Entangled (A Private Collection)

by Fresina, Jayne

  “Where’s that tall feller what came yesterday?” he blurted.

  “I’m here, brat.” Lawrence emerged from the back room.

  “Still here?” Albie chirped, rolling his eyes. “Ain’t she got rid o’ you yet?”

  Lawrence looked at her. “Not yet.”

  She hastily turned away, dividing the day’s post into the wooden pigeon holes on the wall.

  “What’s in that big box o’ yours, mister?” she heard Albie ask in his usual impertinent fashion.

  “The bones, tongues, and eyeballs of naughty little boys who get under my feet.”

  “Liar, liar, pants afire.”

  “Come here then and I’ll show you.” She heard the flap in the counter being lifted as Lawrence pretended to reach for the boy. “I’ve room for one more skeleton.”

  Albie ran out, screaming joyfully, almost colliding with two guests coming through the doors.

  “So that’s the man who won’t marry you,” he murmured somewhere behind her.

  “Albie?”

  “Very amusing, but no. The pin head in the fancy suit of clothes. I heard him order you for dinner like a boiled lobster.”

  She knew he was close. The air prickled and sizzled around her. His hand had just brushed her skirt as he passed between her and the counter. She’d never realized it before, but there wasn’t really room for two bodies in the narrow space. “I didn’t say he won’t marry me. I said he can’t.” It was also true that she didn’t want to marry Guy, but she left that out.

  “Why did you lie to him?” he said suddenly.

  She stared at the wall. “I didn’t.”

  “You told him I was a drayman waiting for payment.”

  Daisy exhaled a small sigh. “It wasn’t the right time to introduce you.”

  “He knows about this marriage plan of yours, does he?”

  “Yes.” She carefully made her face calm and turned around to join him at the counter. “Of course he knows. And he understands why I have to marry. He’s perfectly all right about it. It’s just that you’re a little different to what he expects.”

  “In what way?”

  She ignored his question, turning her attention to the guests newly arriving. Lawrence Bailey probably knew very well what she meant, but he tried wringing the words out of her. Now he stood at her side and she could barely concentrate on the task at hand. He was too distracting and she wished he would go to bed. Within a few seconds, however, he was offering to carry luggage upstairs for the new arrivals. Apparently his earlier dizziness had evaporated like a puff of hot breath on a winter’s morning.

  Watching him take the stairs two at a time even loaded down with guests’ luggage, she had the awful, sinking feeling that keeping Lawrence out of her lover’s view was going to prove almost as difficult as telling herself she wasn’t attracted to him. She was angry about everything and with everyone. She was angry with herself for this weakness, with Lizzie Jenkins for misleading her, with Guy for coming to the hotel before she was prepared and then, as it was just pointed out to her, commanding her to join him for dinner rather than asking politely. Most of all she was angry with Lawrence Bailey for being so damned hale and hearty. She ought to send him away, tell him there would be no marriage because she’d changed her mind. But wouldn’t it be cruel to turn him out on his ear, especially after all he’d been through?

  He was already settling in, making himself at home. Even Albie appeared to like the fellow, and the boy was picky. If he liked a person he followed them about, driving them steadily mad. But if he was silent and stayed out of their way, it was because his survivor’s instinct told him not to push their patience. He was wily as a stray mutt.

  That afternoon, she watched Albie shadowing Lawrence around the hotel, trying to match his short legs to the man’s long march. Frequently Lawrence told him to shut up and go away, but the boy did neither and it seemed only a token protest in any case. By five o’clock, Lawrence had succeeded in getting a damp washcloth to Albie’s face and a comb to his hair. A feat even Daisy had never managed. It made her smile, the sight of the tall man striding about, arms swinging, and the little boy trailing behind, pulling on his sleeve, straining his neck to look up. She was feeling rather giddy, all pins and needles, but she put it down to excitement about dinner with Guy.

  Well, this time tomorrow she and the mysteriously healthy Lawrence Bailey would be married. Better make sure those separate bedrooms were far apart, preferably at opposite ends of the hotel.

  Watching two ladies in the foyer surreptitiously admire him as he passed by, Daisy wondered why he’d taken her up on her offer. He was evidently capable of looking after himself, and if he wanted a woman’s nursing, he could easily have found it without resorting to putting himself into the hands of a complete stranger just to help her out. Had he been the Lawrence Bailey she expected, it would be far more understandable. But this man was different. He didn’t need her no matter what he said. There was a quiet strength about him, a self-confidence she envied, an aura of capability. The female guests watching him noticed it too.

  Daisy was extremely glad he didn’t notice them in return.

  When he looked over suddenly and smiled at her, she hastily hurried back into her private office.

  * * * *

  By half past six her husband-to-be had taken a sudden turn for the worse.

  “You were right,” he muttered, sinking to a chaise in the conservatory, barely able to raise his eyelids. “I must have overdone it today. But don’t worry about me. You go and enjoy yourself. I’ll be fine. Alone.”

  Daisy had already dressed for dinner and was leaving instructions with the night receptionist when Albie came running to tell her Lawrence was ill. Immediately she hurried to find him in the conservatory. She brought an oil lamp to the small table beside his chaise and removed her evening glove to touch his brow. It made her look as if she knew what she was doing. She hoped. His head felt quite cool, not feverish at all, but he was making the most dreadful groans.

  “Please,” he whimpered, “don’t fret, Daisy. I’ll be fine again in a moment.”

  She hadn’t expected to care quite so much. Before he arrived, she thought she could be kind and helpful, but detached the way nurses were meant to be. Suddenly, however, he was her responsibility, her burden. Another worry. As if she didn’t have enough of those managing the hotel. This, she reminded herself, was precisely why she never wanted a permanent husband or a child of her own. He stubbornly refused to go up to his bed, so she fetched a blanket from the linen cupboard and tucked it around him. Again, she hoped she looked as if she knew what she was doing, although she’d never tended a sick person in her life. His eyelashes flickered open and he managed a wan smile.

  “Thank you, Daisy. You’re too good to me.”

  She liked the sound of her name on his lips, but she certainly wouldn’t let him know that. “Now please rest.”

  “I’ll try.”

  She stood a moment, fidgeting with her white gloves, looking at the sickly man in the chair. It didn’t feel right to leave him like this. It just didn’t. “I ought to send for Doctor Winters.”

  “Really, that’s not necessary.” His eyes opened again, wider this time. He couldn’t hide the gleam of wickedness that reminded her of their earlier kiss. “I’ll just rest here. I’m sure I’ll be all right. Look in on me when you return.” His arm suddenly shot out from under the blanket and he gripped her bare hand. “You won’t be back too late will you?”

  She’d been slow to catch on and that was unusual for Daisy Wellfleet. Now the light dawned. Belatedly. His hand around hers was exceedingly firm and cool for a man too sickly to stand.

  * * * *

  He knew immediately that he’d pushed it too far. Just hadn’t been able to stop himself. The sight of her in that cobalt blue gown, simply too stunning for words, had instantly made him determined not to let her go out tonight. He didn’t like Guy Westerfield the moment he heard him talking to her. He lik
ed Westerfield even less when he saw the effort she went to for dinner with the man. It wasn’t right. She shouldn’t be with a fellow like that, wasting her charms on the chinless ingrate. He had to do something, didn’t he? It was a very good thing he’d stayed after all. Clearly she needed someone to look after her and set her straight about men.

  Luke Blackwood had met young fools like Westerfield at university. Born with a silver spoon in their mouths, they thought the world was their playground and they didn’t have to try too hard for anything or anyone. They had no ambition and no purpose. He always steered well clear of men like Westerfield, because otherwise they ended up owing him money and he was obliged to beat their heads in when he would much rather be reading a book.

  In fact, Luke would usually prefer a book even to the company of a female, which made him somewhat of an oddity in his family. But Daisy Wellfleet was more intriguing than an entire library of priceless tomes. Her chatter drew him in; her liveliness lifted him out of his usual grumpiness. It couldn’t be helped. He was actually, much to his despair, turning into his brother Harry, who had been known to take extraordinary lengths to seduce a woman he fancied. Until now, Luke didn’t know he had it in him. Apparently the Blackwood curse was alive in him too, despite years of denial.

  Their father used to say that one woman was all it took to ruin a man if he wasn’t careful. Randolph would know, of course, having married a woman he was besotted with who left him, walked out on them all when the boys were children.

  Beautiful women were dangerous and never to be trusted. It was one of the first things Luke learned about the female sex.

  Daisy Wellfleet stood beside his chair letting him hold her bare hand, but the gloved one was on her waist and the pose suggested she wasn’t entirely fooled.

  “You’ll be cold out tonight in that dress,” he said, sweeping her with another slow appraisal. “April nights can be chilly.” The gown had no shoulders, just a lot of frivolous fluff framing the high, rounded curves of her bosom.

  “I’d rather be too cool than too hot in a restaurant,” she declared.

  “It’s too revealing.”

  “It’s only off the shoulder.”

  He arched an eyebrow. “It’s almost on the floor.”

  He felt the stifled laughter rippling through her hand where he held it tight.

  “I’m not sure you should be seen dining out with another man the night before our wedding,” he added.

  “It’s a private room at his club, very elegant and very discrete.”

  “Ah. He doesn’t take you out in public then.”

  She snatched her hand away from his.

  “I’m surprised he doesn’t want to show you off. I would.”

  Her lips rolled inward. He could see her bosom lifting with every taut, angry breath. It was a surprise that flimsy material managed to restrain so much sumptuousness.

  “I suppose he bought you the gown?”

  No reply. She strolled to the glass panels overlooking the lawn and checked her reflection, nervously touching her hair. This evening she wore all those rich, auburn curls restrained and pinned up in a more sophisticated manner. It bothered him. Her natural loveliness shouldn’t be tamed, gilded and rearranged.

  “What else does he buy you?”

  “Many things,” she snapped. “He’s very generous.”

  “Why doesn’t he help you out with the bills then?”

  She spun around, one hand still on her hair. With the apricot sunset behind her, framing an hour-glass figure and lighting a thousand little sparks in her hair, Daisy Wellfleet was stunning. It hurt to look at her, especially since she was about to waste all that on some unworthy man.

  “Are you going to lay there irritating me all night, or are you going to bed?” she demanded, chin up, eyes flaming.

  He grinned. “I could do both.”

  She made soft sound of disapproval at his malapert suggestion, but it lacked conviction when her eyes couldn’t quite summon enough scorn. Frost could never thrive in that potent, liquid heat. A jolt of desire raced through him, sent blood surging through his body, and made it necessary to alter his casual pose.

  “Albie tells me you’re behind with some of the bills,” he added, hitching himself higher against the button-tufted chaise. “Why doesn’t young Mr. Westerfield help?”

  “For your information— not that it’s any business of yours–I prefer to keep the running of this hotel separate to my relationship with Guy. The Wellfleet is my responsibility not his.”

  “Yes. We wouldn’t want to burden him with any responsibilities. I don’t suppose he works for a living.”

  “Of course not.” She marched back across the room to plump some cushions on a sofa. “He’s a gentleman.” Pausing, she glanced at him over her smooth, bare shoulder. “What are you looking at me like that for?”

  Slowly he shook his head. “I thought you were cleverer than that and stronger too. Why do you let him use you?”

  She faltered, eyes wide.

  “You deserve better,” he added. “I don’t know what you see in that boy.”

  “Plenty. He’s handsome, charming—”

  “How long have you known him?”

  “Years.”

  “Ah I see. He’s just a habit then.”

  She opened her mouth to argue, but he quickly tossed her another question.

  “Is he a good lover? Go on, you can answer surely. You told me those matters don’t embarrass you.”

  Pulling on her glove, she avoided his gaze. “I don’t care to discuss my love life with you.” Sometimes she assumed a different character when talking, mimicked someone she looked up to and aspired to be.

  “Perhaps you don’t know the difference between a bad lover and a good one.”

  “My lover’s skill is not your concern.”

  “Of course it is.” He folded his arms over his chest, looking solemn. “A woman like you ought to be treated the right way. Handled properly.”

  She almost laughed. “Handled? I’ll handle myself, thank you very much.”

  “I have no objection to that thought. None at all. But it’s much more fun with company.”

  “You’re being very impertinent. I’m going out now.” She turned away, still fumbling with her glove, which seemed too big for her arm and kept wrinkling down to her elbow.

  “So young Master Westerfield won’t marry you, but he will marry one day, of course. Family duty. What happens then? You’ll stay happily on the side, in the shadows? Share with another woman?”

  “He won’t marry. He loves me, and I give him everything he needs. Why would he marry?”

  “Why not? You are.”

  “That’s different. I have to marry to keep the hotel. It’s only a marriage of convenience.”

  He smiled wryly. “And that’s exactly what he’ll tell you when he takes a wife.”

  * * * *

  Of course he didn’t know anything about her relationship with Guy, she reminded herself briskly. Apparently he was trying to prick her temper, but she refused to take his bait.

  It was seven o’clock and she’d just heard the bell ring at the front desk. There was no time to argue further. Guy was waiting.

  “He’s the only man you’ve ever known?”

  She stopped, startled. “Yes.” Annoyed with herself for answering, she prepared to walk out of the conservatory, but his next words brought her to another stumbling halt.

  “Then why settle? You ought to try me at least, before you devote yourself to his bed. I’m willing to give you a sample tumble, no strings attached, no obligation.”

  He shouldn’t talk to her that way. It was rude, indecent, shocking. Yet she was amused by it. He had a manner of making these improper statements as if he was totally serious and not just saying it to make her blush. But she knew he was amusing himself too.

  Rolling her eyes, she exhaled a short laugh. “Thank you for the offer. You’re too kind. But you’ve come all this way for me and put
yourself out already. I really couldn’t ask for anything more.”

  He rolled back the blanket she’d tucked around him. “Come, sit here with me and we’ll discuss my generosity and your gratitude.”

  “You’re supposed to be ill,” she pointed out.

  “Then you ought to stay tonight and nurse me back to health.” His eyes grew infinitesimally darker. “Or else I might not be well enough for the wedding tomorrow.”

  Her heart beat slowed. Would he really spoil her plans at the last minute? She needed a wretched husband if she meant to keep the hotel out of her brothers’ mercenary clutches, and men willing to go through with a sham marriage were few and far between. Most of them weren’t clean, respectable, and honest. Many would expect payment for their trouble, which she couldn’t afford. No, Lawrence Bailey was her best chance and she couldn’t let him get away.

  At least, those were the hasty reasons her mind assembled for keeping the mischievous man when she’d already admitted it was a bad idea.

  She squared her shoulders and said carefully, “Do what you like.”

  He blinked, sighed, and stretched his arms overhead. “I feel myself growing weaker by the moment.”