Lions and Lace

by Meagan Mckinney

  “Don’t let’s speak of it now, Christal. You look so tired, this can’t be good for you,” Alana whispered.

  “No, I’m going to remember, Alana. It’s my only hope.”

  “Christal—” said Alana, her voice breaking with emotion. She couldn’t stand to see her sister in such pain, her dear little sister who had gone with her to Loft’s confectionery all those years ago and with wide eyes had surveyed the rainbow of gumdrops and chocolates, only to agree with her older sister that the licorice was best. There were all kinds of misfortunes in this world, and poverty was definitely one of them, but at that moment, if working with a shovel would have eased her sister’s plight, Alana would have dug until her hands bled.

  “Please go now, Alana.” Christal wiped her cheeks and stood. She crumbled her remaining bread crumbs for the ducklings still gathered at her feet. “I really am tired, and you’ve been here too long. You mustn’t make your husband impatient on my account.”

  Alana stood, wanting anything but to leave at that moment. “Let me help you to your room.”

  Christal shook her head. “You can’t help me with any of this, Alana. In the end, I’m the only one who can do it.”

  “Please don’t upset yourself.” Alana went to take her hand, but Christal brushed it away.

  “No, Alana, you must leave now. I can’t be responsible for taking you away from your husband. He’s already been so kind to let you come. You must tell him how grateful I am”—Christal’s voice shook—“and you must promise me that you’ll tell him that I said he’s wed the most brave and dear lady in all of New York.”

  Alana began to weep, and unwilling to upset her sister further, she ran up the hill toward the front of the asylum and her waiting carriage. Christabel didn’t watch her go. The ducklings still gathered at her feet, and she stared down at them with the tragic face of a doomed Ophelia.

  Alana’s eyes were red and puffy from crying when the coupé stopped in Washington Square. Despite the clamor for her attention to the upcoming wedding, she went directly to her room and stayed there, ignoring everyone from the delivery boy to sweet-tempered Margaret. She wanted desperately to cheer herself. In the past she’d always found a way to do it, but this time she wondered if she would ever smile again. The tears still streamed down her cheeks every time she thought of Christal.

  Her sister’s plight had always affected her, but today something inside her broke, and now the dam no longer held. Perhaps it was the strain she’d been under, perhaps tomorrow’s impending ceremony, but Alana knew in her heart that it was neither of those things. Seeing Christal as she had today was what was breaking her heart. Her sister’s attempt at bravery in the face of such monumental sorrow made Alana ashamed for ever having indulged in a moment of self-pity. Her troubles, even Sheridan’s forced marriage, seemed inconsequential compared to Christal’s. As she wiped her tears again with her damp handkerchief wadded tightly in her hand, Alana swore with all the power of her soul that someday she would see her sister out of that place and restored to the life she’d been meant to lead.

  A knock interrupted her solitude, and Alana was tempted to ignore it. But when the couturiere, Madame LaBoeuve, called to her in a desperate plea for her to try on her wedding dress so that it could be finished by morning, Alana took pity on the woman, wiped her eyes, and opened the door.

  She looked nothing like a joyful blushing bride, but Alana didn’t care. Ignoring the curious stares of Madame LaBoeuve’s seamstresses, she stepped out of her carriage dress and stripped down to her pink silk corset and chemise threaded with matching pink ribbons. Madame LaBoeuve and her seamstresses went to work expertly pinning and basting the satin gown, all of them very noticeably trying to ignore her red eyes and tear-stained cheeks. Alana knew she should care what they thought of her, but at that moment she just wanted to be left alone.

  She should have known she wouldn’t be so lucky.

  Not a second had passed after Madame LaBoeuve placed the last straight pin when Alana’s maid, Margaret, could be heard protesting vehemently outside the bedroom door. All eyes turned, and to Alana’s horror, Trevor Sheridan suddenly appeared with Margaret near hysterics at his coattails trying to bar him from the room.

  “The man won’t listen, miss!” Margaret shrieked. “Shall I fetch Kevin to throw him out? What shall I do?”

  “Whatever is this about?” Alana gasped, feeling as if she were naked beneath Sheridan’s stare with just the loosely basted bridal gown held to her bosom.

  “I’ve never seen such a beast of a man—to barge into a lady’s boudoir!” Margaret squealed.

  Sheridan ripped his gaze from Alana, flashed a dark smile down to the little maid, and said for her ears only, “Go dachta an diabhal tú.”

  Margaret’s eyes widened, as if to say the language, if not the words, were familiar.

  “You don’t know what I’ve said, do you, Pegeen?” Sheridan inquired, vaguely annoyed.

  Warily, Margaret shook her brown curls.

  “The English take you, then, if you don’t know the tongue of your motherland. Go on! Go back to the kitchens. Leave. All of you,” he suddenly commanded to Madame LaBoeuve and her army of seamstresses. “I want to be alone with my”—his gaze again traveled to Alana, who stood in the brightness of the windows clutching her bridal gown—“fiancée,” he finished with an amused glitter in his eyes.

  “This is outrageous behavior,” Alana protested, his gaze making her heart thump wildly in her chest. “You can’t come into my bedroom! It’s not done!”

  “It’s now done,” he answered succinctly as the last little seamstress scurried past him. Even Margaret had disappeared, running back to her Kevin, no doubt, to see what kind of Gaelic curse Sheridan had placed on her brow.

  “Have you no decency? What gives you the right to barge into my bedroom like this?” she hissed when they were alone, unable to believe the gall of the man.

  “I’m your husband. That gives me the right.”

  “But no one else knows we’ve wed. You’ve shocked my servants.”

  “Let them be shocked.” He walked closer and suddenly saw her red-rimmed eyes. “You’ve been crying,” he stated flatly, the expression in his eyes the only hint of his interest.

  Anger colored her all the way to her temples. She turned her face from his and said in a low, vengeful voice, “Why shouldn’t I cry? I’ve a lot to cry about.”

  Her sister’s situation was killing her, but he didn’t know this, and when she looked at him again, it was obvious he had mistaken her tears as a sign of her shame over their marriage. If it were possible for a man to freeze, Trevor Sheridan had done just that. He was never a terribly warm man, but in seconds his manner and attitude suddenly changed from neutral to menacing. With stiff, formal steps he went to a chintz-covered chair by the fireplace. He sat as if defiantly claiming his territory and laid his walking stick like a rapier across his lap.

  She strode over to him, nearly tripping on the long bridal train. “If you wanted to speak with me, you should have waited for me in the parlor. Why have you barged in here like this?”

  “I don’t wait in parlors.” His eyes were as cold as she’d ever seen them. How such a dazzling combination of gold and green and brown could so suddenly turn to ice was beyond her ability to comprehend. “You’re my wife,” he rasped. “You’ll see me now.”

  His words sent a chill down her spine, but she found them all much more preferable to the word wife. He made it sound like a curse. “This was not a part of our bargain,” she whispered harshly. “I didn’t agree to allow you to invade my privacy whenever you thought it might convenience you. You must leave this minute.”

  He stared at her, his gaze unwillingly flickering over the white satin that was taut against her breasts. Nonetheless, his expression remained dispassionate. “Would you have rather I sent my attorneys here instead? I wager your privacy would have been more violated with a dozen lawyers crawling around this room.”

  “You
r lawyers would have at least waited for me in the parlor.”

  “I’m not sure about that. They’re a very excitable group. When I informed them I had married, they fell over themselves to try to see you. Apparently they don’t like anyone encroaching upon my estate.”

  “Well, they’re intelligent men. I certainly intend to have some recompense after what you’ve put me through.” She thought of her sister’s bills. Those lawyers wouldn’t find a way to circumvent what she had due.

  He shook his cursedly handsome head. “I’ve told them about our agreement. But for you to get anything, they insisted that you sign these papers immediately. They were about to come when I told them I’d bring them to you myself.”

  “How gracious of you.” She couldn’t keep the acid out of her words, especially when she saw how premeditated this was. He’d come instead of his lawyers just to see the irritation spark in her green eyes.

  He smiled cynically, coldly, and reached into his breast pocket. He took out a thick sheaf of paper and laid it on the table next to him. “Have you a pen?”

  “What am I to sign?” A small frown appeared on her brow.

  “This stipulates the funds I am giving to you. Is ten thousand a month sufficient?”

  The blood rushed from her head so quickly, she nearly fainted. Calculating quickly in her mind, she realized even if they were married for only a year, she’d have enough money to take care of Christal forever if necessary. Suddenly she was feeling more optimistic.

  “Are you agreeable to that, Alana?”

  She looked at Sheridan and nodded. Finding a pen and ink at her escritoire, she brought them over to the table and signed all the pages he designated. She wanted to read what she was signing, but there were so many hereins and more-overs that the words became like Greek. There were three pages devoted just to “the definition of authenticity of signature,” whatever that meant.

  Disgusted, she blotted her signatures, and he placed the papers back in his breast pocket. “I can already hear the sighs of relief at Glass, Goldstein, Sach et al.” That cynical smile again graced his lips.

  “Now that the majority of your money is safe from my greed, will you excuse me?” She raised her eyebrows and pointed to the door.

  He looked in no hurry to depart. His gaze again lowered to her wedding gown. Even in pieces it looked impressive. The satin clung and draped just where it should—at her breasts, at her waist, along her derriere. His eyes warmed, and he seemed to hesitate. “You haven’t told me what you want sent over. This house goes for sale tomorrow.” His lips quirked in disgust. “I suppose you’ll insist on keeping that annoying maid of yours?”

  “Margaret’s been with me since the day she arrived at Castle Garden. I wouldn’t think of putting her out on the street.”

  He rolled his eyes. “So be it. When they arrive tomorrow, tell them my butler Whittaker is the one they must answer to.”

  “Whittaker. You’ve an English butler, then?”

  She’d made the comment with the most benign intentions, mostly because she was curious to know a little about the situation in which she was destined to find herself tomorrow. But Sheridan did not find the comment so innocuous. He grew still; his hands tightened on his ebony walking stick. “This isn’t Ireland, now is it?” he said caustically. “We’re in America, and the British can work for the Irish for a change when the Irish can pay for it.”

  “I meant only that—”

  “I know what you meant.”

  She put her hands out in supplication. “No, really—”

  He stood, and the words died on her lips. He was mistaking her comment for something she hadn’t intended, something cruel and vicious. As much as she didn’t like the man, she didn’t want him thinking that of her. Yet his attitude was infuriating. He was always so anxious to jump to the worst conclusion.

  “The wedding is to be at nine o’clock,” he explained in a frigid, perfunctory manner. “I don’t want anything to delay it. Lent is over, and the priests have too many to marry. I can’t reschedule.”

  “If only I’d been thrown to you during Lent. Then I wouldn’t be in this mess.”

  A black smile touched his lips. It never came close to those eyes. “You can cry some more, wife. It’s not bad enough you’ve married an Irisher, but you’ve got a Catholic one as well.”

  “Stop it.” Her chest heaved with suppressed anger. “Not everything I say is a premeditated slur against your background.”

  “Forgive me if I find that difficult to believe.”

  “No, I won’t forgive you.” She pulled up her train and followed him as he walked to the door. “I can’t live as your wife and guard my tongue against any and every phrase that might be taken in the wrong way. You can’t burden me with that too.”

  “Yes, and as you’ve just pointed out, I’ve already put a lot of burdens on you.”

  She grabbed his lapels and forced him to look at her. She whispered harshly, unwilling to let the servants hear her, “You have burdened me, and don’t you ever forget it! You’ve forced me into a loveless marriage. You’ve taken away all my money. You’ve nearly ruined me with scandal. Yet for the last time I shall say this: You misjudge me when you twist my words. I don’t care that you’re Irish, and upon my grave, I swear I meant to attend your sister’s debut. So knowing that fact, you will now and forever treat me accordingly!”

  He hesitated, and for one precious second he almost looked as if he believed her. But not totally. His ire raised, he cupped her jaw and forced her to look at him. “I hate to blacken that snow-white soul you’d like everyone to see, Alana, but you’ve all the selfish reasons in the world to say such things to me. No, you’re just like the rest of those Knickerbockers. You care about the ‘purity’ of those around you and little else.”

  “Yes, I care about that! But it’s the purity of their hearts I judge them by, and I’ve seen well enough of yours to know you haven’t a clean spot on it!” Angry that he’d so upset her, she released a moan of fury and pried his fingers from her chin. But before she could get them off, a pin along the seam of her bodice jabbed at her and viciously pulled along the tender flesh next to her breast. She tried to grab it, but the seam was underneath her arm, and she couldn’t see well enough to find it. In agony, she reached around until she felt a strong hand on her arm and another at the seam searching for the pin. When Sheridan had several pins taken off, revealing a good portion of her pink silk corset, he finally found the offending object hidden in the pink-ribboned edge of her chemise. He removed it, then took out his handkerchief and pressed it to the edge of her breast to absorb the tiny drop of blood before it stained her delicate undergarments.

  “I can do this now,” she said stiffly, embarrassed that he’d seen so much of her corset.

  He nodded and allowed her to take his handkerchief. Surely it was her imagination, but when he removed his hand, it brushed lightly against the side of her breast, and she could have sworn that it trembled.

  “Your handkerchief,” she whispered when she no longer needed it. She thrust it into his palm, a small crimson dot the only evidence of her wound.

  He stared at the drop of blood, then at her as she clutched the sides of her seams together to preserve her modesty. That mysterious Irish fire burned again in his eyes, and as if he were afraid of being burned, he glanced down at the red drop and said cruelly, “Funny. It’s not blue at all. In fact, it looks remarkably like Irish blood. Who’d have thought?”

  His sarcasm cut her. “We both bleed,” she answered quietly. “I think it wise neither of us forget that.”

  He pocketed the handkerchief. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “In the morning,” she nearly sobbed before he walked out the door.

  11

  The day of Alana’s wedding arrived, and she thought it fitting that it was still dark when she arose to dress. Madame LaBoeuve, looking ten years older than when she’d first shown herself at Alana’s door, appeared with her dress at p
recisely six o’clock. The gown was now finished, with a pointed basque-waist richly oversewn with passementerie of pearls that must have taken an army of seamstresses all night to attach. Her skirt was satin, looped up in back to reveal an underskirt of Duchesse lace. It had a simple virginal veil of silk tulle that covered her face and tumbled to the floor elegantly behind her. Everything from the rose-point lace of her gloves to the satin of her shoes was the tender color of snow in candlelight, even the bridal bouquet. Sheridan had delivered orange blossoms.

  Her attire was exquisite. No cost had been spared. But Alana could find no joy in it. As Margaret tightened her white damask corset and handed her her silk garters, all Alana could think about was how much this day should have meant to her, how much it would have meant to her if she’d been in love with her bridegroom. A painful longing tugged at her heart, but with it came the doomed acceptance of what was to come. She had to marry Sheridan. Everything she cared about depended on it, yet that thought was little solace as she picked up her bouquet and smelled the fresh sweet scent of orange blossoms. In years to come that innocent fragrance should bring back vivid memories of a joyful day. But already her wedding day was something she wanted fervently to forget.

  She was dressed before the first blush of morning painted Washington Square. She couldn’t sit easily because of the yards of fabric of her heavy satin train, so she stood at the window and watched the emboldened sunlight stride across the park, her breakfast still untouched on the tray on her desk.