by Nan Ryan
Suddenly Will realized he was holding his breath. He released it in a loud exhalation, then dropped the letter on his polished desktop. A lifelong friend of the Regents, as well as their legal counsel, Will Davis was stunned. And skeptical.
It was, in his opinion, highly unlikely that Anna Regent Wright had, after all this time, turned up in an Arizona convent. He had long ago written Anna off as dead.
Will Davis was tempted to burn the letter and tell no one of its existence. If he did burn it, everyone involved would be better off. But he didn’t dare. If he did and LaDextra ever found out… Will shuddered at the thought. He sighed heavily, ran a hand through his hair and rose from his chair.
He would do his duty.
Will wasted no time. He ordered his one-horse gig brought around, told his law clerk he might not be back all day, and left immediately on the six-mile journey to The Regent.
At the huge eight-columned mansion in the rocky foothills of the soaring Guadalupe Mountains, LaDextra Regent was informed by a servant that a carriage was coming up the front drive. LaDextra immediately rose from her chair and began awkwardly smoothing her upswept white hair. Then she made her way to the front parlor and settled herself on a long velvet sofa.
Will Davis was shown into the parlor, and LaDextra smiled when she saw him. “Come, Will,” she urged, patting the sofa cushion beside her, “sit here by me and let’s gossip awhile before lunch. You are staying for lunch?” Her pale eyes twinkled with merriment. Will was her pipeline to the outside world. For the past few years now, LaDextra rarely left the ranch. But Will knew everything that went on in Regentville and kept her well informed.
“This isn’t a social call, LaDextra,” Will said as he plucked at the creases in his gray suit trousers and sat down beside her.
“Oh?” Her thin white eyebrows shot up. “Is there some kind of legal problem? Are we being sued for—”
“No. No, nothing like that,” Will interrupted. He handed her the letter.
She looked at it; she looked at him. “What is this?”
“Read it.”
LaDextra’s eyeglasses, suspended on a heavy gold chain, rested on her billowy breasts. She lifted the glasses, settled them on her nose and began to read. By the time she had finished reading the letter, all the color had drained from her sun-wrinkled face. Overcome with emotion, she couldn’t speak for a moment.
Then she started to smile and said, “Dear Lord, can it be? Is my little Anna really alive? Is she coming home after all these years?”
“Now, LaDextra,” cautioned a concerned Will, “please don’t get your hopes up before we’ve even had a chance to meet this woman and check her out. Father Fitzgerald is old and dying. This may well be wishful thinking on his part. We have absolutely no reason to believe that the girl is actually Anna and I am not—”
“Get back to town, Will,” LaDextra snapped, “and fire off a telegram to Nogales. Tell my granddaughter to come home to me!”
A week later, Mary stepped off the train on The Regent’s private rail spur. Will Davis was there to meet her.
Mary wore a stylish traveling suit of crisp blue cotton and carried one small valise filled with new clothes she’d bought with the $278.27 that the late Father Fitzgerald had left her.
Tucked carefully among the folded dresses were the personal items from her captive days that she had not been allowed to see since they were taken from her that first day at the convent. When she was ready to leave, Sister Catherine Elizabeth had handed her the bundle containing her childhood treasures. The turquoise-handled knife. The faded bits of fabric. The baby teeth. The gold locket with the initials M.S.H. on its face.
Standing beside the parked carriage, Will Davis looked up, saw the young woman step out into the strong Texas sunshine, and felt his breath catch in his chest. She was stunningly beautiful, with pale blond hair. Fair porcelain skin. A tall, willowy body.
Will stepped forward, thrust out his right hand, smiled and said, “I’m Will Davis. LaDextra Regent sent me to meet you.”
Mary flashed Will a blinding smile, shook his hand firmly and said, as if there were no doubt about it, “I’m Anna Regent Wright, Mr. Davis. Thank you so much for coming.”
“You’re very welcome,” said Will as he put his hands to her small waist and lifted her off the wooden platform. He reached for her valise and guided her to the waiting carriage.
On the one-and-a-half-mile ride to the ranch, Will Davis learned that this charming young girl was more than just a pretty face. She was polite and friendly and intelligent and totally likable. Just as her mother had been. Enchanted, Will listened with interest to her earnest inquiries and forgot entirely that he was supposed to be the one asking the questions.
Mary looked around curiously as she talked. The long dirt road they traveled cut through fenced pastures where hundreds of cattle grazed.
“Do all these cattle belong to The Regent?”
“All these and more,” Will replied with a smile. “Presently there are approximately fifty thousand head of cattle on the ranch. They only keep a few hundred head here in the Tierra Verde pasture.”
Mary frowned. “Tierra Verde? Doesn’t that mean green land? It doesn’t look very green to me.”
Will smiled. “No, it doesn’t. We haven’t had a lot of rain this spring, but hopefully we’ll soon be getting some gully washers.”
“So there are other pastures as large as this one?”
“Many more. This ranch is a million acres of land under two thousand miles of fence.”
Mary started to comment, but the sprawling ranch house, now clearly in sight, arrested her full attention.
“Is that it?” Mary asked excitedly, pointing.
“Yes. That’s it. The Regent.”
Mary was overwhelmed. Since leaving the railroad spur they had been crossing the flat desert floor, moving steadily closer to a towering mountain range to the north. Now they were almost up into the Guadalupes, the road—graveled now—swiftly ascending into the rocky foothills.
A quarter of a mile ahead and a hundred feet above, a majestic white, two-story mansion with eight Doric columns rose to meet the blue Texas sky. Vast manicured grounds surrounded the huge house. Broad, hedge-trimmed terraces flanked the west side, and a completely level, velvety green lawn stretched out on the east, where a wishing well stood like a sentinel in the sun.
Mary stared at the enormous house, unable to believe that such an impressive dwelling actually belonged to one family. The house was so large and the grounds so immense, it brought to mind the pictures of European castles she had seen in books back at the convent. That’s what this ranch house looked like—a magnificent castle in the clouds.
“Lawyer Davis,” she said in awe, “the house…it’s a palace. Royalty should live here.”
Will Davis smiled and said, “Here in Texas, the Regents are royalty.”
Three
At the imposing ranch house waited an alert, expectant LaDextra Regent. With the aid of her gold-handled, ebony cane, the eighty-one-year-old matriarch paced nervously back and forth on the mansion’s sunny gallery. A statuesque woman with a halo of shining white hair and clear blue eyes, she was wearing her signature black, high-collared, long-sleeved dress.
LaDextra Regent looked formidable, indestructible, but her aging heart kept fluttering crazily as she anticipated the arrival of her granddaughter.
If it was her granddaughter.
How was she to know if the young woman was really Anna? Anna had been only eight years old when the Apache took her. Would she look anything like she had then? Would she, LaDextra, know at once, as soon as she saw her, that the girl was Anna? Or that she wasn’t?
LaDextra suddenly frowned.
And if she was Anna, what about Brit? Would he feel threatened? Would he hate Anna? Would he hate her as well? The prospect of his hating her was too painful for LaDextra to consider. Britton Caruth was like her blood grandson, not just her stepgrandson. She loved him dearly.
And Brit had been cheated enough in his life.
Orphaned at twelve, Brit had been an unruly, rebellious child who had caused her no small amount of grief. She had spent more than one sleepless night worrying about him. But from the start she had been fond of the troubled little boy. That fondness had grown as he grew, and as he began to feel that he was not in the way, that The Regent was his true home, his behavior had improved.
The devilishly handsome, twenty-eight-year-old Brit was, in LaDextra’s opinion, the same cut of wild, rugged Texan as her dear departed husband had been in his vigorous youth. Like Robert Regent, Brit was a fun-loving, fearless fellow whom men admired and women desired.
A lusty hell-raiser, Brit was a natural charmer who enjoyed fine Kentucky bourbon, an occasional fistfight and the company of beautiful women. He was also intelligent, a hard worker and, for the past four years, the respected general manager of the vast Texas spread.
And presumptive heir to The Regent.
But if the girl was actually Anna…
If Anna was really alive…The Regent rightfully belonged to her.
LaDextra stopped pacing and frowned worriedly, her weak heart fluttering alarmingly.
LaDextra’s worries of impending trouble were forgotten entirely when the young woman she hoped was Anna stepped onto the mansion’s sunny gallery.
“Land sakes alive, let me look at you,” said LaDextra, staring at the tall, slender girl before her. Her arthritic hands raised and clasping her own sun-wrinkled cheeks, her blue eyes misting with tears, LaDextra Regent felt as if time had turned backward and she was looking at her pretty daughter, Christina.
“Anna, my own Anna, welcome home!” said LaDextra. “May I hug you, child?” She didn’t wait for an answer.
Mary found herself abruptly swept up and wrapped in the long, loving arms of LaDextra Regent. Mary was surprised to find that it was not unpleasant. The firm embrace gave her a feeling of being safe, a feeling she’d never had before. It came to her, as this woman rocked her back and forth affectionately, that she had never been hugged in her life. Her own slender arms lifted and went awkwardly around the statuesque LaDextra.
It was then, standing there in the sun on the wide gallery of the huge white mansion, that Mary decided she was Anna. From that minute forward, she would think of herself as Anna. She would be Anna and she would stay there forever. She would live in splendor and ease in the imposing mansion. She’d be accepted and loved and know that, finally, she belonged.
She belonged at The Regent!
This was her home and nobody could take it away from her. Nobody.
“Why don’t we all go inside?” Will Davis suggested.
“Yes, yes of course,” LaDextra agreed, reluctantly releasing Anna, but reaching for one of her hands.
The old woman led her inside, ushered her into the spacious drawing room, and once again Anna was astonished. Awed by the grandeur of the mansion and its impressive furnishings, she was tempted to slide her hand over the lid of a gleaming grand piano that sat in front of the large front window.
The room, square in shape and gigantic, held fine furniture of a kind Anna never knew existed. There were handsome velvet sofas, silk shantung chairs and marble-topped tables, frosted-globed lamps and fresh cut flowers in fragile porcelain vases.
Above a fireplace of shiny white marble hung a huge gold-framed mirror. Matching smaller mirrors graced the walls, along with paintings that Anna assumed were priceless original works of art.
LaDextra chuckled at the look on Anna’s pretty face. She said, “I know what you’re thinking. That this house looks out of place here in west Texas.”
“No, I…” Anna began, shaking her head.
LaDextra’s blue eyes twinkled. “It does look out of place. Sit down and I’ll tell you why. I’m sure you’ve forgotten how I love to tell the tale.”
Anna took a seat in a wing chair as LaDextra gingerly lowered herself onto a velvet sofa. The attorney, Will Davis, thoughtfully disappeared, slipping into the library to have a drink of bourbon.
Rubbing the soft arm of the sofa, LaDextra said, smiling, “Child, your granny wasn’t always a wrinkled, sunburned old Texan. No sirree. I was a pampered Kentucky belle when your granddaddy met me. Robert Regent was a brash bachelor who had come to Louisville looking for blooded horses. My daddy brought him home to dinner one evening and it was love at first sight for us both. Robert said if I’d marry him and come to Texas and help him run the ranch, he would, within ten years, build me the mansion of my dreams.”
Anna smiled, nodded.
“He kept his word,” said LaDextra proudly. “I told him I wanted a fine antebellum-style Southern mansion with eight Doric columns and wide wraparound galleries. Eager to please me, Robert imported the materials and craftsmen and had this home built for me.” She laughed then, remembering, and said, “You won’t see another house like this in west Texas.”
“It’s a beautiful home,” said Anna.
“It’s your beautiful home,” said LaDextra.
At those words, Anna grew almost giddy with delight. It was all she could do to keep from laughing hysterically. She realized, with great relief, that this big, raw-boned, white-haired matriarch was more than eager to accept her as the long-lost Anna. The deception was going to be much easier than she could have dared hope.
Her future was secure.
Anna’s newfound sense of security was shattered that very evening at dinner. She, LaDextra and Will Davis had gathered in the well-appointed drawing room as the April sun was setting.
LaDextra, glancing at a gold-and-crystal clock on the marble mantel, said, “We’ll wait a few more minutes. Then we’ll go on into the dining room.”
Hungry, not used to eating at such a late hour, Anna wondered why they were to wait a few more minutes. Too soon she found out.
She blinked in confusion and apprehension when a tall, broad-shouldered, raven-haired man dressed in a spotless white linen shirt and a pair of dark, neatly pressed trousers abruptly entered the lamplit room. Flashing a dazzlingly disarming smile, he apologized for being tardy, walked straight to the sofa where LaDextra sat, leaned down and gave her forehead a quick kiss. Her face lit up like a Christmas tree.
The lean man then crossed to the attorney, shook his hand and said, “Good to see you, Will.”
Then he turned directly to her, reached for her hand and took it firmly in his.
“Welcome home to The Regent, Anna,” he said in a low, well-modulated voice, his dark eyes flashing in his tanned, handsome face.
Anna’s heart sank.
She knew in that instant that this compelling stranger did not believe her claim. Would never believe it. She had no idea who he was or what he was doing here, but she knew, instinctively, that he was going to cause her trouble.
“I’m Brit Caruth,” he said in a warm baritone, gently squeezing her hand in both of his own. “LaDextra’s no doubt told you that my father married your mother.”
“Now, Brit,” scolded LaDextra, “I didn’t want to bombard her with too much at once. She knows nothing about you. We haven’t talked about you yet.”
As if LaDextra hadn’t spoken, Brit Caruth, his dark gaze holding Anna’s, said, “So I suppose that makes me your big brother.” He paused, grinned wickedly and added, “You need anything, little sister, you just let me know.”
Caught off guard, Anna wished that Father Fitzgerald had warned her about this…this Brit Caruth. Or had he? She vaguely remembered the old priest mentioning that Anna’s mother had married a widower with a young son. But she’d never considered the unlikely possibility that the man’s son would still be at the ranch.
Anna sat stiffly throughout dinner. She had no appetite for the prime Regent beef that was cooked to tender perfection. The minute she learned that the dark man who managed the ranch for LaDextra also resided right here in the mansion, she was no longer hungry.
Dear Lord, she was to live under the same roof as Brit Caruth, whose lean,
handsome face was cynically set and whose dark, flashing eyes silently told her he knew what she was up to.
Anna was horrified.
But she carefully concealed her feelings. Quickly she realized that LaDextra considered him to be a member of the family. So she sat across the table from him, pretending an ease and comfort she didn’t feel. She listened politely to the pleasant dinner conversation, nodding at the appropriate moments.
She did her best to answer the casual questions posed to her by a beaming LaDextra, the amiable Will and the skeptical Brit Caruth. Anna had no trouble with LaDextra’s and Will’s harmless questions. But she faltered when Brit quizzed her. It was not just his probing questions that unsettled her, it was also the challenging gleam in his dark eyes when he addressed her. That, and the way the flickering candlelight cast menacing shadows on his dark face, accentuating the high cheekbones and firmly chiseled features.
Anna grew so nervous she felt beads of perspiration forming at her hairline as she noted how the fabric of the white linen shirt he wore stretched so tantalizingly across the flat, hard muscles of his chest, and that the shirt’s collar was open, revealing his smooth, tanned throat. She stared, entranced, as the muscles there moved like well-oiled machinery when he drained the contents of his stemmed wineglass.
He set the empty glass down with both hands, the movement causing his shirtsleeves to pull taut over his muscular upper arms. Unable to take her eyes off those bulging biceps, Anna wondered involuntarily how it would feel to have those powerful arms around her.
Brit looked up, caught her staring at him and grinned accusingly at her. Anna shivered, quickly looked away and was greatly relieved when Brit dropped his dinner napkin on the table and pushed back his chair.
“Ladies, Will,” he said, “if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll run into town for a while.”
LaDextra smiled fondly at him. “Who is it this evening? The brunette or the redhead?”