Imposter Bride

by Patricia Simpson

  “I don’t care about sense!”

  “You care nothing for anything, is that it?”

  “Not anymore.” Sophie didn’t care how petulant she sounded. Her heart was aching. Ian Ramsay had just abandoned her to the wolves. Obviously, her blossoming love meant nothing to him. He thought of her as a girl, not a woman. He’d made that plain enough.

  Lady Auliffe swept forward and put her arm around Sophie’s shoulders. “My dear, you have much to learn about the way the world works.” She hugged her gently. “And you will thank your Mr. Ramsay one day for looking out for you.”

  “He’s heartless.”

  “As he told you, he’s a realist.”

  Sophie sighed. Had Lady Auliffe heard everything? Seen everything?

  “But you must never see him again. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.” She slowly straightened and clenched her jaw. “I understand.”

  That night Sophie couldn’t sleep. All she could think about was the kiss she and Ramsay had shared on the veranda, the way he had looked at her, talked to her. She couldn’t let the man she loved walk out of her life, not without telling him the truth. It wasn’t right that he should turn away from the love that had assuredly sprung up between them. Something must be holding him back, something from his mysterious past, and she had a right to know what it was. She was not a child. She was a woman. And she would fight for the love she felt for this man.

  That night, lying abed in the opulent chamber whose vastness only served to intensify her loneliness, Sophie decided she would go to Ramsay’s townhouse tomorrow and tell him outright that she loved him, no matter how improper it was. She would confess to her real identity, no matter what consequences she must face. Ian was more important to her than any amount of sheen on her reputation, more important than her escape from London. Even if he turned his back on her, it would be better than living this life of pretense where no one knew her for her real self. All this lying was eating her up inside. She had to take the risk.

  Chapter 13

  At the sound of the familiar curt rap at his office door, Ramsay looked up to find Puckett unusually flustered.

  “Yes, Puckett?”

  “You have a visitor,” he said, looking to the side as if that was hint enough to take the mystery out of his odd behavior.

  “Well?” Ramsay waved him away, still busy with his accounts. “Show him in.”

  “It’s a lady, sir.”

  Lady? Ramsay rose out of habit, wondering if Sophie had decided to challenge his hard won personal policy of silence. It would be like her to try to cajole him out of his decision, but he would remain firm, no matter what she did in an attempt to change his mind. He was surprised and somewhat disappointed when Lady Auliffe swept into the room.

  “What an ungodly amount of stairs!” she exclaimed.

  “Madam, had I known—”

  “Tish!” She waved the air with a gloved hand. “‘Twas good exercise.”

  Ramsay strode forward to help her to a chair, amazed that a woman, whom he guessed must be in her seventies, had climbed the three flights of stairs and still had breath enough to speak.

  “You are remarkable, your ladyship,” he said.

  “Thank you.” She sank into a chair near his desk while he walked to the fire, giving himself a few moments to review the possibilities for this unusual visit. Either the woman was here to bribe him to stay away from her granddaughter, or she had come to threaten to run him out of town if he showed himself to Katherine again. Either possibility enraged him, mostly because he had been in a turmoil ever since he’d left Sophie the night before, and was angry at the entire world, but especially at himself.

  He could still see Sophie’s crestfallen face, could still feel the sharp pang of self-loathing for selfishly accepting her kisses and her regard, and then turning his back on her—and more than that, for being guilty of wickedly manipulating her future. Far too soon would come the day he must renounce her to the world, to bring her down in everyone’s eyes in order to ruin the English family that had destroyed his own. More and more he turned his thoughts from that day, a moment he once had savored and dreamed of, a fantasy of triumph that had kept him going for twenty years.

  He was a bastard. A confused and bitter bastard. Seeing Sophie float down those stairs the night before, startlingly beautiful in the apricot-colored satin and cloud of lace, he’d realized he’d been the biggest fool in the world to let her go, to give her over to the English society he despised and to which she belonged no more than he did.

  He would make no promises to stay away, not to snobby Lady Auliffe or to anyone else for that matter. The only promise he would make would be to himself: to forget what was better left behind him and press onward. He couldn’t have Sophie Vernet and Highclyffe at the same time. The two were inextricably exclusive. Damnably coupled. And so he would give her up and all thoughts of her as well.

  When Ramsay judged himself capable of decent interaction with another human being, he turned from the fire. “To what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?”

  “To curiosity,” she replied bluntly.

  “In regard to what?”

  “You. And what my granddaughter finds so irresistible about you.”

  “She’s young and impressionable.”

  “She is smart and discerning. I rather doubt she would place her affections on someone undeserving.” Lady Auliffe steadily regarded him. “Which makes me even more curious about you.”

  “Is that why you invited me to the ball?”

  “Partly. And to see if you would come.”

  “You can’t be pleased that I accepted.” He watched her, unsure of her motivation. “Not after last night.”

  “Not entirely. It gave me a chance to see you in action.”

  “I had no idea I was so fascinating.” He crossed his arms and leaned against the edge of his desk, highly suspicious of the direction of the conversation, but not about to change the subject until he knew the woman’s frame of mind.

  “Oh you are fascinating. And such a mystery.” She snapped open her fan. “I daresay, Captain Ramsay, that no one in London knows much about you.”

  “I prefer it that way.”

  “Obviously you do. But I wonder, why the clouded past?”

  “Clouded past?”

  “Oh yes. I’ve looked into your affairs, does that shock you?

  “Not at all.” Ramsay kept his voice level, when all the while he felt like leaping up and throttling the woman. Yet he had expected to be grilled, especially after having kept Sophie at his house for so many days. Any concerned guardian would have done a certain amount of investigation into the character of Miss Hinds’ host.

  “However, there wasn’t much to find out. Only that you’ve been a very busy young man.”

  “‘Tis no shame to do a day’s work in the colonies.”

  “And now you’re the owner of one of the most exclusive gambling houses in London. A feat to be sure at the age of thirty and no family money.”

  “Again. Hard work.”

  “Financed by a fortune gained in the shipping business. Your own, in Boston?”

  “Ship masts and tar, madam.”

  “And what a surprise.” She raised a brow. “To learn that one could make a fortune in such things!”

  “Until all ships are ironclads, madam, my business shall turn a handsome profit.”

  “And before that, when still barely weaned, a distinguished military career in Canada and the colonies—however misplaced your loyalties.”

  “My loyalties do not necessarily lie parallel to yours,” he replied. “I’m an American.”

  “Are you?”

  Her question sent a chill down his spine. How much did she really know?

  “As to that,” she continued at his silence, “your childhood history was wholly unremarked.”

  “As most childhoods are,” he retorted brusquely, enraged by her nosing into his past. “What do you care for mine?”
/>
  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Puckett step forward.

  “May I get you a refreshment, Lady Auliffe?”

  Ramsay was thankful for the interruption, timed he knew, to give him a chance to recover his composure. He jerked himself away from his desk.

  “She will have a claret,” Ramsay stated, recalling the drink Lady Auliffe had favored at his town house.

  “How observant of you,” she purred.

  “And you, sir?”

  “A strong coffee.” He set his jaw. “Thank you, Mr. Puckett.”

  They both watched his assistant bustle out of the office, and then Lady Auliffe sat back in her chair. “Perhaps you are aware of my upcountry residence?” she asked, pulling off her gloves. Did she intend to stay much longer? Good Lord, he hoped not.

  “No, ma’am.”

  “‘Tis near the Firth of Clyde. Near Loch Lemond.”

  “Lake Lemond?” he put in, pretending he was unfamiliar with the area.

  “Yes. Wild country, which I have come to love dearly.”

  “I’ve heard about Scotland. I hope to travel there someday soon.”

  “Yes.” She gave him a measured glance. “When I married a second time back in the forties, to Lord Auliffe, he took me to Loch Lemond for our honeymoon. I’d never been there before.”

  “I assume you had a pleasant holiday.” He tried not to sound impatient.

  “Unfortunately, it was bad timing on his part.”

  Ramsay felt his heart sinking, and he had a mind to tell her that he was much too busy with business to hear the ramblings of an old woman, but he held his tongue, out of respect for her, and out of sheer morbid curiosity. “And why was that?” he croaked.

  “There was an uprising. Just across the lake, at a place called Highclyffe. It was a Scottish stronghold, I was told, and it fell to the English just as we arrived.”

  “You were endangered?”

  “No, but we saw the lord of that place hung by the neck. An Alec MacMarrie. A travesty. A horrible travesty.”

  Ramsay felt the blood rushing from his head, felt his chest pressing in on him. What was this lady’s intention? To see him collapse at her feet? To make him admit that he’d seen everything she had witnessed and more? To make him cry out that she was right, he wasn’t an American by birth, that he was going to dupe her and ruin every Englishman he could get his hands on? He tried to think of something to say, something to stop her, something to show that he cared nothing for her story. But he couldn’t utter a sound.

  “MacMarrie was tall, raven-haired, proud.” She glanced at the fire as if seeing him in her mind’s eye. “The most handsome man I’d ever laid eyes upon.” She glanced back to him. “You are so like him, ‘tis uncanny.”

  “‘Twas long ago.” Ramsay swallowed. “Your memory is likely skewed.”

  She studied him, as if gauging his reaction to her comparison. “I’ve heard the Scots are a passionate race.”

  “Have you?”

  “And that we English are cold and unfeeling. Would you agree, Mr. Ramsay?”

  “I don’t make such sweeping generalizations, ma’am.”

  “Do you not?” She smiled, but the expression held more sadness than amusement. “Then you are not like the rest of us.”

  He looked down, shamed once more by her words. He was more guilty than most for doing just that, lumping all Englishmen together, and damning them for the slaughter in his homeland. Was that the moral of her story? Or had she come to tell him of his father, to compare that lord’s looks to his own.

  “Perhaps that is the quality Katherine admires in you,” she ventured. “Your far-reaching sensitivities.”

  “I rather doubt it.”

  The door opened and Puckett bustled in with a tray. Ramsay had never been more relieved in his life to see the small wiry man. Lady Auliffe’s words had been far too close for comfort. “Your claret has arrived,” he said.

  Lady Auliffe accepted the drink offered to her by Puckett and then waited until he reluctantly left the room.

  Ramsay suspected his assistant would linger on the other side of the door, listening for news about Miss Hinds, having voiced his interest in her future. At least Puckett’s interest in her welfare was genuine.

  Lady Auliffe placed both hands on her gold-tipped cane. “You were candid with me last night,” she said. Her gaze wandered around the room. Did she evaluate everything and everyone around her? Yet did not he do the same thing? He had to admire the quality. Then her piercing brown eyes came to rest upon him. “I appreciate that in a person.”

  “But it distressed Katherine. And I am sorry for it.”

  “You were only thinking of her future. There’s nothing wrong in that.”

  “She will make a lovely countess.”

  “Which brings me to the other reason for my visit.”

  “And what is that?”

  “Money.” She reached for her claret. “I trust you, Mr. Ramsay. Do you think that odd?”

  “Yes.” He reached for his coffee.

  “Any other man would have said what they thought I wanted to hear last night. You didn’t. You spoke your mind.”

  Ramsay took a gulp of coffee, knowing he was far less than what she believed him to be.

  “It is because of your frankness that I am here. I need some information. And I know you’ll be honest with me.”

  Ramsay glanced up. “What sort of information?”

  “I’ve heard rumors since coming back to London.”

  “About what?”

  “About Edward Metcalf. That he may be in serious financial trouble.”

  “He gambles. That much I know.” Ramsay took another sip of coffee, unwilling to allow his respect for Lady Auliffe to endanger his own agenda.

  “And his losses?”

  “I could not say, ma’am.”

  “Can not or will not?” At his silence, she sniffed. “Come now, Mr. Ramsay. Surely you must have some idea of his financial condition.”

  “If you wish to discover such information, I suggest you ask Metcalf himself.”

  “Damnation!” She struck her cane sharply on the floor. “Tell me!”

  Unmoved by her dramatics, Ramsay rose. “It is not my practice to discuss the state of my customer’s finances. Surely you understand.”

  “And surely you know to whom you are speaking.”

  Ramsay’s chin rose. She was not aware of his contempt for such a phrase. The old anger flared, choking him, the same anger his father had felt for a race that had repressed his people and eventually killed him. “Oh, I know all right,” he replied, rage chilling each word into separate shards of ice, belying his claim to a dispassionate nature. “Madam.”

  She seemed to sense she’d reached a dangerous limit with him. Scowling, she rose. “And Katherine? You would refuse to help Katherine?”

  “She has you.” He met her gaze, his eyes as hard as hers. “What more could she possibly need?”

  “You will stand by and watch her wed a wastrel?”

  Yes, he would. It was part of his plan, a plan that was progressing more smoothly than he could have hoped, thanks to the beauty and charm of a maidservant from the West Indies.

  “I would like to help,” Ramsay stated at last. “For Katherine’s sake. But I cannot.”

  “I see that I misjudged you,” she retorted, her voice clipped.

  “Apparently you did.”

  It was the truth. He was nowhere near the man she thought him to be, and nowhere near the man Sophie Vernet deserved. Ramsay rubbed his temples with his thumb and middle finger, feeling the harbinger throb of a crippling migraine.

  That afternoon, with every twist in the hedgerow path, Sophie felt a growing disquiet. She had come to Hyde Park on her daily promenade with Edward, but had never experienced the sensation of being trapped before.

  “Whatever is the matter?” Edward questioned. He drew to a stop in a clearing where they were surrounded by tall shrubs, trimmed to form an impassable
wall of green. Sophie thought she saw a flap of a cloak disappear behind the corner at her right. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing,” she lied. An escalating sense of dread pulsed through her, sure now that she was being followed.

  “You’re trembling,” Edward murmured, using the excuse to draw her against him as he embraced her from behind. “You’re cold!”

  “Edward,” she protested, having enough to deal with as it was, without fending off his constant and increasingly aggressive advances.

  “Shush, my dove.” He nuzzled her neck and sighed in her ear. “I’ve wanted to touch you like this for weeks!”

  “Please,” she said, trying to step away without causing a scene. “Someone might see.”

  He held her tightly. “Haven’t you wondered what it will be like?” he asked.

  “What what will be like?” She played the innocent, all the while wondering how she would get out of this situation without insulting the earl.

  His hands moved upward, and even through her heavy woolen cloak, she could feel the pressure of his fingers upon her breasts. He squeezed them and sighed raggedly.

  “You’re so lovely,” he gasped. “I’m quite beside myself!”

  “Edward, don’t—”

  “You must allow me this,” he replied, his lips at her neck. “I have been so good. So good.” His breathing became more labored with each moment and his hands ever more bold. She shook her shoulders, breaking free of him, but he apparently thought she was teasing him. Laughing, he caught her up again, and this time pulled her close to him, face to face.

  “I cannot wait until we are wed,” he confided. “Let me come to you, Katherine. Let me come to you tonight. I’ll go mad if you don’t! I’m in absolute pain!”

  Before she could move, his mouth clenched over hers, and he pressed her head back until it was clear he meant to have his way with her, whether she wanted it or not. Could he not tell she did not return his ardor? Did he not care that her fists were pushing him away?

  “You try to fight it, I know,” he gasped. “But you can’t. ‘Tis a fever, Katherine, burning like I’ve never known!”