The Most Eligible Bachelor Romance Collection: Nine Historical Romances Celebrate Marrying for All the Right Reasons (55 page)

“Are we back to this again? I just want to be left alone.” Alicia’s fork clattered to her plate, and she yanked her napkin from her lap and throttled it. “Grrrrr.”

“Really, Alicia, is all this drama necessary?”

Mother’s cool tone and ever-present control jabbed at Alicia, making her want to do something drastic, like hurl her cut-glass goblet into the marble fireplace. She’d tried so hard to remain composed, but her mother could drive a turtledove to violence. Lately, every conversation they had veered toward the same infuriating topic.

“Mother, I’m merely expressing my feelings on the matter.” She took a sip of her water, set the glass out of immediate reach to lessen the temptation, and curled her fingers in her lap. “While I appreciate your efforts on my behalf—”

“No, I do not believe you do.” Mother arched her perfectly shaped eyebrow, and with the deftness of a surgeon parted snail from shell before popping the escargot into her mouth. She chewed carefully before blotting her lips with her napkin. The fact that she had interrupted Alicia midsentence showed the extremity of her feelings on the matter, and Alicia knew better than to speak again until her mother had finished. “You are our only daughter and heir. The matter of your marriage is paramount this season. It is, after all, your third since your debut. If you don’t marry this year, people will talk. They’ll think there’s something we’re hiding that makes you an undesirable match. New York society has been blessed with several possible candidates among the young men, and it is up to us, as your parents, to select the most suitable.”

“And I have no say in the matter?” Alicia’s voice echoed off the ceiling mural and walnut paneling.

Mother took her time once more. “I did not say that, and I would appreciate it if you would modulate your voice as befitting a lady of this house. I said we would select a few young men we deemed suitable. From that point, the choice is yours.”

“After you’ve looked through their pedigrees and prospects? After they’ve looked through mine? I feel like a show dog, trotted out for approval and blue ribbons.”

“Really, Alicia, that is taking things to an extreme that is unbecoming to you and unbefitting to us. We’ve left you to your own devices for the past two seasons, with nothing to show for it in the way of matrimonial prospects. It’s now time for us to step in and assist you.”

Abandoning her last hold on decorum, Alicia shoved her plate away, setting her water goblet to rocking, and appealed to the higher power seated at the head of the table. “Father, surely you aren’t in agreement with this plan?”

He lifted his large, leonine head, slanting his eyes first toward his wife then his daughter. He smoothed his sideburns with his palms and straightened his tie. “Now, Ally-girl, don’t get yourself into a bother. I’m sure your mother knows what’s best in these matters.”

“Please, David. Her name is Alicia.” Mother leaned back to allow the maid to remove her plate. The gaslight from the chandelier caused golden arcs to race along the smooth, shiny wings of her dark hair, pulled back into a severe knot that accentuated her high cheekbones and wide, brown eyes. A great beauty in her youth, she retained a regal loveliness. “As your father says, I do know best in these matters. I had hoped you would be as eager as I to secure your future, but if last summer’s behavior in Newport is any indication, you would rather fritter away your time painting seascapes and sketching shorebirds than meeting eligible young men.”

“That’s because the young men in Newport couldn’t have come up with an original thought amongst themselves.” Alicia flung her napkin down. “You can’t seriously think I would be interested in one of those egotistical coxcombs? All they care about is sailing and soirees and sport. None of them know how to
do
anything. They just talk.”

Incessantly. About themselves.

“I want a husband with some substance, with a mind and muscles and the ability to use both. The men you trot out are fops and dilettantes, more concerned with matching their cravats to their waistcoats than doing anything worthwhile with their lives or their money.” Her mind jolted to the young man she’d run into—literally—at the museum that day. With tanned skin, rough hands, and piercing eyes, he had the bearing of a man of purpose, intelligence, and action.

Max. The name suited him.

Mother’s lips drew tight. “These are young men of breeding from some of the finest families in the country. They will head great companies and manage great wealth. I have high hopes that you will soon abandon these pedestrian qualities you are displaying—which I am sure must come from your father’s side of the family—and remember that you are not only a Davidson but a Van Baark as well. You owe it to your family to make a good match.”

What about what I owe to myself?
She knew better than to say the words. Mother wouldn’t put up with what she deemed impertinence, and Father would bow to Mother’s wishes as he always did when it came to “domestic” matters.

Picking up her napkin, Alicia folded it carefully and placed it beside her plate. “May I be excused? I’m not feeling well.” Which wasn’t exactly a lie. The entire conversation nauseated her.

“You were late for dinner again tonight, and now you want to be excused early? Whatever am I to do with you, child? We are expected at the opera tonight.” Mother’s pointed reminder made Alicia want to scream. “With the Van Rensselaers.”

“Please, give them my regrets.” With as much dignity as she could muster, Alicia nodded to her parents and swept from the room. The train on her silk gown shushed across the carpets, and upon reaching the foyer, her footsteps echoed on the cold marble stairs. She didn’t stop ascending until she reached the fifth floor. Though she had a palatial bedroom on the second floor just down the hall from her parents’ rooms, it was here under the eaves that she spent most of her time in the house.

Moonbeams drifted through the massive skylight, bathing her studio in soft, creamy rays. She inhaled the familiar, comforting scents of turpentine and canvas and paint, wrapping her arms at her waist and letting her eyes drift closed, releasing the tension in her neck and shoulders. Sighing, she closed the door behind her. Turning the key on the gaslight, she brought artificial light into the room. Gossamer curtains wafted at the french doors opening onto a tiny balcony, and she went to rest her arms on the wrought-iron railing and contemplate the city below.

The sound of horses’ hooves on Fifth Avenue drifted up to her, and on the spring breeze the sound of new leaves rustling in Central Park across the street bespoke the coming of summer. Over the tops of the trees, if she leaned out far enough, she could make out the dark bulk of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. If her heart was in this studio, her soul was at the Met.

The sputtering clatter of a motor car rattled by, disturbing her thoughts. It pulled into the half-circle drive and under the porte cochere. Mother’s ride to the opera. Voices drifted up, and Alicia wasn’t a bit sorry not to be down there. The Van Rensselaers had an obnoxious son with perpetually moist lips who tried to hold her hand at every opportunity. A shudder rippled through her.

She tried to shove him and all the rest of it from her mind. Unpleasant thoughts weren’t allowed here in the safety of her aerie.

Tomorrow, she would slip away early with her sketch pad and walk the stately halls of the museum, breathing in the essence of the artwork and antiquities, refueling the deepest, most vital part of her, the part her mother couldn’t seem to understand.

And she would fix today’s drawing, adding another feather symbol to the cartouche of Seti I.

Who was that young man? He must be somebody at the museum if he had meetings there. She closed her eyes and tried to envision the glimpses of paperwork she’d caught. Galleries, display cases, and lots of numbers. Maybe he was an assistant curator. He obviously knew something about Egyptology.

He didn’t dress like a dandy. If anything, he dressed like a horseman, or at the least an outdoorsman of some kind, with his high boots and tweed jacket.

Max. The name fit him. Solid and strong. She smiled to herself, a little thrill racing up her arms. No man had ever piqued her curiosity like this before. She couldn’t seem to stop thinking about him. If he were among the gaggle of men her mother wanted to parade through here this season, she might not kick so much.

The door opened, fluttering the curtains, and she turned. When she caught sight of who it was, she relaxed her grip on the railing and laced her fingers together in front of her. “Did Mother send you up to ‘reason with me’?”

“No, darlin’, I came up to make sure you were all right. Your mother’s set off for the opera. Are you sure you won’t go? It’s the final night of the season. I could send for the carriage if you’ve changed your mind.” Father crossed the studio floor and came to put his arm around her.

“I don’t want to go to the opera. Or the theater. Or Newport for the summer.” She laid her head on his lapel, taking in the scent of pipe tobacco and the butterscotch hard candy he favored. “I don’t want to be trotted out like a prize pony for the highest bidder, nor do I want someone else choosing whom I should marry.”

He patted her shoulder. “Well, that’s a lot of what you don’t want. What
do
you want?”

She pulled away, spreading her arms to encompass the night sky. “I want to live. I want to paint and travel and experience life. I don’t want to be confined to endless rounds of social calls and convention. I want more than a Fifth Avenue mansion and an ‘excellent match’ with someone I barely know and care about even less. I want what you had before you got rich and moved to New York and married Mother. I want to be a Davidson, not a Van Baark.”

Father shook his head and dug in his pocket for his pipe. “You
are
a Davidson. Something your mother reminds me of every time you threaten to go maverick.” He dipped his pipe into his tobacco pouch and tamped the bowl full.

“I love her. I really do. But I don’t understand her, and I know she’ll never understand me. It’s hard to be the daughter of someone so… perfect. Honestly, she’s so controlled all the time, she’d make a footstool look flamboyant. Meanwhile, I feel as if I’m ready to burst out of my skin… like I’m a butterfly in a cocoon, but I can’t break the shell open and fly.”

Clouds of smoke wreathed Father’s head as he lit the pipe. Whipping his hand to extinguish the match, he studied her. “I know how you feel, Ally-girl. And I know you love your mother. Believe it or not, she loves you, too, though she doesn’t say so. It’s just not her way, you understand? You know how reserved all the Van Baarks are, and Una Van Baark is the Van Baarkiest of them all.”

Strolling back into the studio, he tilted his head, studying the canvas propped on her easel. “Lovely painting of a boat, Ally.”

She giggled and rolled her eyes. “Daddy, it’s the Great Pyramid of Giza.”

He grinned and pointed his pipe stem at her. “I know it, girl. You might’ve gotten your looks from your mother and your adventurous spirit from me, but I’m blamed if I can figure out where you got your artistic talent. I can’t even draw water.”

Alicia smiled at his familiar jest. “What am I going to do about Mother?”

A sigh lifted his snowy shirtfront. “Be patient. Deep down, all your mother wants is for you to be happy. It’s just that she’s had a pretty narrow existence and can’t see past her own experience. She lived a sheltered life with a small circle of friends. Her family wanted her to marry well, and by that I mean marry money. The Van Baark fortune was dwindling and needed a boost. Along comes this brash Westerner with some ready cash, and hey, presto, we’re married. Things were pretty rocky for a while, but we sorted it out. We’ve been married twenty-two years, and I reckon we’ll continue on the same path. Business is good, and the money’s flowing in, and on top of that we have the prettiest, sweetest daughter in the city—one that’s talented to boot.”

She hugged him, knowing he meant well, but still fighting a tide of restlessness.

“You keep your eyes open, girlie. I wasn’t looking for marriage when I tripped right over it. The right man for you is out there somewhere. You’ll find him.”

“I’d rather he find me.”

James Maxwell Kirkland pinched the bridge of his nose, pushing his spectacles up onto his forehead. He dug his fingers into his neck to ease the knots. Ruefully, he nudged aside a stack of paper on his desk and propped his boots up on one of the packing crates filling the cubbyhole the museum had allotted him as an office. Things were progressing, in spite of interference from too many people. It had been a long, trying day of meetings, distractions, and details, and he wasn’t finished yet. He leaned his head back against the chair and closed his eyes.

A loud knock jarred him upright, his feet slamming to the floor.

“Max?” Augustus Bellows stuck his bull-like head and shoulders through the doorway. “So this is where you’ve been hiding yourself. I’ve been looking all over for you.”

Max pushed himself to his feet and shook the big man’s hand, trying not to wince under the crushing pressure. “Good evening, sir. I haven’t been hiding. I’ve been working.”