The Bachelor's Bargain

by Catherine Palmer

  “I know your hands. I know your mouth.” He traced a line across her forehead. “And I know your mind. You view life as you do your lace patterns—as a great weblike maze to be worked through, one which you alone understand. You hold the threads, do you not? It is you who designs the patterns.”

  “No!”

  “Yes, and the more you learn about the world, the more complex your design grows. You have read a few books, now you want to read more. Your father taught you to speak your mind, now you speak to dukes and duchesses. You traveled from Nottingham to Tiverton. Now I think you would very much like to see London . . . and Paris . . . even America.”

  “I would not!” Anne cried, and even then she was unsure she had spoken the truth.

  “You would, and you will. I have ordered your trunks packed, and tomorrow we shall set off on our grand pleasure tour. Miss Watson may accompany you along with your lady’s maids, and I shall take Foley and the odd footman. Walker will go with us, too, and we shall all have a capital time.”

  “Stop this!” Anne pushed at his chest with both hands until he released her. “Mr. Walker said nothing to me of a pleasure tour on the Continent.”

  “And why should he? I have not yet informed him of it.”

  “You expect him to go with you? How little you understand the man you call a friend. Mr. Walker will never leave Devon. Only moments ago, on the pathway, he told me this land has become his home. Your arrogance blinds you, Lord Blackthorne.”

  As she swung away, her shawl slid to the ground between them. Abandoning it, she took two steps toward the gate before whirling to face him.

  “You speak as if indeed I am a spider, spinning webs and manipulating the threads of my own existence. It is you who are the predator, Ruel Chouteau, Marquess of Blackthorne! You chase people into corners. You mock and ridicule the innocent. You force even your friends down paths of your own choosing. What will happen after you have devoured us all? You will be alone, will you not? As alone as you truly are right now in your empty, black soul.”

  He stared at her, letting his gaze wander down to the hip on which she had set a clenched fist. Then he raised his focus to her eyes. “My empty, black soul does not interest me in the least,” he said. “My wife, on the other hand, intrigues me endlessly.”

  Anne lifted her chin. “My husband does not interest me in the least. Though I shall make it my duty to pray for his empty, black soul.”

  “Not at bedtime, I hope. I should dislike anything to interrupt us then.”

  Her cheeks hot, Anne narrowed her eyes at him. “I have no intention of performing conjugal duties for you, sir. Though I lay drugged and injured on our wedding day, I clearly heard you assure your father that in time you mean to terminate the arrangement between us. If you think for one moment that I shall accommodate your physical desires or bear your children, you are sadly mistaken.”

  “Am I?” He advanced toward her, leaving her glove and shawl on the grass behind him.

  “Yes, you are.” She took a step forward. “I intend to speak to the vicar and ask his blessing on an annulment of this preposterous situation.”

  “And then what will you do?”

  “I shall go back to Nottingham.”

  “With what money?”

  “You will give me back my lace!”

  He stopped less than a foot from her. “I am afraid I left it in London.”

  “You are the very devil!” She clenched her fist to strike his chest, but he caught her arm.

  “Come with me to London and Paris, Anne. Charm the ladies and disarm the men. Make them believe we adore one another, that our tour is nothing less than a grand gallivant to the Continent in celebration of our wedding.”

  “Make them believe?” She fought the tears that had sprung to her eyes. “This is what you want of me?”

  “Not only that. In France, I mean to use Walker’s assistance and skill with metalwork in setting up an enterprise.”

  “Smuggled lace machines.”

  “Do not make them sound so evil. They are nothing but glorified stocking knitters. All the machines can do is create net. Innocent enough, and all but valueless.”

  “Unless they are worked over with patterns . . . by hand.” A chill washed down Anne’s spine. “You cannot do this without me.”

  He smiled. “We have struck a bargain, have we not?”

  “If we did, it is because you need me. You need my skill, my expertise. Without my help, you are doomed to failure. And I can demand of you whatever I choose.”

  “I shall make a gambler of you yet.” He touched her cheek. “What is it you would ask of me, my dear wife?”

  Knowledge of her own power sent a tingle of triumph through Anne’s veins. Mr. Walker had been right—God could do anything. Perhaps the marriage had not been such a dreadful mistake. Perhaps the Lord would make good come of her willful, thoughtless actions.

  “My father,” she said quickly. “I wish to engage an attorney to defend his case to the court.”

  “Already done. While in London last week, I made arrangements with the Chouteau family’s personal barrister. He will investigate the matter at once and advise me as to the best course to take.”

  Anne tried to breathe. He had done it already. Already. He had known what she wanted. He had understood her hopes. She looked into those gray eyes, suddenly afraid he did know her as well as he had claimed.

  “Anything else you would request of me, dear lady?” The corner of his mouth tilted up in that now-familiar expression of amused confidence. “Surely hundreds of things come to mind. Jewels? A grand house in London with liveried servants? A country manor? A chaise-and-four?”

  Anne shook her head. “I do not care about such things, and you certainly know it.”

  “Yes, I do.” He ran his hand down her arm and took her bare fingers. “Remember, I know you, Lady Anne Black-thorne. You want books to read. You want a garden lush with wild roses, hawthorns, foxgloves, feverfews, and buttercups. You would like a large, sunlit gallery furnished with a mahogany table upon which you can design lace to your heart’s content. You want reams of parchment on which to prick elaborate patterns. You want threads in silk, linen, and cotton. You want stuffed lace pillows and steel pins by the thousands. You want twenty skilled young women to whom you can teach your secrets. Am I overlooking anything?”

  She wished his fingers were not so large and firm and pressing so hard against her own. She wished he were not looking into her eyes as if he could see straight to her soul. Most of all, she wished her heart would stop beating so fast.

  “You paint a bewitching picture,” she said, “and one that tempts me. But you are wrong to believe I would ask such things of you. If I agreed to receive them, I should only be chained more tightly to your benevolence. I shall not allow that. You are taking care of my family, almost a fair trade for my assistance in your smuggling venture.”

  “Almost? What else would you have of me?”

  “Distance.” She took her hand from his. “Do not come near me again, Lord Blackthorne, or I shall tell the regent himself of your plan. I shall sleep alone and, other than maintaining the pretense of marriage with you in public, I shall not be forced to endure your presence.”

  “Endure me? Am I so odious?”

  She swallowed the urge to confess the unsettling, tantalizing emotions he evoked in her. “Do you not know how I feel about you?” she asked, taking on the mocking tone he so often used with her. “But I thought you knew everything about me, Lord Blackthorne.”

  “I believed so.”

  “You said yourself you know my hands, my words, my mind. Before I spoke of it, you knew my plan to save my father. You even guessed at my dreams of a lace school. Surely you know how I feel about you.”

  “Anne—”

  “You will not touch me. Swear it.”

  He reached out to her.

  She stepped away. “Promise me.”

  “This is a wretched business!” He raked a hand th
rough his hair. “Blast it all, if that is your wish then I shall not touch you.”

  She rewarded him with a smile. “And I shall help you transform your ugly machine-made net into lace so sumptuous that every French aristocrat will shower you with ducats. But lest you become too confident in our partnership, Lord Blackthorne, do not forget there is one part of me you do not know . . . and never will know.”

  His gray eyes softened as he watched her drift away from him. “What part of you is that, my lady?”

  “My heart.”

  After giving her husband a little curtsy, she turned and walked through the gate toward the house.

  Eight

  “Quite impertinent of you, Walker.” Ruel crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the sill of the huge, multi-paned window in the library. “Now is not the time to play the loyal Devonshire blacksmith.”

  “I do not play at my work.” The tall Indian eyed the younger man. “I am a blacksmith. Devon is my home. I shall not leave.”

  “For years, all you have spoken of is America. You have told me a hundred tales of that land. You are why I traveled there. I had to see the place for myself, and now I have. Missouri is as beautiful as you said, as lush, as green, as populated with deer and bison and wild turkey. Your people are there, Walker.”

  “Your people are there. They have taken the land.”

  “Not all of it. The Osage still roam the forests and streams of Missouri as they always have. How can you tell me you do not wish to go back to them?”

  “I have no people. I no longer remember the Osage tongue. I do not look or behave as they do. I told you, Blackthorne, with my English manners and my blacksmith’s skills, I am worth nothing to the Osage.”

  “Then come with me as far as France.”

  “Never.”

  “Are you afraid?”

  “Of course I am. In order to ensure Osage obedience in the Louisiana Territory, I was sent to France as a hostage. Thanks to God, I escaped. If I were seen there again, I could be thrown into prison.”

  “That happened years ago. The Louisiana Territory is greatly altered. Osage land is now part of the Missouri Territory— independent of France, Spain, England, and everyone else who has tried to control it. I expect the Missouri Territory will become one of the United States before long. France certainly has no time to track down an escaped hostage. Napoleon has returned from Elba, and that country is in arms. The truth is, Walker, no one even remembers your journey to France.”

  “How can you be sure? You know I was not the only one.”

  Ruel did know. Of course his friend had kept the details from him when he was a child, but in the years since then he had learned the full, appalling story. In 1725 a group of Indians—Osage, Missouria, Illini—had been taken to France to meet the boy king, Louis XV. Like circus clowns, they were driven to the Bois de Boulogne and told to run down a deer. They were dressed in cock hats and coats trimmed in gold. They were ordered to dance at the Italian Theatre and at masked balls. They knew the bedchambers of the French aristocracy. Mighty warriors had been sent to France as playthings for the nobility. One of the Indian hostages was a young Missouria girl. The French named her LaBelle Sauvage and lavished her with diamonds and jewels. The Duchess d’Orleans made herself the girl’s godmother, had her baptized in Notre Dame de Paris, and arranged her marriage to a French sergeant. All for the amusement of the aristocracy.

  Walker’s voice dropped. “You toy with the young lacemaker, Blackthorne. She is an honest woman, and she would make a good wife for some man. She deserves a home, a hearth, children . . . a loving husband. Yet you play with her life, with her heart.”

  “No more than she plays with mine.”

  “Truly?”

  Ruel frowned, uncomfortable at how much he had revealed. “Listen, Walker, if you think I mean to make use of you for my own pleasure, you are dead wrong. Yes, your skill with metal can help me assemble my lace machine in France. I shall not deny that, and I have stated my intent to pay you handsomely for your services. But I have no purpose in taking you to America other than to restore you to your people.”

  The Indian gave a snort. “My people. When the Indian delegation was taken away, the Little People said they would mourn for fifteen moons. After that period, if the hostages did not return, they would be counted dead. Fifteen moons. I have been gone twenty-eight years.”

  Ruel turned away in exasperation. How could Walker so easily dismiss his childhood home? Ruel knew he never could. He gazed out through the library window. The parks, gardens, and woods that stretched for miles around Slocombe House always had been home to him. He was tied to Slocombe House with bonds that would never let him go. Oh, certainly, his family’s imposing edifice on Cranleigh Crescent in London held a great fascination and delight, but this was where he belonged. He could not understand Walker’s indifference toward his place of origin, nor his conviction that no one would be waiting for him there. Though Ruel could not imagine leaving England for decades at a time, he knew he would always be welcome no matter when he returned.

  He had not expected Walker to be so difficult. Ruel needed the man at his side for a more important purpose than assembling a lace machine, yet he did not know how to persuade the Indian to accompany him. Should he tell the truth? Should he reveal the suspicion that had begun to gnaw on him while he was in America and now seemed to be confirmed— the suspicion that someone meant him bodily harm?

  “On August 16, 1787,” Walker was saying, his voice trancelike, “Wa-Tcha-Wa-Ha and Arrow-Going-Home were called to Chouteau’s Town, St. Louis. The Spanish officials of the territory demanded that some of their chieftains be delivered as hostages to New Orleans. The hostages were to guarantee Osage future good behavior. Of course, the Osage would never turn over their leaders, the Little Old Men, so they sent others—Padouca and Pawnee captives who had learned the Osage language and manners after living so many years with their captors . . . and Osage warriors who could defend themselves. They sent me, Walks-in-the-Night.”

  Ruel had heard the story of Walker’s journey to New Orleans and then to Spain as a hostage of the Spaniards. He knew all about the Treaty of San Ildefonso, signed in 1800, transferring the Louisiana Territory from Spain to France. Many times as a boy, Ruel had listened to Walker tell him how he and the others had been transferred from Madrid to Paris. Walker had become certain he would never return to America, and his desperation had been intense.

  Listening to a story he had heard so many times before, Ruel let his focus linger on the scene outside the library window. The pathways, the knot gardens, the parks . . . the arboretum. His heart lurched. A slim figure slipped between the heavy iron gates and into the tree-filled enclosure. Her wisp of a green dress told him it was Anne.

  Straightening, he tried to watch her progress through the trees. Just a glimpse. She appeared for a moment in a glade, then vanished again. What was she doing? Why had she returned to the place of their meeting? Did she hope to find him there? Or had she some other assignation . . . a lover?

  He had not considered that possibility. Might the woman he had married love another man? A footman or a gardener? Despite her assertions to the contrary, maybe she had attached herself to the gamekeeper. Ruel had been told of the man’s pursuit of her. Did she return his affection?

  “It was in Paris that I heard again the beloved name of Chouteau,” Walker was saying. “Then I knew I had hope. I made arrangements to meet this man, Etienne Chouteau, uncle of Auguste, who is friend to the Little People. Etienne Chouteau is a great man, very wise and very, very old. He had me brought in a carriage from the prison to his grand house on the Champs-Elysées, and there he told me that he had two brothers.”

  Ruel nodded. Yes, yes, he knew the story. There were three of them—sons of Raoul and Marie Chouteau of France—Etienne, Laurent, and René. Etienne lived in Paris and was a grand patron of the aristocracy. Laurent had traveled to England, where he assumed the family’s duchy of Marston, married
the Englishwoman Beatrice, and produced five daughters and two sons, the elder of whom was Ruel himself. René had married Marie Therese and journeyed to America to seek his fortune. He became the father of Auguste Chouteau before separating from his wife and fading into anonymity.

  The story was as familiar as any nursery rhyme. Ruel was much more interested in the slender woman who had vanished into a copse in the arboretum. Perhaps she was only a commoner, a housemaid, a criminal’s daughter—but she was his wife. She certainly owed her husband the pretense of faithfulness. If she were attending a lover’s tryst, could she not at least conduct her rendezvous away from the grounds of Slocombe House?

  The thought of Anne folded into the arms of another man sent a stab of anger through Ruel’s chest. The image of her lips pressed against another man’s mouth . . . of someone placing his hands around her waist . . .

  “Do not touch me,” she had said. “Promise me.” Of course she could not bear for Ruel to touch her! Of course she denied him the marriage bed. She was in love with someone else. Why had he not seen it?

  Because he had been too busy arranging for her father’s defense and sending seamstresses and milliners to clothe her in silk and feathers! Too wrapped up in his own plans and too absorbed in investigating the mystery that swirled around in his head, he had missed the truth in front of him.

  “It was Etienne Chouteau who helped me escape to his brother Laurent, in England,” Walker continued, as if he were speaking to a rapt audience. “Here in Devon, though I knew I would never be welcomed as an equal, I was given a home and a trade and treated as a man. I am grateful to your father for saving me from a life in the prisons of France. That is why I shall never go back to that country. Not even for you.”

  Ruel scowled at the window. Where had she gone? He had a mind to walk straight down to the arboretum and publicly disgrace her and her ill-bred lover. She was his wife, for heaven’s sake. She had promised allegiance. Did he not have the right to expect a degree of faithfulness?