by Anne Gracie
“Keep him very healthy,” she said without hesitation.
Ramón gave a snort of laughter. “Almost I could envy you, Englishman.” And he glanced at Perlita and his gaze warmed. “Almost.”
For the rest of the evening he engaged Luke in conversation, firing questions at him about crops and livestock and estate management in England. Luke answered with assurance and intelligence, Bella noted. He would not need her skills or knowledge.
Bella and Perlita, on opposite sides of the table, couldn’t speak of anything they did not want Ramón to hear, so except when Luke addressed them in conversation, they spent most of the night in silence.
“So they are your mother’s pearls?” Luke exclaimed after supper when they were alone in their bedchamber again. “I thought at first they were, but when you didn’t react…”
“Yes, they’re unmistakable. If I wanted to prove it, I could. The biggest pearl has a tiny mark on it where I bit it when I was a child.”
“Then, dammit, I’m going to get them back for you.” Luke strode toward the door.
“No!” Bella flew across the room to stop him. “Leave it, Luke.”
He frowned. “But they’re all you have of your mother.”
She shook her head. “No, my mother is here.” She touched her heart, then sighed. “Besides, I left the pearls behind eight years ago, knowing Papa was mortally wounded and Ramón was to be the new owner of the estate. I didn’t think. It’s my own fault I lost them.”
“You were thirteen,” Luke growled. “With too damn much to think about as it was. And I don’t like it that that little bitch sat there smugly wearing them to taunt you.” He clenched his fists. “I’ve a good mind to—”
“No, no, please.” She grabbed his arm. “I couldn’t bear it if you and Ramón fought. Besides, Perlita wasn’t being smug or taunting me.”
He grunted. “Why else would she have worn them? If she hadn’t, we’d have been none the wiser.”
“It wasn’t her choice to wear them; it was Ramón’s. She knew nothing about them until tonight, I’m certain. She must have asked him about them after I asked her, and then he made her wear them. She wasn’t at all happy about it, I could see.” She removed the silk shawl and folded it carefully.
“Swine,” Luke muttered. “And she’s just as bad, going along with him.”
“Don’t blame her. She loves him.”
Luke snorted.
Bella said, “She’s just a nineteen-year-old girl who’s never had very much, and she’s hanging desperately on to what she has. Knowing her situation is desperately insecure.”
“So you’re going to just give up the pearls without a fight?”
That was exactly it, Bella thought. Without a fight. Love was making a coward out of her. She wouldn’t risk Luke’s life for anything.
She shrugged as if she didn’t care. “It doesn’t matter. I’ve lived without them for eight years…” The pearls weren’t worth a man’s life. Any man’s. Even Ramón’s.
“It’s not like you to give up so easily.”
The pearls were her past. Luke was her future. And besides, she had better things than pearls to fight for.
She was not going to bed with a shirt.
She took off her shoes and began to unroll her stockings.
His eyes, dark and unfathomable, rested on her. “I’m going for a stroll before I turn in. Would you like a maid to assist you?”
“No, thank you.” She’d dressed and undressed herself for the last eight years, and if her husband was going to be pigheaded and stubborn and refuse to be there to assist her now, she would manage alone.
“It occurred to me today that I’ve been remiss in acquiring a maidservant for you. I’d be happy to engage a girl from Valle Verde for you to take to England.” His voice lost a little of the stiffness. “She would be someone from home you could talk to in England.”
It was a kind thought. Bella considered it briefly. “No, thank you. Such a girl would be lonely in a land where she had no family and didn’t speak the language.”
“Will you not be lonely?” he asked, as if it had only just occurred to him she was leaving everything she knew to go with him.
“I’ve always been lonely. I shall manage.” She gave him a direct look. “Are you coming to bed?”
He avoided her gaze. “Not yet. I’m in need of a stroll.”
A stroll was supposed to be a short walk. He’d been gone for ages. The candle she’d lit for him had sputtered out.
Bella sat in bed, waiting, her bedclothes huddled to her ears. She had almost nodded off when she heard the door creak open. At last.
He closed the door quietly behind him. The room was in shadows, lit only by the glow of the dying fire. He removed his coat and sat to pull off his boots. She heard first one hit the floor, then the other. He’d be starting on the buttons of his waistcoat now.
“You can light a candle if you like,” she said softly. “I’m not asleep.”
He paused. “No need. The fire throws enough light to manage.” He removed his waistcoat and hung it on the back of a chair. He was a tidy man.
“I thought you’d be asleep by now.” Next he unfastened his breeches, shoved them down, and stepped out of them. He shook them out and laid them across the back of the chair. There was no self-consciousness in him; not about his naked lower half, at least.
“I waited up for you.” Now for the shirt. Would he remove it or not? Bella held her breath.
He pulled it over his head. Bella said a rapid prayer.
Then he shook out his nightshirt, put it on, and climbed into bed beside her.
Bella had to press her lips together hard to prevent her disappointment spilling out. She was determined not to nag him about it. Trust could not be forced.
He faced her in bed, his lips parted as if to say something, then he frowned, distracted. “That’s my shirt. Why are you wearing my shirt in bed?”
“Work it out.”
He reached for the shirt. She moved and his palm brushed against her breasts. She shivered and her nipples hardened. He noticed. His eyes darkened. “Take it off,” he said softly.
She moved back a little. “Not unless you take your shirt off first.”
He stiffened.
She folded her arms. “As long as you wear a shirt in bed, so do I.”
“If you’re going to start that again…” He turned away.
“But—”
“I will not discuss it, Isabella,” he said in a hard voice. “If you do not wish to share a bed with me, then that’s your prerogative. I shall sleep elsewhere.” He climbed out of bed, gathered up his clothes, and strode stiffly from the room.
Bella slept badly that night. She kept waking up, thinking Luke was back, but he wasn’t.
Such a short time a wife, yet already she was so used to sleeping with a big, warm man at her back, she couldn’t sleep well without him. The bed felt too large, too empty, too cold.
He appeared at the breakfast table only moments after her. She was about to ask him where he’d slept when Ramón and Perlita arrived.
“Was this yours?” Perlita asked, placing a small cloth doll on the table beside Bella.
Bella picked it up. It was the doll her old nursemaid, Marta, had made her after Papa had given Perlita the doll Bella had seen. Bella must have told Marta something about a golden-haired doll, and Marta made her one.
Bella had flung it away in a rage. She wanted a golden-haired doll from Barcelona, not a stupid homemade thing. But afterward she’d felt bad and had retrieved the homely little doll and hugged Marta.
She hadn’t seen it for years, but it didn’t look quite the same. It was heavier, and the hair was different—golden silk, not thick yellow wool. The doll’s clothes were new as well.
Bella glanced from the doll to her sister. “I don’t understand.”
“I hope you don’t mind. She was looking very shabby and worn,” Perlita said. “So I fixed her and made her some new cloth
es.”
Bella stared. “You made these clothes?” She examined them. The doll was dressed in traditional Aragon dress, each item finely embroidered and perfect down to the last detail.
Perlita smiled. “S í, I like dolls and I like to sew. I make all my own clothes.”
“You make them?” Bella exclaimed. Perlita made all those gorgeous dresses?
Perlita laughed. “You think Ramón would waste money on fancy dresses when Valle Verde is in need?”
To Bella’s amazement, Ramón stopped shoveling food down and kissed Perlita’s hand with an almost courtly air. “It’s not a waste to adorn my beautiful Perla.”
It was almost charming. But then he resumed stuffing food in his mouth and the charm evaporated.
The rest of breakfast passed more or less in silence. Bella had no intention of talking to her husband about the previous night with an audience present, and since they were never very talkative in the morning, nobody noticed the slight constraint between them.
After breakfast was over, it was time to leave Valle Verde. Their bags were stowed in the carriage, and everyone gathered at the front of the house to bid them farewell.
Bella said good-bye to all the servants first. It was harder than she’d thought. Even though she’d been gone for eight years, their farewells were very affectionate. “Come back soon, señora, and do not forget us.” She was no longer Little Master.
There was only one master now at Valle Verde.
And even he managed a passably civilized good-bye, kissing her hand—he must have been taking lessons—and shaking Luke’s hand in a hearty manner. No one would believe, seeing him now, that only the day before he’d offered to murder her husband.
She turned to say good-bye to her sister, but Perlita had disappeared back inside the house. “You forgot this,” she said, returning with the little cloth doll. “Take it with you and keep it in memory of your foolish sister.”
She hugged Bella tightly, kissing her on both cheeks. Bella fought the tears. Perlita made no attempt to hide hers.
Bella turned to get into the carriage, then changed her mind. She marched back up the stairs toward Ramón, grabbed him by the shirtfront, and dragged him aside.
“Marry my sister!” she said. “You’re a stupid, thickheaded, blind fool and a disgrace, and I cannot think why she loves you, but she does, and you don’t deserve her. I wanted to take her to London with me and introduce her to society—”
Ramón’s face darkened. “You won’t take my Perla—”
“Only because she wouldn’t go.” Bella thumped him angrily on his chest. “She could have made her come-out in society. She’s so beautiful she would have had all the men—rich men, lords, handsome men—”
Ramón grinned. “But she chose me.”
“Oh, wipe that disgusting grin off your face, you stupid, smug, self-satisfied oaf!” Bella snapped. “She’s only nineteen and her life is already over—because you’ve ruined her. She has no friends, no relatives—only me, and I will be in England.”
Ramón scowled. “She has me.”
“And you think you’re such a bargain, don’t you? You who make no secret of wanting to marry a rich woman!” Bella poked him in the chest. “Perlita is a treasure, but you’re too stupid to see it. She should be your wife, Ramón, building Valle Verde with you, not sitting in an empty house, seeing no one, and dressing dolls instead of having your babies. You, Ramón, are a big, fat fool. And you disgust me! I pray for the day Perlita grows up and sees you for the selfish pig you are. And when she realizes what she really wants in life, Ramón, then I will be waiting to help her get it, and she’ll be out of here so fast you won’t know what hit you. And then you’ll only have a big house and your own stupidity for company.”
Ramón glowered, his brow thickly knotted. “Little viper. Thank God I never married you.”
“I thank Him for the very same thing.” She wanted to hit him with frustration. Couldn’t he see what he’d done to her sister? She’d come here to help her and nothing had changed, nothing.
Luke slid his hand under Bella’s elbow. “Come on. You’ve done what you could.”
Ramón waved his hand. “Yes, take her away, Englishman. You have my sympathy.”
“Oh, I’m well content with my choice, Spaniard. It’s as my wife said; you don’t recognize gold when it’s under your nose.”
Bella hugged her sister one last time, saying, “Write. And come to us anytime you like,” and then she marched down the steps of El Nueva Castillo and climbed into the carriage.
“Well, you got that off your chest, at least,” Luke commented as the carriage pulled away.
“I should have let you kill him,” she muttered. “Then Perlita would have had no choice but to come with us.”
“I thought you wanted to give her the choice.”
She said nothing, just stroked the little doll Perlita had given her.
“You can’t rescue someone who doesn’t want to be rescued.”
She sighed. “I know.”
“Your sister is a strong-minded young lady. Family resemblance there.”
They traveled in silence for a while. “You know, I wish Perlita had stolen my pearls. It would have made it easier to leave her there.”
“How so?”
“If she had them, then if and when Ramón finds his heiress, she could sell them and leave, make a new life somewhere else. That’s all I really want—for her to have the choice. But since the pearls are in his possession…”
“She’ll never leave him.”
“I know.” She sighed.
“No, I meant, even if she had the pearls and the choice and he found his heiress, she’d still never leave him.”
“I know. She loves him.” She glanced at him. “Mama always said that love was a curse.”
“Your mother was right.” He had the bleak, faraway look in his eyes she’d come to recognize.
The landscape slipped past. They would be back in Huesca by early afternoon.
Traveling in a carriage was nearly as boring as sewing sheets, Bella decided. Luke was about to doze off, she could tell, and she would not sit here, bored witless, bouncing around in a carriage while he slept. She poked him awake. “You can tell me now.”
Luke stretched and responded sleepily, “Tell you what?”
“What provisions you made for me in your will. You said you’d tell me when we left Valle Verde, and we have. So I want to know now—and I’m warning you, Luke, I don’t care how kind your mother and sister are, I won’t be dependent on them.”
He shoved his hands deep into his pockets and crossed his long, booted legs. “I told Ramón the truth; I left you nothing in my will.”
She narrowed her eyes. His eyes were dancing. She caught a gleam of blue in the darkness and the sight heartened her. “Stop teasing.” She tried to look stern.
“It’s true.”
She threw the doll at him. It bounced off him and hit the carriage floor with a bump.
“Ow,” he said mildly. “That doll packs a wallop.”
She snorted. “It’s a rag doll. I know you’ve done something sneaky about the will, so tell me at once, or worse than a flying doll will befall you.”
Luke said thoughtfully, “For a rag doll it’s quite heavy.”
Bella said impatiently, “Perlita restuffed it when she repaired it. She probably used sawdust or something. Now Luke, don’t be so tedious—tell me.”
Luke picked up the doll and examined it. “It’s not sawdust. It feels like… pebbles or something.” He took out his knife and glanced at her. “Do you mind?”
“No.” She was curious, too.
He pulled back the doll’s skirt and slit the stitching down her middle. He parted the seam, closed it, and tossed her the doll. “See for yourself.”
Bella looked. And gasped. From the doll’s stomach she drew a long string of pearls, South Sea Island pearls. “She stole them back for me.”
She ran the pearls throug
h her fingers. They were even more beautiful than she remembered, glowing with a creamy sheen. Each one was perfect. She slipped them over her head, and they went around twice, with room to spare. “Mama’s pearls.”
“I thought you said you didn’t care about those pearls,” he said grimly.
“I lied. I didn’t want you to fight Ramón.”
“Oh for heaven’s sake—”
She looked up, worried. “They must be priceless. When Ramón finds out…”
“She will handle him,” Luke said. “Your sister has a great deal more character than I thought. You might want to settle something on her.”
“Settle something? What do you mean?”
“Some of your inheritance.”
“But… I don’t have an inheritance. You said—”
“No, I said I’d left you nothing in my will. I don’t need to. You still have the fortune your mother left you.”
She gaped at him, speechless. “But, how? When a bride marries, everything she owns belongs by law to her husband. I know that is true. They taught us that at the convent. Unless the bride’s family negotiates settlements, and I know nobody negotiated anything for me. There wasn’t time.”
Luke grinned, enjoying her amazement. “Ah, but your groom did it for you. I promised to look after you, remember? Some protector I would have been if I gained your fortune through marriage one day, and was killed the next. And in wartime there was every likelihood of that.”
She crossed herself. “Thank God you weren’t. But I still don’t understand.”
“I owned your fortune—whatever it is, I still have no idea—for barely a day. When we got to the convent, I wrote out a document returning to you every penny of your mother’s fortune, and anything else that you owned before the marriage, to be held in trust until you turned twenty-one. I made two copies and left one with your aunt, who witnessed it. She still has one copy. The other one is here.” He drew a packet of papers from the breast pocket of his coat, selected one, and handed it to her. “That’s why I left you nothing of mine in my will. You’re a rich woman, Lady Ripton.”
Stunned, she stared at the document. It was as he said. He’d signed everything back to her almost immediately after the wedding. She swallowed. “That is why my aunt was so sure this marriage was the right thing for me. She knew you were a man of honor. But why did she never tell me?”