“It’s too short for her, you goose,” Chloe said.
Deirdre in his arms, Kieran turned and headed toward the salon door.
“The Duchess Suite.” Mama hastened ahead of him to open the door.
Chloe and Juliet started to follow.
“I will see you in my study as soon as she is settled,” Tyne commanded. “Chloe, Juliet, this is none of your concern. Stay right here.”
“But, Papa . . .”
Kieran left the salon and headed up the steps. Part of him looked forward to the confrontation with Tyne. The rest of him—
Felt like the ne’er-do-well to which his father could usually reduce him in a few words.
The Duchess Suite was the farthest bedchamber from his own. He would have to remedy that, but not now when Deirdre looked so ghastly pale. The past two weeks of mist and rain had begun to rob her of her bronzed tone, and he did not like her new, if fashionable, pallor.
She was a heavy female for all her slimness.
Her eyes opened. “What happened? Why are you carrying me?”
“You fainted.”
“Deuce take—”
“Shh, Mama is coming.”
Deirdre struggled in his arms. “Let me down.”
“I think not. If you fainted again on the stairs—”
“I’ve never fainted in my life.”
“You have now.” He continued up the next flight of steps and down the corridor to the suite of rooms named for the one visit of his aunt, the Duchess of Worthington.
Better not tell Deirdre she now had an aunt by marriage who was a duchess. She might swoon again. Then again, if she gave him trouble . . .
“I was startled is all.” She glared at him. “You didn’t tell me your parents are titled.”
“And you may as well know now that so am I.”
She closed her eyes. For a moment, he feared she had indeed swooned again. Then she spoke through clenched teeth. “I am going to kill you.”
“Not if I get to him first, Miss MacKenzie.” Mama darted ahead of him to open the door and turn down the bed. “These are freshly aired sheets. I’m so glad you let us know ahead of time that you were bringing a . . . guest.”
Her hesitation over the word “guest” and the concern in her eyes asked Kieran a score of questions.
“Stop treating me like I’m fragile and tell me why you didn’t warn me.” Deirdre’s green eyes blazed up at him, though her pallor remained.
“I will—later.” He laid her on the bed and backed away. “Right now I had best settle matters with Tyne, or neither of you will have the opportunity to make me a corpse.”
“You’re going to leave me here?” Deirdre shot upright, then grabbed her head and slumped back onto the pillows. Perspiration beaded her brow, and she took several deep breaths. “I must be coming down with something. I am so sorry to come into your house ill.”
“No need to apologize.” Mama smoothed her hand across Deirdre’s brow, then tugged the combs from her hair. “I think you are exactly where you belong. You just rest there for a minute. I’ll be right back with some tea.”
“I can’t stay here.” To Kieran’s horror, Deirdre began to cry.
He returned to her side and brushed the tears from her cheeks with the tips of his fingers. “You can and you will stay here.” He wanted to kiss her, but Mama was already glowering at him as much as someone with a face as sweet as hers could glower. He settled for pressing two fingers to Deirdre’s lips, then drawing the coverlet to her chin before following Mama into the corridor and closing the door behind him.
The instant the latch clicked, she seized his lapels. “Tell me the truth, Kieran, is that young lady enceinte?”
“Most likely.” He kept his tone bland to disguise his elation.
“Most likely?” Mama jabbed a forefinger into his sternum. “If she is, are you the father?”
“Most definitely.” He couldn’t stop his grin. His feet seemed to hover a foot or so above the floorboards.
“Why are you smiling? Have you learned nothing after Joanna? Did we go astray in teaching you right from wrong? Oh, Kieran.” Tears swam in Mama’s eyes.
They slammed Kieran back to earth. “It is all right, Mama. She’s my wife. We married on Bermuda seven weeks ago, before I ever touched her.”
“Then you should have told us.” Mama set her hands on her hips. “Your father is already raging against you. This is only going to make matters worse.”
“I have no doubt.” Kieran’s tone was cold. “He will draw the same conclusions as you and think the worst.”
“When you didn’t tell us of the marriage, what do you expect?”
“Some faith in my honor?” He laughed with more bitterness than humor. “If he were not so determined to think the worst of me, he, of all people, should realize that I could not have brought home a noncombatant prisoner without having married her.”
“And you didn’t make matters clear to us because you want to egg him on.” Sighing, Mama shook her head. “This feud between you two has got to stop.”
Kieran crossed his arms over his chest. “He can start taking my word for the truth. All of you can.” He turned away. “Please see to Deirdre. She hasn’t had a mother since she was ten or so and not a great deal of female contact since then. I need to beard the lion in his den.”
“Tell him straightaway that she’s your wife, Kieran.”
Mama’s admonition followed Kieran down the hallway. Of course she was right. He should walk into Tyne’s presence and make the announcement of his marriage straight off. That would take the wind from Tyne’s anger-filled sails, especially if he suspected why Deirdre had fainted. By the time Kieran reached the ground-floor study, he resolved being up-front after all was the course he would take for the sake of peace—or at least a truce—between Tyne and him.
He paused outside the study door and knocked.
“Enter.” The voice of Garrett Ashford, Earl of Tyne, still held the resonance that had made it audible along the deck of a frigate.
And instilled fear and trembling in those he summoned to his presence.
Kieran entered and made himself pace to the chair across from the desk with the languid amble of a feline too lazy to move any faster. Tyne watched him the whole time, his deep blue eyes as cold as the lapis they resembled. Kieran shivered and sank onto the leather chair, his legs sprawled out before him, his prepared speech a jumble of nonsense in his mouth.
He had persuaded a beautiful, headstrong woman to marry him. He had kept a ship full of sailors and prisoners under control and gotten them safely back to Plymouth. He was five and twenty and about to be a father himself, and the icy disapproval of the man across the desk from him reduced him to the state of a recalcitrant schoolboy about to be caned by the headmaster.
He was not worthy to be Deirdre’s husband, nor the father of any boy or girl with which she presented him. For her sake, though, he needed to try.
He started to sit more upright. “Sir, I need to explain—”
“You need to explain a great deal.” Tyne’s voice lashed with the crack of a cat-o’-nine-tails. “Do you know how your actions of the past six months have shamed your mother and me, how they have pained your mother especially, and hurt your sisters?”
“A great deal, I know.”
No concern for how their actions had hurt him.
For Deirdre’s sake, he held his tongue in that regard. “I am trying to make amends.”
“By bringing that young woman here when she is obviously more to you than a hapless victim of war?”
“She is indeed more—”
“Have you no more honor than to treat her like the spoils of war?”
“Tyne—” Kieran’s resolve snapped. Before he could spew out the fury, the anguish of the past six months in a stream of vitriol that would surely leave more scars, he shot to his feet. “Thank you. I do not mind if I do have some brandy. It’s dashed cold here after the tropics.”
&n
bsp; “Sit down.”
Kieran ignored the command and stalked over to a table where a variety of decanters and glasses ranged. Liquor that would dull his wits in front of his parent was the last thing he needed, but he wanted something to do with his hands.
“That you would buy letters of marque in my name after the scandal was bad enough, but now you bring home this poor young woman.”
Trying to block out Tyne’s voice, Kieran splashed cognac into a glass before he faced his father, leaning back against the table. “Tell me, sir, what was I supposed to do with myself? You banished me from England. The Americans declared war on us, so I could scarcely go to Georgia after that. I was not welcome here. You have seen fit to allow someone else to live at Bishops Down and run that estate—”
“Because I prefer to keep it profitable rather than a den of iniquity—”
“And,” Kieran pressed on despite the stab of pain in his chest, “Uncle David’s widow and daughters are cluttering up Tyne House, not that they would have wanted me there.”
“With good cause.” Tyne’s voice rose in volume. “No sensible mother—”
“What am I forgetting?” Kieran fairly shouted down Tyne. “Oh yes, I was not allowed in London either, thanks to Joanna’s brother.”
“With whom you fought a dishonorable duel.”
Kieran glared at Tyne. “You were so convinced I must be dishonorable, were you not? You took rumors for truth and wrote me those scathing letters without asking. I—” Brandy glass or not, he began to shake. He thumped it onto the table, yanked the ribbon from his hair, and scraped the waves back. “I was the one who was wounded. See that?” He turned his damaged ear toward Tyne. “See how close he came to ending the Ashford line?” He did not look at Tyne in case he showed no concern, no reaction.
“Rutledge and his seconds said you shot early.” At least Tyne’s voice was softer, less certain.
Or was that wishful thinking?
“Even your seconds agreed.”
“Seconds who were no friends of mine.”
“But what did they gain by lying?”
“Bringing down an Ashford for not being a dupe.”
“Are you saying you did not fire early?” Tyne’s tone held a challenge.
“Yes, dash it all, I did shoot early. I fired into the air. But I never even turned around. My wound proves that.” With a curse, he shoved the brandy glass onto the floor, where it landed with a satisfying crash. “My shot never went near him. But of course you do not believe me, so why do I trouble myself explaining?”
Turning his back on Tyne, he paced to the fireplace, where he stood trying to warm his hands and calm his breathing.
“That was a rather childish display,” Tyne said in a conversational tone.
“I suppose it would have been far manlier if I had thrown it at your head. And I suppose I would have been more honorable to shoot Rutledge over his slut of a sis—”
“Kieran Ashford,” Tyne bellowed, “you will never call a lady that again.”
“Joanna Rutledge,” Kieran said through his teeth, “is not a lady.”
“Thanks to you.”
If he had not agreed with Tyne about smashing the glass being childish, Kieran might have smashed something else, something even more satisfying like the ormolu clock on the mantel or one of the French windows.
Instead, he sighed. “I denied it before, not that you would listen to me, and I will deny it again. I was not responsible for Joanna’s downfall.”
“You were found by several people with her in a grotto, and her clothes were awry.”
Kieran speared his fingers through his hair. “We were walking in the garden as betrothed couples are wont to do. She fainted.”
“As females in her condition are wont to do.” Tyne’s voice held a coldness that made Kieran flinch.
He inclined his head in agreement, swallowed. “Joanna was further along that night than I could have managed in the weeks of our acquaintance, but we will never know that, with the way her family packed her off to Greece with that scholar who preferred their money to his wife’s virtue. He should have been a proud papa two months ago or more, giving his fine name to a footman’s bas—”
“Kieran.”
He did not just flinch this time; he jumped. Then, his ears growing hot, he gripped the edge of the mantel, feeling as though he could rip it from the wall, took a deep breath, and plunged. “But you are not interested in the truth, are you, my lord? You are interested in anything that confirms your belief that I am—”
He could not finish the thought that his father considered him feckless and without direction. Tyne might agree.
Silence fell in the study save for the hiss and crackle of the fire. Outside, mist had turned to rain that beat a monotonous tattoo against the windows.
Then Tyne’s chair creaked. That was the only warning Kieran received that his father approached him. At eight and fifty, Garrett Ashford could still move without a sound.
He paused directly behind Kieran. “I have sent a messenger to Greece to learn of the actual date of the child’s birth.”
“Sir.” Suddenly, Kieran felt the fire’s warmth.
Tyne had believed him enough to go to the expense of sending someone all the way to Greece to learn the truth.
“Your mother wishes to take Chloe to London for another Season and launch Juliet into society in the spring,” Tyne continued. “She cannot go back into society with everyone believing that her brother is a debaucher of young ladies.”
So he had done it for Chloe’s sake, not his son’s.
Kieran gripped the mantel until his fingers hurt.
Tyne sighed. “So tell me about this young person upstairs.”
Kieran would have been taken aback by the abrupt shift in subject, but he knew where Tyne was going and that it was not a true shift at all.
He should tell him now that she was his wife.
He could not. He simply could not miss this opportunity to show Tyne how unjust he was.
Kieran shrugged. “She was the captain’s daughter. The man died, not from any fighting. They surrendered without a true fight. So I took her under my protection.”
“And Heron did not try to stop you?” Tyne sounded shocked.
“He had no choice. The Phoebe got separated from us in a storm.”
“I see.”
This time, Tyne chose to cross the room and pour something liquid into a glass. He did not smash his; he drank its contents.
The glass thudded onto the table. “Just tell me, Kieran, did she faint because she is with child?”
Kieran relaxed his grip on the mantel. He knew the rules to this game.
“More than likely.”
“Is it yours?”
Kieran faced Tyne, smiling. “Most definitely.”
Tyne’s back went rigid. “That you would take actions that are little better than piracy is bad enough, but to . . . to take advantage of a female without a protector—” He tramped to his desk and sank into the chair, looking all of his years. “Get out. Get out of my sight before I say or do something I will regret.”
Kieran gazed at the lines etched around Tyne’s mouth, the increased gray in his hair, the shadows of fatigue beneath his eyes, and remained where he was. The game was over. He regretted having played it. Watching Tyne, his father, age before his eyes took away any pleasure he thought he would gain from exposing how badly he thought of his only son and then laying down his trump card.
“Sir.” He returned to the chair across from Tyne and perched on the edge. “Deirdre was my wife before I ever touched her.”
Deirdre wanted to crawl under the covers and hide. No, under the high bed would be preferable. If only she didn’t suddenly feel so utterly fatigued, she would have raced after Kieran and yanked out every strand of his hair for not telling her just how powerful a family he came from, he was a part of.
She had read about the English in books, in old pamphlets from the Revolution, in newspap
ers that made their way into foreign ports. The English nobility like Kieran’s family ruled the country by right of birth, not common election. They carried privilege beyond anything the wealthiest Americans possessed. Their wars with America and France proclaimed how fiercely they intended to hold on to what was theirs and take what they wanted.
Now she was a part of them, but wholly intended to betray them by getting her crew out of prison. Surely her rank in the ruling class would make treachery all that much worse.
She rolled onto her side. Tears flowed onto the pillow that smelled of something sweet and clean.
Kieran had been wrong. Their marriage wasn’t going to make matters better with his family; it was going to make them worse. English noblemen’s sons did not marry the daughters of Yankee merchants. He must be up to something else, and she didn’t like not knowing what that was.
The door opened. Silk whispered. “You poor girl.” A cool, smooth hand tugged the pillow away and caressed Deirdre’s cheek. “I’ve got some nice chamomile and mint tea coming up. It’ll help you rest. Do you have a nightgown you can change into?”
Deirdre shook her head.
“That’s all right. Chloe isn’t that much shorter than you. One of hers will do until we can get you some of your own.”
“I’m sorry to be such a bother.” A sob escaped Deirdre’s efforts to hold it back. “To come into your house ill like this . . . without warning . . .”
“You’re our son’s wife. You’re more than welcome.”
Deirdre pushed herself up on one elbow. “He told you?”
Lady Tyne smiled. “He told me, and we can both pray that he tells his father before things get much worse between them.”
To Deirdre’s surprise, Lady Tyne hoisted herself onto the edge of the bed and covered Deirdre’s hand with hers. “But Kieran can’t help but stir up trouble with his father, and Garrett is weary of Kieran’s lack of interest in anything useful—but never you mind all that now. I need to ask you some questions.”
“I married him for protection, not to be a pawn in some game with his father.”
“I’m sure you did, and Garrett will see the reason of the marriage for your protection eventually and that will ease this battle between them.” Lady Tyne squeezed Deirdre’s fingers. “But that isn’t what I wish to discuss right now. I have some female issues to discuss with you.”
My Enemy, My Heart (The Ashford Chronicles) Page 16