Heiress

by Susan May Warren

  She smiled. “We were talking.” But, just because she’d come here to be scandalous, to allay any hint of deceit, to deflect the attention from Bennett’s guilt and onto the flurry of a scandal, she added an exaggerated wink.

  She might have imagined it, but the judge seemed to redden.

  “About what?” This from the prosecutor who had come out from behind his bench. He reminded her of Foster, dark eyes, intimidating. She drew in a breath.

  “About our son.”

  Beside her, Bennett lay his head on the table, onto his folded arms.

  The judge’s voice turned low. “Your son?”

  Behind her, she heard the door open, close, as if one of the reporters might have rushed out to make the morning papers. So, just so they got it correct, she drew in a long breath. “Yes. Jonathon August Worth is Bennett’s son, not Foster’s.”

  Bennett raised his head and his eyes were flames burning into her skin.

  “Did Foster know of your indiscretion?”

  She shook her head. “It was our secret. Until Sunday night. Then, Foster invited Bennett to our home. According to Bennett, Foster was going to leave me for a dancer he’d met in the Follies. Bennett came to my chamber to inquire after my well-being. And discuss our son.”

  She delivered that last line without a hiccup. But she’d practiced it so many times, it seemed nearly natural.

  They had discussed Jack, just not exactly at that time. But without the immensity of the secret, of the potential scandal, Jinx guessed the judge would never believe her story. Indeed, the truth seemed, once voiced in the wood-paneled chambers of Special Sessions, to be suddenly bold, even indictable. She took another step toward the bench. “So, you see, Your Honor, when Bennett discovered that Jack might be a suspect, he panicked and confessed to a crime of which he is innocent. He didn’t want our son to go to jail for a crime he also did not commit.”

  Through her periphery, she saw Bennett stare at her, wide-eyed, shaking his head.

  The judge looked at Bennett then back to Jinx. She managed a smile, managed to hold her chin up, despite the heat on her face. Perhaps that would work in her favor. Perhaps, as people remembered this moment, they’d remember that Jinx may have been a fallen woman, but she crashed with dignity.

  “Have you seen today’s paper, Mrs. Worth?” The judge held up the New York Chronicle. Even from her vantage point, she could read the top headline: Actress Alleges Affair with Murder Victim.

  Jinx stared at the headline, little explosions bursting in her head, her chest. “No,” she said, although her voice suggested otherwise. “Is it about Foster?”

  “And a little missy down at the Ziegfeld Follies. It seems your husband was equally…adulterous.”

  She tried not to flinch at that word, but her chin dipped, just a little.

  The judge stared at the article while her heart thundered in her chest. Her hands sweat inside her gloves and she needed more breath than her corset allowed.

  “The article suggests a motive from someone in Mr. Foster Worth’s employ; that she had a secret admirer who had planned revenge for an assault on the woman.” He looked up at Jinx, who had stilled.

  So, she wasn’t the only one who Foster bullied.

  “Do you know anything about this?”

  Jinx pressed her open palm over her corset, ducked her head. Bennett had his hands in a clench on the table, his eyes closed.

  “In light of this new information, I don’t believe Mr. Worth’s confession, nor am I reasonably convinced the prosecution has enough evidence to bind Mr. Worth over for indictment by the grand jury.” He looked at Bennett while Jinx swallowed her heart back into her chest. “You are free to go.”

  She turned, caught in Bennett’s expression what appeared to be confusion, even frustration as he looked at her then past her.

  “Mother.”

  She stiffened, turned.

  Jack stood in the aisle, his shoulders rising and falling, stricken.

  Rosie stood behind him, her mouth in a grim, tight line. She shook her head.

  “You don’t understand, Jack. I…” Oh, how did she not make this worse? She couldn’t tell him that she’d snuck into Foster’s bed, that she didn’t realize it was Bennett. She glanced at Bennett.

  Because that, she knew long ago, wasn’t the truth, either.

  No more secrets. She walked up to him, lowered her voice just for him. “I love Bennett. I always have. And he should have been your father.”

  With those words, she could breathe. The suddenness of it shook her. No longer the coil of agony in her chest, tighter each year as Jack grew, as she read about Bennett’s trips to New York. With the truth, it simply sprang free. Fresh air, into her lungs, her soul.

  She turned to Bennett, who had followed her up the aisle.

  He wore a devastating, breathtaking smile, and nodded.

  “My entire life is a lie.” Jack’s voice emerged low, dangerous.

  Jinx turned back to him. “Jack, listen to me—”

  “Stay away from me. Stay away.” He shrugged out of his sister’s grip and fled the courtroom.

  She met her daughter’s eyes.

  Rosie shook her head. “I’ll go after him.”

  Jinx watched her go, a different kind of pain in her chest.

  Then Bennett was there, turning her into his embrace. He caught her face in his hands, stared down at her with something of disbelief. “Oh Jinx, you do know how to land on the front page, don’t you?”

  She couldn’t respond before he kissed her, right there in the courtroom, his lips sweet, his touch so gentle she wanted to cry.

  That, too, made the papers.

  Chapter 20

  Esme woke to the rumble of the elevated train outside the window of her father’s former Chronicle office. It seemed to roar through the room, shaking her out of the sweet, exhausted darkness and into a shaft of bright sunlight that blinded her, made her shield her eyes with her hands. She peeked out between her fingers.

  Oliver stood staring out the window, his wide back to her, his shirtsleeves rolled up past his elbows, his black hair a wreck after hours of inserting into the Chronicle the front page article on Flora. The sun streamed past him, over the wide mahogany desk, onto the parquet floor, and he resembled a Caesar surveying his world. My, he had broad shoulders, sinewed forearms, his body lean and strong. Indeed, he’d grown into a man during her absence.

  “Did I fall asleep? The last thing I remember, the presses were running.”

  “I couldn’t tell if it was the sound of the presses or your snoring that was louder.” Oliver turned, his face dark with whiskers, tease in his eyes.

  Esme peeled herself up from his leather sofa, her cheek sweaty and lined. She ran her fingers through her hair, shaking it out.

  Oliver watched with a smile that made her warm to her bones. “I lived for the day I might see you in the morning.”

  She gave him a look then smoothed out her suit. “My daughter will be worried about me.”

  His smile dimmed. “I forgot you had married. And that you had a daughter.”

  “You would have liked Daughtry Hoyt. He was a good man. He reminded me of you. But now, you remind me of him.”

  “I’m not sure—”

  “He was the son of a Crow woman and a miner who became a gentleman. But he died trying to save the miners who worked for him. Believe me, it’s a compliment.”

  He narrowed his eyes then finally nodded. “Your daughter is lovely, Esme.”

  “She has her father’s features, dark and dangerous. She grew up in the West, knows how to shoot a gun, can herd buffalo, and I will just bet that Abel, our hired man, taught her to chew tobacco. So, you can save my feelings. She’s not the deb I was, nor will she ever be.”

  Oliver came over to her, and lifted her chin with his hand. “No one will ever be the deb you were, Esme. But if you’ll recall, that didn’t exactly work in my favor. I much prefer this woman who had to parse every word, bossed arou
nd my linotype machinists, fed paper into the presses, and passed out bundles to the newsies. That’s the woman I knew you were, that’s the woman I fell in love with.” He pressed a sweet kiss to her lips, and it awoke something still asleep inside her. She wrapped her arms around his neck, wove her fingers into his dark, silky hair. Let herself surrender to his touch.

  Oliver.

  He drew back. “I want to show you something.” He got up, took her hands, and drew her to the window. Below, the city had already awakened, fruit and bread vendors in the square, pigeons creating a scandal between their feet. Traffic—horse-drawn trolleys, motorcars, pedestrians—crossed Chronicle Square. Around them, taller buildings loomed. And, on the corners, newsies peddled the Chronicle.

  “I love to watch them, to see people buy the paper, read the front-page articles.” He slipped his hand into hers, warm and strong. “Your article.”

  “Our article,” she said.

  He glanced at her, raised an eyebrow, then picked up the paper from his desk. “Your article.” He handed it to her.

  She read the byline on the top of the article. “Where’s your name?”

  “It’s your article. I wanted you to have your own byline. You deserve it.”

  She read the article through. “I wish we’d been able to pry the name of Flora’s suitor out of her.”

  “I suspect she’ll be having that very chat with the police by lunchtime. My court reporter called. The charges against Bennett were just dismissed.”

  Esme ran her hand over the article, the feel of the paper so familiar. Newsprint came off on her hand. She set the paper on his desk, turned to watch the square. “I have to admit, I thought that someday this would be my view, my office. I thought I deserved it because I was a Price. But this office has to be earned, not bequeathed.”

  “Are you saying you don’t deserve your inheritance?”

  “I ran away. So, no.” She looked up at him. “I went to Montana thinking God wouldn’t bless me because I’d despised all the other things He’d given me. But He blessed me anyway, despite my mistakes.” She tried a smile. “I figured out when Daughtry died that blessing wasn’t about being rich or powerful. It was about knowing that through all of it, rich or poor, I could trust in God’s love for me. Being poor in spirit is about needing God, and it’s when I needed Him that He poured out his riches into my life. My daughter. My town…” You. She wanted to say it, but she wasn’t sure what lay beyond this moment, this day.

  She turned back to the window. “I just wish my father would have believed in me, known that I grew into a woman who loved newspapers, just like he did.”

  “He did believe in you,” Oliver said, frowning. “He kept everything you ever wrote.”

  She stared at him, and must have worn her bewilderment.

  He gave a laugh, something that sounded more like disbelief. “Of course.” He took her hand. “Come with me.”

  He walked her through the lobby—clearly not caring that his receptionist watched them with censure on her face as they exited his office, Esme in her rumpled clothes, he in his shirtsleeves, and walked her down past the editor’s offices to the library. Racks and racks of archived newspapers lined the shelves, their dates written on placards on the shelves below. Oliver pulled her through the room to the back, to another set of shelves. He pointed to a placard.

  The Copper Valley Times.

  She let go of his hand, lifted out a newspaper. One of her first, she recognized it as one she’d sent to her father. She ran her hand across the flimsy paper, eight pages of poorly written news. “I sent this to him.”

  Oliver nodded. “And then, one day, you stopped. He told me about how he waited for the paper every week, how he closed his door, read it cover to cover when he received it, how he saw you between the lines, growing into a businesswoman, a pioneer. He was so proud of you, Esme.”

  She blinked back the burning in her eyes. Swallowed. Slid the paper back into its place. “But these…” She read the dates on the next stack. “I didn’t send him these.”

  “He ordered these. He didn’t want you to know, so he had them sent to Chicago, and his correspondent there forwarded them to the Chronicle.”

  She remembered that, the post office box in Chicago; she had thought it might be the subscription of one of the former miners. “Why didn’t he want me to know?” But she could answer that for herself, she didn’t need Oliver’s wince, the way he tried to find a clever truth.

  “His pride. I know it too well,” she said quietly. She moved her finger down the row. It seemed he’d collected every paper for the past twenty years. She pressed her fingers under her eyes, caught the wetness there.

  “Now you have newsprint on your face,” Oliver said, turning her. He took out his handkerchief, held her chin as he wiped it off.

  She caught his wrists. “Oliver…I know that this paper doesn’t belong to me anymore. And I’m so proud of all you’ve become here. But…do you think I could have a job? A real job, as a reporter?”

  She couldn’t read his expression—amusement, disbelief?—and she suddenly wanted to steal the words back. What was she doing? She had her own life, her own paper, her own mine back in Montana. She didn’t really want to stay here, resume her life…

  Except, yes, she did. Standing in the Chronicle office, with the bustle of the street below and the elevated train rumbling by, the current of the city had rippled through her, the dormant passion fresh, young, burning to live inside her.

  She wanted to stay here, introduce Lilly to her legacy. Fall in love all over again with Oliver. She saw them skating in Central Park and attending the Opera, or even one of the Ziegfeld Follies, saw them writing articles late into the night, stopping when he looked at her with those dark eyes that could unravel her thoughts…

  Like now.

  “Esme,” he said quietly. “I can’t give you a job.”

  Oh, she tried not to flinch, tried not to let the betrayal show on her countenance. She gathered up the society woman inside and took a breath. “I understand.” After all, why would he want to work with her again?

  He’d already done that.

  She nodded, moving past him, toward the door. “You’re right, of course. I have a good life in Montana, and people there that depend on me, and—”

  “Esme!”

  She felt his hand on her arm, turning her. In the murky light of the library, he suddenly appeared the young, angry man she’d remembered that day when she’d visited him in the tenements, shocked, even frustrated at her appearance. “Esme, I can’t give you a job, because you’re the heiress. This paper is yours.”

  She blinked at him, frowned. “But you said—”

  “I thought I could make you go away. I thought you’d give up, and frankly, I couldn’t take letting you into my life only to break me again. But here you are, with newsprint on your face and your hair down to your waist, asking me for a job and I—I’m a scoundrel if I don’t tell you that making you publisher is exactly what your father wanted.”

  Her mouth opened, and she might have uttered a sound, but she had nothing comprehensible.

  Oliver stepped closer to her. “Esme, this paper belongs to you. It’s your inheritance. I was wrong not to go after you, but I thought you didn’t want it.”

  Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I want it. And…I want you to run it with me.”

  She closed the gap between them, ran her hands up behind him, hooked them onto his shoulders. “Run this paper with me, Oliver. It belongs to you too.”

  He drew in a long breath. “Would you still marry your footman, do you think?”

  She tucked herself into his arms, drew in the smell of him at his neck. “It’ll make the headlines,” she said. Then she kissed him beneath the dust and shadows of the Chronicle, right above the cloakroom, where they began.

  * * * * *

  “Roll up the carpet, Amelia, and add it to the fire.”

  Jinx stood at the doorway to Foster’s den, the hear
th roaring, spitting out ash as it devoured Foster’s things, the pictures of his motorcars and the Jinx, a stash of playbills she’d found in his desk drawer, even his tuxedo, which she’d found in a closet in his den, the stink of him in it, a woman’s kiss at the collar.

  She’d dispose of him, incinerate him from her life.

  Start again, clean.

  The doors to the garden hung open, the smell of the room drifting into the spring breeze. She’d arrived home after dropping Bennett at the Waldorf-Astoria and set about creating a life that lived outside society’s whims.

  She would have burned the dueling pistols, but they’d disappeared after her arrest, probably in police custody.

  “And the picture, ma’am?” Amelia gestured to the oil of Jinx and Foster, the one she’d had commissioned early in her marriage when she believed in a happy ending.

  Perhaps she still believed in a happy ending. Just not one of her own making. “Burn that also.”

  “Jinx!”

  The voice turned her on her silk heel.

  Her mother stalked up behind her, dressed in the latest fashion—a V-necked blue silk dress, cinched tight at the waist, her face betraying the horror that Jinx knew she should probably feel. “What on earth are you doing?”

  “I’m cleaning house, Mother.” Jinx turned back to the room. “I’m starting over.”

  “With nothing!” Phoebe grabbed her arm, turning her, too roughly. “I was in the middle of my morning tea when Elizabeth Fish called me and informed me of your public declarations of”—she chiseled her voice to low—“ your indiscretion with Foster’s brother.”

  Jinx jerked her arm away. She’d had enough of people intimidating her. “You needn’t whisper, Mother. Bennett and I are getting married, today perhaps, and by this evening, I will be a scarlet woman no longer.”

  “Come to your senses, Jinx! No woman benefits in society by admitting cuckolding her husband. You will be cut, uninvited, your family ignored in society. You need to retract your statement, tell them you were under duress. Perhaps even take an extended trip to Europe at some sanatorium. Maybe then, you will be accepted back next season.”