not fall into that tender trap again. “Then you had better move so we will not be late,” she suggested blandly.

He blinked, and his mouth tightened. He dropped his hand. “Yes, I suppose I had better,” he said, but still he did not step aside.

She sighed. “What would you have me do? Tell me, so I may go.”

He stared at her, a vein pulsing in his temple, looking suddenly vulnerable. Worse, he seemed uncertain of himself, no doubt an uncomfortable position to be in for someone normally so decisive. It must be unbearable for him. She felt a moment of pity.

“Poor Wolf. You really don’t know what you want, do you?”

His face closed up. “You’re right.”

She was surprised until he moved aside.

“We had better go. We don’t want to be late.” He turned and stalked off down the hall.