Refine (House of Oak Book 4)

by Nichole Van

  He smiled. Only Jasmine.

  “There’s the Reluctant Smile I adore.” She dug out a handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes. “Give me a second to get my act together. I naively expected the nineteenth century to be less Macbeth and more Downton Abbey.”

  “I am so deeply sorry, my love. You were supposed to have months before being confronted with a situation like this. Do not think that life here is usually this complex. My uncle is a cad.”

  “Yes. I quickly gathered you knew nothing about this betrothal. How can he even do that? It’s totally medieval.”

  Timothy sighed. “Precisely. But as a friend of Miss Heartstone’s uncle and guardian, he pledged my name in good faith, thinking I would readily agree to the scheme. We had discussed it before I disappeared.”

  “Soooooooo, what are you going to do? Marianne says you can’t break the engagement to Miss Heartstone yourself.”

  “That is true. It would ruin her, and she is as much a victim of her uncle’s machinations as I am of Uncle Linwood’s. I cannot be that callous.”

  “But Marianne said that Miss Heartstone can break the betrothal without a problem. Where’s the fairness in that?”

  “Nothing about this situation is fair. But, yes, Miss Heartstone can break our engagement.”

  “Which, if she did, leaves us where we started. You still need to make up a shortfall of sixty thousand pounds. And with Arthur not having any capital to advance you . . .”

  “Yes, I know. I have been discussing options with Daniel.”

  “And?”

  “It is . . . fraught. Without instant capital, the ideas I have will not work. Other ventures will require more time and will be more damaging to the Linwood name and honor. There would be repercussions for family members.”

  The weight of his title had never been so heavy. Much as his uncle’s presence chafed, his words were true. The fact that he had backhandedly betrothed Timothy did not negate the reality of the situation. The viscountcy needed cash. And, as Linwood, it was his duty to see it done in an honorable way. His actions did taint the family as a whole.

  Returning had been . . . difficult. So much more difficult than he had ever anticipated. Not the actuality of leaving the twenty-first century. But trying to fit all these new parts of himself into his old life.

  Viscount Linwood, the name and title, needed a strong dynastic marriage to a lady of his own social class and a large influx of capital in order to remain afloat, providing for tenants and meeting his familial obligations.

  On the other hand, Timothy Linwood, the man, wanted nothing more than to snub conventions, marry Miss Jasmine Fleury and live out the rest of his life in peace and happiness with her cheery spirit at his side.

  No. Scratch that.

  He yearned to marry her. Wanted her in his life with a fierceness that bordered on agony. Society be damned.

  He rested his forehead against hers. Took a determined breath. “Give me time, my love. Just a little more time. I am trying to find an answer. There has to be one somewhere. I will not give up on us.”

  “The Duke and his entourage arrive tomorrow.”

  “I know. Prepare yourself for a couple of horrid days. But after he leaves, we can explore other options. Have faith in me.”

  Now he just needed to have faith in himself. Was there a solution? He felt like he was hoping and praying for a miracle at this point. There had to be a way.

  The conflict between Viscount Linwood and Timothy Linwood was tearing him apart. The torment between duty and happiness.

  She nodded. “Of course. I’m not going down without a fight.”

  Which was why he loved her, right?

  Despite the storm clouds which threatened, he would find a safe harbor. A way forward through the storm.

  The folly rotunda

  The west gardens

  Kinningsley

  May 21, 1815

  “Heavens but you bring the world to life under your brush, Miss Fleury.” Marianne stood behind Jasmine’s canvas, studying the scene Jasmine was painting.

  “It is tolerable, I suppose, if one has a taste for lowbrow melodrama.”

  That snooty voice belonged to Aunt Linwood. A woman Jasmine was coming to actually despise nearly more than her own Aunt Rita. Forget wicked stepmothers. Aunts were the new fairytale bad kids.

  Aunt Linwood sniffed and shot Jasmine’s painting another scathing glance.

  Why did the nineteenth century have to be all Mean Girls? It was like junior high drama in petticoats and satin. Though, it would make for uh-mazing reality TV . . .

  Marianne gave Jasmine an apologetic smile. But that was as much support as Jasmine could expect.

  She was tossed to the wolves here.

  They were all gathered together for a spring picnic under the large rotunda which stood at the top of the highest hill on the estate, offering a spectacular view of the surrounding countryside.

  And by all, she meant Timothy’s menagerie of house guests.

  Marianne and Arthur, of course.

  Mrs. Heartstone and poor Miss Heartstone.

  Uncle and Aunt Linwood and two of their daughters, the radiantly betrothed Emilia and the more dour Mary, their two younger daughters not being ‘out’ yet.

  The chilly Duke and Duchess, as well as their equally haughty son.

  The only bright spot was Sir Henry Stylles, Timothy’s neighbor and Mrs. Heartstone’s cousin. He, at least, had spared Jasmine a kind look and jovial, whiskered smile.

  They were picnicking. A casual affair, Timothy had called it. Casual apparently meant fine china, silver and cut crystal for each guest, not to mention a fleet of footmen to wait on them. Everyone wearing gray gloves, of course. They were having a spring picnic after all.

  Though the view made for perfect painting. Perched on a hilltop overlooking the entire Kinningsley estate, Jasmine had allowed her imagination free reign. She was rendering the view as dramatic clouds loomed, a solitary beam of light hitting the house while the violent storm raged around.

  It was a fitting metaphor.

  A week. Jasmine had been in the past for one long, discouraging, frustrating, soul-crushing week.

  And she had formed a decisive list of likes and dislikes.

  She glanced over at the person who headed her list of dislikes, one Mr. John Linwood and his family. And his incessant obsession with rules and propriety and family honor. The man himself stood apart from the picnicking group, chatting with the Duke, leaning on his walking stick, refusing to even acknowledge her presence. They had all made it blatantly obvious that Jasmine was an ‘upstart mushroom who needed to go’ (Aunt Linwood’s words).

  On the like side, Timothy (obviously), Marianne, Arthur, baby Isabel, the calm rhythms of nineteenth century life. The slowness of it.

  Those parts felt . . . good. When she was alone or even just spending time with Marianne, she could see herself living here. Taking time to learn everything she needed to learn, being accepted for who she was. That idea of the nineteenth century was a soothing balm. It felt like getting acquainted with a new friend. That one you hadn’t known you needed until you met them and then you realized you could never live without them.

  Much like Timothy himself, she supposed.

  She glanced at him, seated on a blanket beside the rotunda, resting his weight on one hand. He chatted calmly with Miss Heartstone and her mother. A slight breeze ruffled his hair and perfectly tied cravat. Though she knew her Timothy was inside that immaculate veneer, he had been adopting his Lord Linwood mask more and more.

  The whole thing with Miss Heartstone was ridiculously melodramatic, but Jasmine understood the reality behind it. The weight of his concerns were valid. A lot of people depended on him to make the right decision. Not the easy decision or the best decision for himself.

  But the right decision for all those involved.

  Every time they managed a few stolen moments together, he would reiterate his promise, that he would find a way. But she co
uld see his resolve slipping. There just wasn’t enough money and the stakes too high.

  How long could she sit on the sidelines, helpless, and watch him enact this drama? And how could she stay with him, if the only solution involved tenants—innocent men, women and children—being cast into the street? She had met some of those people over the past week. It was one thing to know abstractly that people would be harmed. It was something else entirely to put faces and names to the tragedy. Something, she realized, Timothy had known all along.

  She and Timothy could secure happiness but at what expense? Such a heavy price would certainly weigh on their relationship.

  A hundred times a day, she wondered why was she here. Why had the portal practically insisted she return with Timothy? To be a friend to him? Get him through this adjustment back into his old life without completely reverting to his old ways? And then what? Would there be a way for them to be together?

  Her dreams had been particularly vivid since coming to 1815. Maybe it was the eerie dead quiet of night. The pitch-blackness of it.

  She was wandering in mist, golden tendrils begging her forward.

  Marmi’s voice haunting through the air.

  “Come, my dear. You must come.”

  The mist parted and she saw Duir Cottage, sitting alone in a forest clearing.

  She stumbled inside, the space cluttered with merely the shape of things. The scent of lavender in the air.

  The portal hummed, bursting with energy. She needed to do something . . .

  The tendrils flashed down the cellar stairs, dragging her after them.

  She staggered down the steps, staring as the ribbons coalesced, pulsing into the shape on her pendant.

  A dara knot surrounded by a quatrefoil shield.

  Blazing bright in front of the portal. Begging her to return home . . .

  She had woken with a start, tears streaming down her cheeks. The dream haunted her. Was she to return to 2015 after all?

  Why, why, why couldn’t her dreams come with an instruction manual? Why could she never sense the path of her own life? If this were Emme or some other friend, she would totally know what needed to happen. But for herself . . . everything was dark.

  Hence her painting. The threatening clouds kinda said it all.

  Jasmine added another brush stroke, a swipe of red and then orange, creating a fiery sunset breaking through the storm. Kinningsley gleamed in golden white against all the dark blues of the sky and slashes of red coming through the clouds. The entire composition focusing on the regal house.

  “I think your paintings are remarkable,” Marianne said. “They have the look of an old master to them. I have never seen their like.”

  “Yes, well, on that point we may agree, Marianne.” Aunt Linwood gave another disgusted sniff. “I, too, have never seen anything quite so vulgar. It quite reminds me of those horrid paintings that young Mr. Turner regularly shows at the Royal Academy—”

  “Aunt.” Marianne’s quiet voice strained with censure.

  Jasmine raised an eyebrow. Turner? Seriously? As in Joseph Mallord William Turner, the uber-famous nineteenth century landscape painter?

  She would take that back-handed compliment and run with it.

  Jasmine moved on to the finer details, highlighting the brightness of the house, the menace of the storm swirling around.

  It captured Timothy’s life as she sensed it.

  Losing herself in her work, she slapped on the oil paint, creating raised impasto in quick Impressionistic strokes, feeling avant-garde for the time period. She was adding highlights of the lightest yellow-green to the clouds when a voice cut through the murmur.

  “Miss Fleury, we have been discussing the Americas and trying to pinpoint your origins exactly. Who, again, are your family?” Aunt Linwood, of course. Who else would ask such a challenging question? “We were merely trying to remember if we had acquaintance with a family of American-born Fleurys.”

  Jasmine raised her head, regarding the woman. Aunt Linwood had moved to sit on a blanket with the Duchess. Both Uncle Linwood and the Duke turned at the question.

  Timothy glanced up from his seat next to Miss Heartstone. Knowing him as she did, she could see the alarm in his eyes. Clearly his aunt was up to something with her questioning.

  “I do believe I had a French maid once who went by the last name of Fleury,” the Duchess said, tone dripping with I’m-a-backstabbing-wench condescension.

  Aunt Linwood and the Duchess were clearly soul mates.

  “What do you wish to know, madam?” was Jasmine’s cool reply.

  Aunt Linwood gave an elegantly dismissive shrug. “Your last name is French, but your accent proclaims you an American. I am merely curious about your history. Who are your parents?”

  And wasn’t that the question of the day?

  Now every head swiveled in Jasmine’s direction.

  Pleased to have an audience, Aunt Linwood continued, “And did your mother intend to condemn you to a career as an opera dancer when she named you Jasmine Fleury? Or did you adopt the name yourself, thinking it sounded . . . sophisticated?”

  A low chuckle spread through the assembled guests. With the exception of Marianne and Timothy himself, of course.

  Jasmine caught his eye. His brow a thunder cloud. He was rising to his feet, obviously intent on giving a quelling set-down.

  “Aunt.” His voice low and laced with all sorts of spine-tingling threats, The Look making a grand appearance.

  “Heavens, Timothy, do not censure me.” Aunt Linwood shot him an appalled look. “You are the one who has insisted on thrusting this unknown . . . quantity . . . into our midst—”

  “Aunt, you walk on thin ice. Miss Fleury is my guest, and as such, will be treated with the courtesy—”

  “Courtesy? Those of the lower classes do not deserve my courtesy. I am merely confirming that she is, indeed, a nobody. Is that not correct?” Aunt Linwood flashed Jasmine a smile that would have done Tony Soprano proud.

  Timothy took a step forward, but then stopped when his uncle placed a hand on his arm, giving him a sharp glance that clearly said, ‘Down boy!’ With the Duke and Duchess looking on, now was not the time to engage his aunt in a family squabble.

  And what was there to say anyway?

  Aunt Linwood was right.

  Jasmine stabbed at her painting with her paint brush.

  She was a nobody. Abandoned by a family she never knew. Cast out by the only family she had ever known. And now floundering about in a place so far removed from her home it was practically a separate planet.

  And then, the icing on the cake, she had to deal with huffy Aunt Loserwood and her posse of hoity-mactoity harpies.

  (Oh! Which would make a totally awesome band name, wouldn’t it? Big A Loserwood and the Hoity MacToity Harpies. They could be all heavy metal with long stringy hair, ripped jeans and over-mascaraed eyes, Aunt Loserwood shredding it on the guitar. Now that was a happy image . . .)

  Where was she?

  That’s right. Aunt Linwood and her bullies.

  Were they going to go all mafia on her? Send in a one-armed man named Pino who had a penchant for long knives and fish feeding?

  Not to mention little Miss Heartless over there stealing a move on her man. Did she even know that Timothy had dimples? That he preferred his eggs coddled? That he made this darling cute sound in the back of his throat when he kissed—

  “Good heavens, Linwood! Can no one silence the girl? Is she mad, as well?”

  Jasmine snapped to attention, ripping her gaze from her painting.

  To see every single eyeball, in what must have been (approximately) a mile at least, fixed on her. Eyes so very, very, very wide.

  Timothy’s included.

  Oh no!

  Nonononononono!

  She closed her eyes, pinching her lips firmly together. Please, if there were a kind, benevolent bit of karma somewhere that could make this situation go away . . .

  Jasmine was surpris
ed her scalding blush didn’t start her skirts on fire. Granted, the tears spilling down her cheeks would have put it out just as quickly.

  How could she have let Aunt Linwood get to her like that?

  Timothy moved quickly through the crowd, eyes concerned, intent on reaching her.

  But Marianne beat him to it, shooting her brother a shooing, go-away look in the process.

  “Come, Miss Fleury.” She took the paint brush from Jasmine’s hand and then tugged on Jasmine’s arm, urging her toward the house in the distance. “The sun can often play tricks on the mind. Allow me to accompany you back to the house to lay down.”

  The day was actually quite cloudy, but bless Marianne for her good heart.

  Jasmine gave everyone a wobbly smile and an even wobblier curtsy. And shooting a desperate I-am-so-sorry look at Timothy, allowed Marianne to lead her away.

  Timothy watched Jasmine take Marianne’s arm, walking slowly toward Kinningsley in the distance. His heart pounding in his chest. How dare Aunt Linwood goad poor Jasmine like that!

  He took a few steps away from the rotunda, intending to run after her, wanting to take her in his arms, tell her everything would be okay—

  A strong hand wrapped around his elbow, jerking him back, holding him firm.

  “Do not even think about it, boy.” Uncle Linwood hissed in his ear. “You will not undo everything I have worked to build. You must send Miss Fleury away. She will destroy everything. Too much is riding on your behavior right now, and that woman is a threat to your composure. You have had your fun dallying with Miss Fleury. Now be a man. Show us that you can do what is needed to preserve your family.”

  Send Jasmine away? He would sooner cut off his arm.

  But . . .

  Voices slipped through his anger, through his resolve. The Duchess saying something about Jasmine’s poor manners. Aunt Linwood agreeing, assuring her that Timothy would send Miss Fleury packing by morning. Everything laced with privilege and power and expectation.

  What was to be done? Why could he not just callously decide to hell with everyone and everything, marry Jasmine and bask in happiness?