Selena thought Kyle might object to being ordered about so brusquely, but as he helped her dismount from the carriage, she saw his lips twitch with a rueful smile.
As introductions commenced, Selena saw again that she had reason to be grateful to Bea, for it appeared that the younger girls meant to follow her example and accept Kyle’s marriage.
“You’re pretty,” Felicity said, beaming as she bobbed Selena a curtsy.
“Felicity!” Bea admonished.
“Well, she is. And I don’t see why it isn’t good manners to say so.”
Selena found it hard not to sweep the precocious child into her arms. “Thank you for the compliment,” she said with a smile. “And even if it isn’t proper to say so on such short acquaintance, I think you are pretty, too.”
“Are you truly married to my brother?”
Selena couldn’t help glancing at Kyle. “Yes… truly.”
Zoe offered a shy smile as she held out her hand to be shaken. “Does that make you our aunt?”
Zoe’s shyness touched a cord in Selena, for it was something she understood quite well. “I think perhaps the official connection is sisters-in-law, but I hope it shall make us friends.” Meeting the gentle brown eyes, Selena knew they would be friends. Already she felt a surprising closeness with the slender, awkward girl on the brink of womanhood.
And when Bea put an arm around her waist to guide her into the house, saying, “Come, now, Selena, we must show you your new home,” Selena’s throat unexpectedly tightened with emotion. She had never expected to be welcomed so warmly.
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Kyle retrieving Horatio’s cage from the carriage. “I have a gift for the girls,” Selena told Bea as they moved into the house. “That is, if you don’t mind.”
But once the cover was removed from the cage, there was no question that the parrot had found a home, too. While Horatio ruffled his feathers and squawked “Come to tea!” Felicity jumped up and down, clapping her hands, and Zoe laughed.
It was while the younger sisters were admiring the bird that Lydia came down the wide staircase. The girl was a beauty and quite aware of it, Selena thought. Lydia had the same brown hair and eyes as her sisters, but hers were a darker and richer shade, which contrasted well with the pale pink sprigged muslin she was wearing.
She had far more polish and apparently less warmth than her siblings, as well. When she greeted Kyle, she held out her hand to be kissed.
Selena was surprised at such affectation, but Kyle obviously expected it. Yet there was an unmistakable gleam of humor in his eyes as he executed a courtly bow and introduced Selena.
Lydia’s reaction was similar to Bea’s. “Your wife?” She shot Selena a startled look. “What about Danielle?”
Shock and disapproval sped across Bea’s face, while Kyle’s amusement faded abruptly. It was the moment he had been dreading—the moment his past indiscretions were exposed for his wife to see. Not that he had intentionally deceived Selena. He simply hadn’t found an appropriate time to tell her. At first he had been too angry at being forced into marriage to think she deserved an explanation. And he was enough of a gentleman to know the subject required delicate handling. Then later, he had been reluctant to hurt her. He could just imagine the wounded look in Selena’s blue eyes when he told her his reasons for not wanting to marry her—that he had intended to wed another woman so he could claim his son. Then after her reaction to Veronique, he hadn’t wanted to face Selena’s censure. Though perhaps, he admitted to himself, he was being cowardly.
Involuntarily, his eyes sought Selena’s. There was a quizzical look on her face: puzzled and expectant. So what should he say? Keeping a mistress could possibly be forgiven, as could patronizing a lightskirt; Veronique and Angel were part of his wild past, and he intended to keep it that way—in the past. But how did he explain Danielle Whitfield? How did he excuse his brief but consequential relationship with a woman who was a kind, gentle, married lady? How did he tell Selena about his son? And how did he do it in a way that would shield Danielle’s reputation as well, without adding fuel to the rumors that had been circulating in Natchez ever since Clay’s conception?
Moreover, how did he keep such knowledge from his young sisters? No one except Bea knew for a certainty that Clay was his son; Lydia was only guessing that his interest in Danielle was anything more than compassion for a lonely woman who was struggling to support a crippled husband and a young child. At least he fervently hoped Lydia was guessing.
Kyle cleared his throat, wishing he was back on his ship, where the only tempests he had to deal with were the wind and the sea; where women had no place.
“Will you dance? Awk!”
At the sudden interruption, Lydia dropped her haughty air in her enchantment over the parrot. As she exclaimed over Horatio’s cleverness, Kyle sent the bird a look of gratitude; he had never been so thankful for a distraction.
“Stubble it! Stubble it! Blast, awk!”
While the younger girls chortled, Kyle glanced again at Selena. Her intelligent, quicksilver eyes were focused on his face, and he realized he was in deep trouble. She was too perceptive not to have sensed the sudden undercurrents in the hall at the mention of Danielle or to brush off the subject as having no importance.
Surprisingly, Selena raised an eyebrow at him. “Where did Horatio learn that?” she asked with a smile that was a trifle forced.
Kyle realized then that she was giving him a reprieve. She was allowing him the opportunity to sidestep the issue of Danielle. But he should have expected it, he reflected. Selena was too well-bred to cause a scene, especially in front of his sisters.
He met her gaze over the heads of his giggling sisters with a look of fervent gratitude. Later, he promised her silently. When they were alone he would make a clean confession. As his wife, she deserved an explanation.
And Danielle deserved an explanation, as well. He couldn’t allow her to hear about his marriage from someone else. He would have to call on her at once and risk the gossip that the call would inevitably create.
And yet he had to consider Selena. A gentleman couldn’t simply deposit his wife on the doorstep like a piece of baggage and allow her to fend for herself. Devil take it, how had he ever gotten himself in such a fix?
Hoping he could count on Bea to extricate him, Kyle drew her aside. While Selena was telling the girls how to feed and care for the parrot, Kyle hastily explained his dilemma to Bea. He wasn’t disappointed, for she understood at once.
“Of course, I’ll help. Kyle, I don’t think Lydia really knows what she’s talking about,” Bea added with a frown. “And even if she does, she has no business discussing it in public, especially in front of Cissy and Zoe. I will speak to her about it—”
“No, Bea, that would only give credence to Lydia’s suspicions. Perhaps it would be best to say nothing at all. If you would just see to Selena while I go into town…”
Bea nodded and then stepped in to rescue him, offering to show Selena to her room and help her become settled. When the younger girls had taken themselves off to the parlor in order to further their acquaintance with Horatio uninterrupted, Kyle was free to suggest that he ought to return the carriage to the livery stable. It was a transparent excuse, for a servant could more appropriately have been employed for such an errand. But Selena again showed her breeding by politely accepting his explanation. She was ascending the stairs, listening courteously to Bea’s chatter, when Kyle made his escape
There were two side wings to the house, Selena discovered, the upper floor of one given over to apartments for the master and mistress. It was to this east wing that Bea led her.
“These were Mama’s rooms,” Bea said, preceding Selena into a bedchamber decorated in creams and golds. “Kyle will have Papa’s, of course, now that he’s home to stay. His bedchamber is through that door. I hope you’ll be comfortable here,” she added when she had shown Selena her sitting room and dressing room.
“I’m sure I
will,” Selena equivocated, though as she glanced at the vast mahogany bed draped with yards of mosquito netting, she couldn’t help wishing the Ramseys weren’t quite so affluent. In a smaller house, she might have been required to share a bedchamber with her husband.
“Kyle told me about your parents,” she said to change the subject. “I’m sorry you lost them so tragically.”
A shadow darkened Bea’s face. “Yes, well…they were wonderful people. You would have liked them. It was hardest on the girls, but they’re recovering. I suppose we should still be in mourning, since it hasn’t even been eight months, but Mama detested black. And I can’t believe it would be good for the baby if I only stared at somber faces and depressing colors all day long.”
Selena smiled, watching Bea gently pat her swollen abdomen. “I imagine you must be very happy.”
“Indeed I am! It took me so long, poor Thaddeus had nearly despaired of ever having children. We’ve been married over three years, you see.” She paused as Selena’s gaze turned wistful. “God willing, you’ll soon be having your own.”
Selena felt herself flushing. At the moment, bearing Kyle’s children seemed highly unlikely. She could scarcely get him to speak to her, much less share a marriage bed. But she couldn’t discuss such a subject with Bea. Turning away, she busied herself with removing her gloves and bonnet and laying them on a small rosewood table.
“I’ll send up a maid shortly to help you unpack,” Bea said as she lowered her plump, ungainly body into a comfortable wing chair. “I have to confess,” she added tentatively, “I was surprised that Kyle married without telling us.”
It was an inquiry, Selena knew—phrased tactfully, but still a request for an explanation. “He didn’t want to marry me,” she replied in a low voice, meeting Bea’s eyes directly. And when the plain-faced woman looked at her expectantly, she told Bea the rest of the story, about Antigua and the altercation in the garden and how Kyle had saved her from scandal, leaving out only the fact that she had made love to Kyle on the beach.
“But you care for him?” was all Bea asked at the conclusion of the tale, concern evident in her voice.
“Yes,” Selena answered softly, in complete honesty. “I care for him.”
Bea relaxed visibly. “Well, then, that’s all right. I wouldn’t worry about how your union began. I know my brother, and he wouldn’t let himself be forced any into anything if he truly objected. Besides, you’re underestimating your appeal. Felicity was right. You’re so beautiful Kyle probably took one look at you and fell head over heels in love. Now, if you had my looks… It’s a wonder what Thaddeus Sidlow ever saw in a plain creature like me.”
Selena smiled as she shook her head. It was easy to guess what any man of discernment saw in such a generous, loving woman. “Thank you,” she said simply, with gratitude for being accepted so unquestionably. And when Bea grinned in return, Selena knew she had found another friend.
“I’m glad you’re here,” Bea admitted then. “I worried about leaving Kyle alone in a house overrun by petticoats. He knows nothing about raising girls or managing a household—or running a plantation, for that matter, but with you to help him, I expect he’ll do quite well.”
“It will be difficult, though, for him to give up his independence.”
Bea waved a hand in dismissal. “Kyle may think he wants freedom, but he’ll be happy with a family, I know it.”
Her smile fading, Selena went to stand at the tall French windows that were opened to the gallery. Below was a garden courtyard, shaded by sweet olive and flowering almond trees and scented with jasmine and roses. Beyond, to her right, she could see the kitchens and house slaves’ quarters, which composed a separate rear wing of the house.
“Bea… who is Danielle?”
She felt rather than saw Bea stiffen behind her. It was a long moment before Bea answered, and then her tone was a touch too bright. “Danielle Whitfield? Why, she’s one of the citizens of Natchez. Her husband, Jeremiah, was gravely wounded in the Battle of New Orleans—his spine shattered by a musket ball. No one thought he would survive, but somehow he has. It has left him a complete invalid, though, and the doctor thinks it extremely unlikely he will live much longer. Danielle works at Chandler’s General Mercantile in town to support him and their two-year-old son.”
“That isn’t what I meant,” Selena said quietly, meeting Bea’s eyes.
“I think,” Bea said, no longer pretending to misunderstand, “you should ask Kyle.”
“Would Danielle have any reason to be upset about our marriage?”
Bea shrugged helplessly. “She can’t. She is married already.”
Selena turned back to the window. Somehow the knowledge that the unknown Danielle had a husband didn’t quite console her.
While her trunks were being unpacked, Bea gave Selena a tour of the main house, conducting her through spacious rooms that were graced with high ceilings, gleaming woodwork, elegant rosewood and mahogany furnishings and polished wood floors covered by plush carpets.
Selena couldn’t help but be impressed. There were five rooms on the main ground floor, which included a large drawing room, a small parlor, a music room, a study for the master of the house and a well-stocked library. There were also two rooms in each side wing, which included a formal dining room, a smaller family dining room, a large sitting room and a general room, where the mistress kept accounts and conducted the business of housekeeping. This last was the brightest, since it boasted two windows and opened onto the flagged courtyard, and was also the most functional, with its huge desk and shelf-lined walls. Selena eyed it with approval; she had been raised to manage a large household and knew she would be spending a good deal of time there.
Selena met Bea’s husband that evening when the family gathered for supper. Tall and angular, Thaddeus Sidlow had an untidy thatch of brown hair that kept falling into his eyes and a studious air that softened measurably whenever he was near his wife. He obviously doted on Bea. Indeed, his manner was so solicitous that when he stood beside her chair, urging her to add another morsel of chicken to her already full plate, Bea told him good-naturedly to stop hovering over her like a mama bird and take his seat.
Such frankness surprised Selena, and she decided it would probably take her a while to become accustomed to the easy, open ways of the Americans.
She wasn’t conditioned to such noise at the table, either. Usually Lydia dined with the adults while the younger girls ate supper in the nursery, Selena had learned, but this evening both Zoe and Felicity had been allowed to join them in honor of Kyle’s homecoming. At the moment Felicity was engaged in quizzing her brother mercilessly about his last voyage and giggling at his teasing responses.
Yet despite the strangeness, Selena couldn’t help enjoying herself; no one could, she reflected, surrounded by such love and laughter. Glancing down the length of the long table, where Kyle sat at the head, she smiled to see him reach out and tweak his little sister’s freckled nose. His obvious delight in the child made her wonder if perhaps Bea wasn’t right about Kyle being pleased to have a family. Selena had never seen him so relaxed and content as he was now, his eyes brimming with mirth as he threatened to make Felicity walk the plank.
Watching him, Selena was conscious of a yearning to have him treat her with the same familiarity, with the same high-spirited affection and love. Yet when Kyle glanced her way, she quickly lowered her gaze to her plate, afraid that her longing showed on her face.
She had just dared to look up again when Felicity left off giggling and blurted out an explosive question. “Kyle, did you know Lydia has a beau?”
Lydia, who had sat stiffly through two courses with a pained look on her delicate features as if she were above such childish displays of exuberance, glared at her sister. “Do be quiet, Cissy! You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I do so! I saw you kissing Tanner Parkington in the summerhouse.”
Bea let out a soft gasp. “Lydia, you didn’t!” sh
e murmured. Kyle’s heavy eyebrows had snapped together in a frown. The abrupt silence that followed the revelation contrasted starkly with the lively conversation that had gone before, which led Selena to conclude that despite the easy manners here, kissing a young man could compromise a young lady’s reputation as thoroughly in American society as it could in British.
“Is that so, Lydia?” Kyle said at last, a hard note in his tone that Selena recognized. She felt sorry for the girl, if it was true. Which it seemed to be. Lydia’s cheeks couldn’t turn any redder, and the glance she gave Kyle was full of guilt.
“Perhaps it is,” she muttered, “but Felicity has no right bearing tales.”
“In this case, I’m glad she did.” Ignoring Lydia’s sullen look, Kyle turned to Bea. “Tanner…Isn’t that Parkington’s youngest boy?”
“Yes, but he’s not really so young. He’s twenty now.”
“Whatever his age, I intend to warn him away. I won’t have him taking advantage of Lydia.”
“He didn’t take advantage of me!” Lydia protested. “I kissed him back!”
Selena saw Kyle’s gaze narrow ominously on his sister. “Tell me, has Tanner found gainful employment since the last time I was here?”
“Of course not! A gentleman doesn’t work.”
A muscle tightened in Kyle’s jaw. “I don’t know where you came by that harebrained notion, and I won’t dispute it with you, but I don’t want him calling here again. Even if his intentions toward you are honorable, he doesn’t have a penny to his name. The Parkington plantation is mortgaged to the hilt.”
Lydia’s expression grew even more sullen, but she didn’t argue further. Yet Selena was certain the contretemps wasn’t over. She was almost as sure that Kyle hadn’t acted very wisely in forbidding Lydia to see her beau. He was only protecting his sister, of course. But such high-handed use of authority was the surest way to arouse rebellion in a girl of Lydia’s temperament.
Selena was considering whether to speak to Kyle about it later when Zoe suddenly claimed the attention of everyone at the table by accidentally dropping her wineglass and spilling dark red Burgundy down the front of her blue muslin dress and on the Aubusson carpet.
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