Hero Wanted

by Betina Krahn

  He quickly opened them and sucked a deep breath.

  Then she threw the damned ring at him, called him a coward, and stalked off to find her own way home.

  A coward. How dare the chit?

  What did she know about him . . . his naval experience, his successes at Oxford, and the number of times he’d been entreated to stand for Parliament? She hadn’t bothered to ask a single question about his plans for the future—ostensibly her future as well. In fact, she hardly spoke when they were together. He had to carry the burden of conversation entirely by himself. At Lady Edgerton’s dinner party she’d yawned—yawned!—in the middle of his rationale for reviving the Board of Trade.

  Wretched female—she should be required to wear a sign warning others to beware her erratic nature. Dull as ditchwater one minute and hot-eyed with fury the next. Both wrapped in an oddly fascinating little body that kept filling his mental vision at unexpected moments. Like now.

  Again.

  Worse yet, he’d have to face his father with the news.

  He groaned as the scantily clad vixen riding his memory vanished. The thought of his father’s reaction was enough to send a chill through the most stalwart of men. Best to go downstairs and get it over with.

  Half an hour later he appeared in the grand, oak-paneled dining room of his parents’ house, where his mother and father had just finished a late breakfast and were engaging in their morning ritual of perusing correspondence and The Times, respectively. He seldom joined them for breakfast these days; he spent most nights at his club or at his friend Barclay Howard’s fashionable town house. They looked up as he entered and greeted him as they always had—as if he were the sun itself, risen to shine just for them.

  “There you are.” His mother lowered the engraved note she was inspecting and gave him a beatific smile. Caroline Townsend was a plump, pretty woman with a calm disposition that contrasted markedly with her spouse’s bombastic nature. Her gray-blue eyes sparkled with life and her dark hair showed threads of silver that hinted at wisdom paired with the warmth she radiated.

  “Made a night of it, eh?” his ruddy, barrel-chested father said with a sly half grin. “Get it out of your system, boy. Can’t be out carousing all night when you’re a married man.”

  Rafe paused for a tick in the midst of taking his usual seat at the elegant table. He hadn’t expected the topic to be raised so helpfully by his granite-jawed father. It felt like a nudge from the Fates.

  “Marriage, I believe, requires a bride as well as a groom,” he said, nodding for the servant to begin serving the eggs, bacon, and scones that filled the dining room with delicious aromas. “As of this morning, I am no longer in possession of one of those requirements.”

  The Times was folded and the invitation lowered.

  “Whatever do you mean?” Caroline looked genuinely puzzled.

  Rafe leaned to allow the servant to pour him coffee.

  “You have a lovely bride-to-be,” his mother said with growing concern. “In three months’ time you will be—”

  “Still a bachelor,” he said, biting into one of Cook’s delectable scones to stall. “I am no longer betrothed.”

  A brief silence fell as his parents looked to each other in dismay and then turned to him. Under their scrutiny, his face heated like a guilty sixteen-year-old’s.

  “What the devil are you blathering on about, boy?” his father demanded, with special emphasis on the last word. It was a tactic that his father had used to intimidate him in his younger years. It hadn’t worked to engender fear and obedience in him for years, but was still useful for demonstrating an escalating lack of paternal patience.

  “What’s happened, dear?” Caroline leaned toward him with an outstretched hand on the tabletop, and suddenly there was a look about her that he had dreaded more than anything else in breaking this news, a look that spoke of tender emotions inside the shell of strength she wore.

  He straightened. Best to come straight out with it.

  “It’s off. The engagement. I have the ring back and it’s off. Not a moment too soon.” He fortified himself with a gulp of coffee, scrambling to recall the sensible arguments against the match he’d thought of while shaving. “The girl was wholly unsuitable. Unstable. Given to glum silences one moment and alarming, impulsive actions the next. Disastrous wife material. Thank the Trinity I found out the truth of her nature in time.”

  He stuffed half a scone in his mouth, trying not to look at his parents as he chewed doggedly. Lack of cream and jam and a dry mouth made it almost impossible to swallow.

  “Do you have any idea what you have done?” His father rose, shoving his chair back and slapping his newspaper on the table with enough force to rattle the silver resting on his plate. “Who gave you permission to call off a wedding that’s been years in the making?”

  “I didn’t call it off. It was more a mutual thing. I found her unacceptable and she—seemed perfectly satisfied to part futures and go on her erratic way alone.” He felt he was on firmer ground now and reached for his coffee to rinse down the mass in his mouth. “Good riddance, I say.”

  He made himself look at his mother. She had a wilted look, and he felt the weight of her disappointment settle on his shoulders like a yoke.

  “She seemed like such a pretty and agreeable young woman,” she said, leaning back in her chair, sinking visibly into the reality of having lost a longed-for daughter-in-law. His mother had always wanted more children and now counted on him to provide them.

  “This is outrageous,” his father bellowed. “You cannot, will not ruin two empires of commerce because of some lily-livered objection to your bride’s silences.” He flung out his arms in a gesture that seemed to be asking the cosmos to bear witness to his son’s folly. “Good God, boy! Two years down the marriage road you would be thanking the Almighty for some peace and quiet!”

  “Horace, really.” Caroline straightened with a fierce look at her husband that was shortly transferred to her son. “You went for a picnic and a boat ride? Then something went wrong. Young couples do sometimes disagree. Did you argue?”

  Rafe felt color creeping up out of his collar and raised his chin to overcome it.

  “Not as such. The chit vaulted out of the boat to swim to some other women floundering in the water. Stripped off her skirts, jumped in the water, and swam them to shore. What kind of woman does such a thing? In front of God and everyone. Then she had the nerve to confront me afterward. She hadn’t spoken more than a dozen words to me all afternoon, but after her ‘swim’ she was babbling like a madwoman.”

  He gave a visible shudder.

  “She gave me back the ring, there and then.”

  “So—” his father’s eyes narrowed to search him “—you didn’t ask for it back. You didn’t initiate the breakup.” Rafe knew that look. Calculation at its best. And worst. Horace Townsend was already determining who was at fault in this breach of contract, already positioning Townsend Imports to benefit somehow from this fracture of his son’s nuptial fortunes.

  “Given her behavior, I certainly agreed with it. I will not, cannot marry that female.” He stuffed his mouth full of sausage and egg and chewed, surprised by their utter lack of taste, before adding for his mother’s benefit, “However, I am willing to look elsewhere for a bride.”

  His father scowled at him, then at his mother.

  “Lawrence—damn his hide—he’s behind this,” Horace declared. “At the very least he’s allowed his daughter free rein for too long. If he thinks—” He straightened, as if stung by a thought. “After all we’ve invested in this merger, if he thinks to get a better deal elsewhere—”

  Rafe watched his father steam out of the dining room like a Bulldog Class engine and felt his stomach sink. The old man was on his way to confront Lawrence Alcott. Blame would be tossed back and forth like a white-hot rivet, and Rafe suspected the explosion of pride would be heard all the way to Windsor Castle.

  He also expected they would find a way
to patch up their meticulously crafted merger—they had to if they wanted to survive in the current business climate. But they would have to find a way to do it without embroiling their children in the mix. Ridiculous idea, inveigling their offspring into an arranged marriage in this day and age.

  * * *

  Indeed, there were fireworks in the office of Lawrence Alcott’s East Anglia Trading Company later that day. Blustering and charges of bad faith and poor parenting on both sides brought the clerks and typewriters in the outer office to a standstill—had them staring slack-jawed at the half-open door to their employer’s inner sanctum. Clearly the pair’s children were not the paragons of virtue and desirability each believed.

  “If you had put your foot down with that girl—taught her to obey—she would know better than to throw away a promising future on a whim!” Horace brandished the head of his walking stick under Lawrence’s nose.

  “You should have put your foot down with that boy.” Lawrence smacked aside that walking stick, glowering at his would-be partner. “If you had taught him some consideration for others, he might not think he’s the blasted center of creation,” he blustered, shaking a fist as they met nose-to-nose across his desk. “So impressed with himself that he has no regard for others!”

  “What others?” Horace straightened as if struck. “My son is universally respected. Our business acquaintances clamor to have him handle their accounts . . . while your daughter is considered to be headstrong, impulsive, and even irrational.”

  “Where did you hear such nonsense?” It was Lawrence’s turn to sputter. “You know better, you old bulldog! You’ve talked with my Lauren and seen her at socials. She charms one and all. Your own wife was taken with her . . . called her a lovely young woman with a nimble mind and a cheerful spirit.”

  “I know her about as well as you know my son,” Horace snarled. “Rafe is strong, educated, and scrupulously honest. He’s had his share of admiration from the ladies, I can tell you. I’ve had a time of it, steering him past undesirable liaisons. And your daughter wrecks all our futures over some ridiculous impulse—”

  Lawrence had spent a sleepless night going over and over their predicament. A marriage was the only way to quietly access the plentiful funds in Lauren’s inheritance to fund the merger and see them through the present troubles. Once she was married and the entailment was met, her husband would control the funds. He had never imagined she would find the Townsend boy so distasteful. It still confounded him that a fellow so accomplished and good-looking could have made such a foul impression.

  He thought on that for a moment, studying his quarrelsome rival.

  “Who says it is wrecked?” If there was any hope of setting their much-needed merger back on track, they would need to work together. “I have taken steps to see that she recants her objection to the marriage, and I believe I can promise you that she will come around.”

  “She had better, Alcott.” Some of the tension drained from Townsend, and Lawrence realized that behind the bluster lay genuine anxiety. They both had a great deal riding on this merger. “Otherwise my lawyers will be contacting that pack of hounds you call solicitors.”

  Four

  Lawrence followed Townsend into the outer office, where his clerks turned to watch his rival-turned-partner exit in a huff.

  As soon as Townsend was out of sight, Lawrence straightened and took a deep breath. He prayed his heavy-handed plan worked quickly to make Lauren recant her rejection of Townsend’s son.

  “And her mother thought teaching her to walk was exhausting,” he muttered, then spotted his staff drawing stealthily together and scowled. The papery rustle, a thump, and the quick sideways step of his head clerk, Higgins, made it clear they were hiding something.

  “What is that?” He tilted his head this way and that, trying to make out what was behind Higgins. “What have you got there?”

  As he approached, the rest of his office staff scurried back to their desks, leaving Higgins alone to explain.

  A newspaper lay on the floor behind his head clerk, who took a step back onto it as if unaware it was there. Lawrence stalked closer, scowling at the man’s feet. Fifteen years of loyal service had revealed Higgins to be a diligent and considerate fellow, if sometimes transparent.

  “You are standing on a newspaper, Higgins.”

  “Am I, sir?” The fellow turned scarlet and looked down. “Oh. That.”

  Lawrence expelled a long-suffering breath and held out his hand.

  After a long moment Higgins stepped off the paper, picked it up, and reluctantly handed it to Lawrence. “Don’t know how that came to be here, sir. Must have been one of the tradesmen brought it in.”

  “A tradesman,” Lawrence said as he righted the paper and took in the name. “Who cares about The Morning Post ?”

  “Really, sir, it is nothing of consequence. A scandal sheet. An embarrassment to literacy—”

  A very popular scandal sheet, Lawrence knew, read by upstairs and downstairs with equal eagerness. Lawrence gave Higgins a censuring look and then perused the page they had folded the paper to reveal. His attention landed on an article appearing on the fold and his mouth dried.

  “Daring River Rescue,” it said. He froze except for the widening of his eyes as he read. There, in print, was an account of his daughter’s impulsive rescue of two drowning women. Even if he hadn’t recognized the description of the event, the writer had the temerity to name the young woman responsible: “Miss Lauren Alcott, daughter of wealthy baron of commerce Lawrence Alcott.” A “baron of commerce” was he, now? He grinned at the sound of that. Horace would be green with envy.

  Then he read further.

  “Miss Alcott” was “a rare example of feminine fortitude.” His chest swelled as he read that she “should be decorated by the queen for her selflessness and valor.” After a general swipe at others present who did not bother to assist in the rescue, the writer singled out the “wealthy and prominent Rafe Townsend” as one of those who merely watched her heroism . . . all of which squared with Lauren’s account of the incident.

  Then came the bit that set his innards sinking. The writer said that Townsend was betrothed to Miss Alcott until the incident, after which she ended the engagement. However, Miss Alcott’s selflessness was accompanied by a brazen exhibition of nakedness that her fiancé seemed to find as appalling as she found his cowardice. It was clearly not a match made in Heaven.

  Lawrence’s face paled as he reread that damning word.

  Nakedness. They were saying his impetuous daughter was naked when she canceled her betrothal to—dear God—his daughter had called Townsend a coward ! And a muckraking reporter had been there and had written it all down in a scurrilous report for The Morning Post.

  He read it through again, then turned and rushed back into his office, recalling Horace’s angry face and pugnacious stance.

  Nakedness. Cowardice. Horace already was talking lawyers and breach of contract. Good Gods he was going to explode when he saw this!

  * * *

  Horace Townsend was quietly simmering when he arrived at the Townsend Imports offices in the City later that day and found his clerks clustered around a newspaper lying on one of the desks. The way they stepped in front of it and greeted him with furtive looks stopped him in his tracks. He stalked over to see what they found so unsettling and discovered a copy of The Examiner open to a page containing sundry adverts and articles.

  His gaze landed on an illustration of a boat, a riverbank, and a prissy, long-nosed fellow drenched and dripping as he sat waist-deep in water beside the boat. He blinked as the situation registered.

  “What the bloody hell?” He snatched it up for a closer look and realized the artist had included a shapely female figure arrayed in angelic white—with what could only be called a laurel wreath on her head. His jaw dropped open. “How could the bastards know about this?”

  The caption read “The Angel of the River,” and the article detailed the very situati
on Rafe had recounted at breakfast: two women in a boat had overturned and Alcott’s daughter shed her skirts and dove into the drink to save them. In the article Lauren Alcott was named a heroine and lauded for her quick thinking and utter selflessness. A chorus of praise from those who witnessed the rescue was presented in florid detail. Then came the words that pierced his pride like a blade.

  The writer claimed to have seen with his own eyes the Alcott female’s disgust as she accused her fiancé of cowardice and ended the engagement. The water-shy fiancé was named as none other than Rafe Townsend, the scion of Townsend Imports.

  Cowardice? The chit called his son a coward? And they had the nerve to print it in one of the most popular penny papers in the nation? The Examiner was widely read by their upper-class circle, despite its championing of the lower classes. The story of a wealthy heir being shamed by the woman he was supposed to wed—it was like tossing meat to caged tigers. The rabble would eat it up!

  Horace turned on his heel, jammed his hat back on his head, and called immediately for his carriage.

  Lawrence Alcott was going to pay for this!

  * * *

  “What are those scruffy-looking men doing slouching around our gate?” Aunt Amanda asked as she peered over Lauren’s shoulder at the small front garden and pavement in front of Alcott House.

  Moments before, Weathersby had brought word that there were three men in front of their house, watching the front doors as if waiting for someone to exit. Lauren had rushed to the upstairs sitting room to peer down at them and make sense of what she saw. She sank onto a knee on the window seat and pressed her head against the glass to inspect the interlopers.

  Three men wearing cheaply made jackets and trousers that could have used a good pressing were lounging about the retaining wall and lamp pillars that framed the entrance to Alcott House. Two of the men wore bowler hats and the third wore a flat woolen cap. They didn’t interact, just shifted feet and stared with expectation at the street and the house.