“I remember.” The horse was going well, Angelo riding as though he were one with the beast. “What about it?”
“I refused you because I wouldn’t betray John, my husband. And I won’t betray you now. I’ll come back, Cameron. I promise.”
Cameron turned and pulled her to him. They stood together, swaying in the sunshine. He felt Ainsley relax, relieved that he’d stopped fighting her. But Cameron was far from yielding.
“I don’t want you back because you feel obligated to me, love,” he said. “That’s the devil of wedding vows—they make you do things for a person you maybe should run away from. Come back to me because you want to, not because you think you ought to. Do you understand?”
Ainsley looked up at him, her eyes a mystery. “I think I do understand you, Cameron.”
Cameron heard more in the sentence than the bare words, but he couldn’t decide what. He kissed her, dissolving in her warmth, and then he let her go.
Angelo went with her. Cameron insisted. Cameron said that he trusted Ainsley but not whatever fools she might meet on her journey. A maid and a footman weren’t enough to guard her. Angelo, he knew, wouldn’t let a damn thing happen to her. So Angelo went, without argument.
Once they reached Windsor, Angelo left to join his family on their canal boat that wandered up and down the nearby Kennet and Avon Canal. Ainsley loaded Angelo with packages of food and clothing, toys for his nieces and nephews, and sent him off.
She found Windsor cold, damp, and sorrowful.
My dearest Cameron,
The queen is quite distraught and most days cannot walk on her own. She has expressed relief that I am here and relies on me most strongly.
I am happy I came, because the others of the household, while sad that the queen is grieving, did not have much love for Mr. Brown. They grow impatient with Her Majesty’s eulogizing and her talk of mausoleums and monuments to him. Their line of thinking is that Mr. Brown was only a servant, and one who got above himself at that. He deserves a proper burial, yes, but nothing more.
But they forget what a true friend Mr. Brown was to the queen after her husband’s death, when her heart broke, and she hid herself away from the world. It was Mr. Brown that got her to do her duty as queen again and gave her the will to continue. He should at least be remembered for that.
I doubt, despite vicious gossip, and despite those letters over which Mrs. Chase was delighted to blackmail her, that the queen and Mr. Brown were ever lovers. A couple can be quite intimate without sharing bodies—though you will likely not believe that, my Cam.
But it can be true. What I feel for you is highly intense, whether you are standing next to me or living a hundred miles away. I do not have to be touching you at all to experience what I feel.
The queen and I go out seldom, and I look longingly across the fields from my high window, wishing I were at Waterbury with you. Here lambs wander across green fields and crocuses sprout the colors of spring. I imagine that Waterbury must look much the same, all misty and soft.
Unhappily I do not see much of spring because I sit most of the time behind thickly draped windows with nothing to do but read to Her Majesty, or embroider, or perhaps play on the piano. At least I have time to work on the pillows I’m doing for our parlor, in very bright and cheerful colors. I enjoy picturing what they will look like in our house.
I will write as often as I can, but truth be told, I don’t have many moments to myself. The queen is in a very bad way and needs everyone who can be at her side.
But whenever I undo my buttons to ready myself for bed, I think of you. I imagine your fingers unfastening my gown, opening me like a Christmas parcel for your pleasure. I tingle even now as I think of it, and so I will close before I quite combust and burn the paper.
Please greet our household for me, and your trainers, and the lads at the stables, and the horses, and McNab. I so miss you all!
With my deepest love, my dearest husband,
Your,
Ainsley
“Now, my dear, I will speak to you about your unfortunate marriage to the Mackenzies.”
The queen must be feeling better, Ainsley thought, if she’s bringing up the topic of my elopement.
Ainsley kept her gaze on her embroidery, blue violets on a cream background. She was redoing the parlor at Waterbury in shades of blue and yellow, brightening it from Cameron’s decorating scheme of “whatever happened to be in the house when I bought it.”
She makes it sound as though I married the whole lot of them. Although, maybe I did.
“Their father was a brute,” Victoria said decidedly. “I knew the duke, and he was awful. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, you know. Marriage to a Mackenzie is no marriage for a genteel young lady, especially one as well brought up as you were.”
Isabella and Beth were genteel young ladies too, Ainsley reflected. The queen, however, made no mention of them.
“Lord Cameron and I are managing to rub along quite well,” Ainsley said. “You’ll see us at Ascot, of course, but I imagine he’ll win the Thousand Guineas Stakes at Newmarket with his new filly. You ought to wager on her. Chance’s Daughter is a brilliant runner.”
The queen gave her a severe look. “Don’t change the subject. You eloped. You disgraced yourself. For once, I am glad your poor dear mother is not alive. You’d have broken her heart.”
While Ainsley hadn’t known her mother, she refused to believe that Jeanette McBride would have minded seeing her only daughter marry happily, if a bit unconventionally.
“What’s done is done,” Ainsley said. “Water under the bridge. I must make the best of it.” She winced as the clichés fell from her lips, but all clichés held a grain of truth.
“I heard of your goings-on on the Continent,” the queen went on. “Cabarets and the casino at all hours of the night. Your brother and sister-in-law hid their faces in shame.”
Ainsley rather doubted that. Patrick, for all his emphasis on hard, honest work, could understand a bit of pleasure for pleasure’s sake now and again. Plus, Patrick was far more open-minded than his rather dour countenance suggested. As she’d told Cameron, Patrick and Rona definitely did not have separate bedrooms.
“And it’s not quite true that what’s done is done,” Victoria said. “The marriage can be put aside. I’m certain that Lord Cameron tricked you into believing you married him legally. He knew you wouldn’t let him seduce you until you had a ring on your finger.”
Ainsley decided to keep quiet about the fact that Cameron had seduced her long before the ring was on her finger. “Ma’am, Lord Cameron isn’t a stage villain. We had a license. I saw it. And a vicar, and witnesses.”
“Hired actors and a forgery. I have caused letters to be sent to Hart Mackenzie, instructing him to take the legal means to declare the marriage null.”
Ainsley imagined Hart Mackenzie’s reaction on receiving those instructions.
But the queen’s presumption that she could so coolly interfere with Ainsley’s life and that Ainsley would simply obey, made her at last lose her temper.
“How dare you?” she said in a low but fierce voice. Victoria’s eyes widened, but Ainsley plunged on, bravely taking to task the Queen of England and Empress of Britain. “After all I did for you. I risked everything to get those letters back for you, because I respected you and didn’t want to see you embarrassed. Lord Cameron helped—did you know that? He gave me the money for the letters so that you’d not have to pay one farthing.”
“You told him?” The queen’s whisper cut through the room, and ladies on the other side looked up. “Do mean to say, Ainsley Douglas, that Cameron Mackenzie, of all people, knows about my letters?”
“If not for him, you’d have had greatest difficulty getting them back.”
Victoria stared at her in outrage. “You little fool. Lord Cameron will have told the duke, and copies will be circulating even now.”
“Cameron has told no one. I asked him to keep the secret, an
d he complied.”
“Do not be ridiculous. He is a Mackenzie. He cannot be trusted.”
“He can be perfectly trusted,” Ainsley said. “But if you succeed in breaking up our marriage, do you not think Lord Cameron might retaliate with what he knows?”
Ainsley didn’t truly believe Cameron would take his revenge with petty gossip, but then again, who knew what Cameron might do? She remembered his look when he’d watched her leave Waterbury: raw, empty, angry.
Victoria, on the other hand, did believe it. “That is blackmail.”
“Yes, it is. It seems to be the only thing that anyone understands.”
Ainsley was suddenly tired of this life—the court, the gossip, dealing in secrets and tittle-tattle. She had always been an outsider looking in, the nobody daughter of a nobody gentleman, hired by the queen for the sake of Ainsley’s mother. Ainsley had never been important enough to be bribed for favors or blackmailed into them; she’d only watched others do so to each other. No one had much noticed Ainsley at all.
Now, as wife of one of the notorious and powerful Mackenzies, heir to the dukedom, Ainsley could be used, or she could be dangerous. She preferred to be dangerous.
“Therefore, I believe that I will remain married to Lord Cameron,” Ainsley finished.
The queen glared at her, but Ainsley saw Victoria looking at her in a new way: not as a sycophant who could be sent on delicate errands, but as a woman to be reckoned with.
“Your poor dear husband will roll in his grave,” Victoria said. “Mr. Douglas was a respectable man.”
“My poor dear husband was quite generous, and I believe he’d want to see me happy.” John had been kind to the end, and Ainsley had always been very, very glad that she’d stood by him.
The queen continued to regard her with cold eyes. “I will pretend that I never heard this outburst. The conversation never took place.” She lifted her needlework from her lap. “If you had not been so rude, Ainsley, I would have told you that your brother has arrived. I’d arranged for him to take you home to wait for your annulment, but now, of course, you may do whatever you wish. We are finished. But there is a saying, my dear, that you might well heed, that those who make their beds must lie in them.”
My, they were full of old adages today. But as long as that bed held Cameron Mackenzie, Ainsley would happily lie there.
Ainsley thrust her embroidery into her work basket. “Patrick is here? May I go?”
“Please do. Send Beatrice to me. I do not believe we shall be seeing you again.”
Ainsley rose and curtseyed, relieved rather than dismayed to be dismissed.
On impulse, she leaned down and kissed the queen’s faded cheek. “I hope you’ll learn to be proud of me, one day,” she said. “And I assure you, your secrets are safe with me.”
Victoria blinked in surprise. Ainsley felt the queen’s gaze on her as she made her way across the room and out of it. The click of the door that a footman closed behind her seemed to signal the end of Ainsley’s old life.
Patrick McBride waited in a corridor not far away, looking uncomfortable and a little drab amidst the splendors of Windsor. Ainsley tossed down her sewing basket and ran the length of the hall to him, arms outstretched. Patrick’s smile as he swept her up was worth every one of the queen’s disapproving words.
“I’m so pleased to see you,” Ainsley said, smiling into his dear face. “I need a cohort in crime, Pat, and you, my so-respectable older brother, will be perfect.”
Chapter 27
The Mackenzies started pouring into Waterbury Grange in April, at about the time Ainsley’s letters stopped coming. Cameron would leave for the meets at Newmarket soon, the racing season once more reaching out to embrace him.
Mac and Isabella arrived first with their two children in tow, Mac taking over with his usual ebullience. Fortunately the house was big enough to absorb them all plus give Mac a place to set up his studio.
Mac had been painting with gusto this past year, in his usual getup of nothing but kilt and painting boots and a gypsy kerchief to protect his hair. He now spent his time fully dressed in the stable yard, doing preliminary sketches of Chance’s Daughter, while his wife kept her robust children from going too close to the horses, an arduous task.
A few days later Ian and Beth and child turned up, accompanied by Daniel, who’d traveled down with them.
In years past when Ian had visited Waterbury, he’d develop a rigid routine, allowing himself only into certain rooms and along certain paths around the unfamiliar house and grounds. He’d be fine if allowed to follow that routine, but the moment anything disrupted it, Ian would fall into confusion and rages, what he called his “muddles.” Only Curry, his valet, had been able to calm Ian back into the comforting routine.
This year, Curry seemed to have been recruited as makeshift nanny. He bounced the ten-month-old Jamie Mackenzie in his arms while Ian assisted Beth from the carriage.
Ian called out that they’d arrived and took his son back from Curry. He slowed his steps for Beth, who was plump with child, as they entered the house. Beth hadn’t been to Waterbury before—last year she’d been pregnant with their first child, and Ian had not wanted her to travel. This year, Beth had insisted.
Cameron greeted them, then stood back with Mac as Isabella hugged Beth and chattered with her about the journey. The two dogs that had accompanied Ian and Beth now swarmed around McNab, the three of them probably also chattering about the journey.
As Ian took Beth’s hand and started to lead her up the stairs, Cameron’s housekeeper blocked their path.
“I’m afraid you’ve been put into a different room this year, my lord,” the housekeeper said. “Her ladyship—Lord Cameron’s ladyship, that is—thought you’d be more comfortable in a bigger chamber. It’s a front one, my lord.” She smiled tightly, familiar with Ian. “It has a very nice view.”
Behind Ian, Curry stopped, looking worried. Beth smiled encouragingly at Ian and squeezed his arm.
Ian didn’t look at the housekeeper but glanced at Cameron, briefly meeting his eyes. “The one at the top of the stairs? I was going to ask you for it, Cam. My usual one will be too small. Ainsley was right to change it. This way, my Beth.”
He glided on up the stairs, baby on one arm and Beth on the other. Curry followed, the look of relief on his Cockney face obvious. The housekeeper relaxed as well, and Mac raised his brows at Cameron.
“Our baby brother has grown up,” Mac said.
He had. Beth had taken the wreck that was Ian and given him a life.
“Ainsley is very perceptive,” Isabella said, leaning on Mac’s shoulder. “I believe I have mentioned that she is excellent at organizing. She’s certainly done wonders with this dusty old place. When is she returning?”
“I couldn’t say.” Cameron’s voice was stiff.
“I’m certain the queen has her running about on some mad errand,” Isabella said. “Ainsley will finish it and sail back here before you know it.” She tapped Cameron’s wrist. “But I will never forgive you for marrying her in that underhanded way, without telling me.”
Cameron thoughts flashed back to Ainsley in Hart’s London parlor, promising in her unwavering voice to honor her husband and worship him with her body. “It was necessary.”
Mac laughed. “Because Ainsley wouldn’t have agreed if Cam had given her time to think about it.” He kissed his wife’s cheek. “It’s the only way to get a woman to marry a Mackenzie.”
“Yes, but one bride in this family should have a sumptuous wedding,” Isabella said. “We could do a second one, as Beth did with Ian.”
Cameron didn’t answer. For now, his bride was elusive, buried with the queen at Windsor while Cameron grew surlier by the day.
Daniel went out with Cameron to the paddocks in the morning to watch the horses run. Cameron liked Daniel there, enjoyed standing next to the solid wall of his son. The idea of Daniel coming to partner with him after university was a good one.
&nb
sp; After they watched Chance’s Daughter leave the other horses in the dust yet again, Daniel said. “You’ll have to trust her, Dad.”
“Who, Chance’s Daughter?”
“Very funny. Ye know I mean Ainsley.” Daniel’s voice was even deeper now, his stance more confident. “If Ainsley says she’ll do a thing, she’ll do it.”
The next set of horses came running down the flat, hooves pounding, mud flying. The roar and rush was supposed to make Cameron’s world come alive, but without Ainsley to watch it with him, that world was flat and dull.
“Women change their minds at the drop of a feather, son,” he said. “You’ll learn that.”
Daniel gave him a patient look. “She’s not women, Dad. She’s Ainsley.”
He pushed away from the fence and strolled toward the stables, waving at the trainers on the way, but his words lingered.
She’s Ainsley.
The world took on a flush of color. Ainsley would come home. She’d said she would, and the truth of that struck Cameron with force.
He’d never trusted a woman before. Elizabeth had long ago stolen that trust from him, and Cameron had held women at arm’s length ever since. He’d always ended his affairs long before the lady in question had a chance to betray and hurt him, having learned, painfully, that he had to control any liaison he entered.
Then Ainsley had bowled into Cameron’s life and taken over. No, not taken over. She’d become part of him, bonded to his heart. Cameron felt that bond now stretching between them, across the miles to Windsor, or wherever she’d gone by now. That bond would pull him to her, and her to him, and he would never lose her.
A peace stole over him, one Cameron hadn’t felt in . . . Hell, he’d never felt anything like this in his life. He’d come close to it holding his son for the first time, the tiny being he’d vowed to protect with everything he had, but never since.
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