A Kiss for Christmas

by Caroline Linden

  The previous summer, though, Ned had destroyed that belief. Deeply in debt, he’d set his cap for winning Celia, then a wealthy widow. When she fell in love with Anthony instead, Ned had not taken it well. He’d tried to disrupt their engagement by telling lies about Anthony, and had even pointed a pistol at Celia in an attempt to hold her for ransom.

  Patrick had shot him then. Not fatally—Ned could no longer lift his arm over his head, but he was alive. Patrick gave him the choice of Australia or America over facing the magistrate in England, on the condition he never return. Ned had chosen Virginia, and sailed with his arm still bandaged in a sling.

  “No, it’s not directly about him. It’s about his mother, Janet.”

  Her rigid posture did not change, and she yanked on the threads with enough force to snap them.

  Patrick forged on. “Janet—Nettie is my cousin, you might know. She’s never been a steady woman, and this business with Ned… It didn’t help.” That was the kindest way to put it. Nettie had become deranged, in Patrick’s opinion. “She was not pleased with me for banishing Ned.”

  “Even after what he did?” Rosalind gave him a cool glare.

  “Oh, she didn’t believe a word of that.” He sighed, fingering a teal colored skein. “She never could believe Ned to be at fault for anything, and I never confronted her about it—foolishly, I see now. Her husband deserted her, leaving her with a young boy and no income. I took pity on her then, but I admit, I should have said more to open her eyes.

  “She was waiting when I returned to Anandale this summer, and carried on like a banshee, wailing that she’d been betrayed, that I had stolen her child from her, that her death would be upon my head…” He grimaced, remembering the full force of Nettie’s wild fury.

  “Indeed.”

  “I felt sorry for her,” he admitted. “’Tis a hard thing to hear of your only child. I once loved the boy like my own son! But what he did was unpardonable. It was for her sake I let him go to Virginia, but she saw only that I made him go, not that he should have gone to prison instead.”

  “Lord Warfield, this really does not concern me. Are those all the green flosses?”

  He looked down at his handful of little balls of thread. “Aye.”

  “Thank you, sir.” She took them and brought out a needle and some kind of embroidery.

  “Nettie stole the letters,” he said. Rosalind looked up in surprise. “Mine to you, and some of yours to me. I thought you’d stopped writing. I thought you no longer cared.” He fiddled uncomfortably with his hands, now empty. “I still wrote to you, but she was very underhanded and she stole them from my secretary’s desk.”

  For a moment she sat unmoving, then gave herself a shake. “Well. That was very wrong of her, but what’s done is done.”

  Oh Lord. She’d lost all affection for him. “I didn’t know she’d done it until a few weeks ago—“

  “You stayed in Scotland,” she interrupted. “When you left you said you would be back by the end of summer, but you stayed months longer.”

  “Nettie,” he said in growing urgency. “She’s lost her reason. She—she started a fire that near burned down my stable. She fed sand into a batch of whiskey and ruined it all. She poisoned my housekeeper, and I had to pension off the poor woman and hire a new one. I was running mad, from one mishap to the next, tearing out my hair trying to sort who was behind it.”

  Rosalind was staring at him in mingled shock and disbelief, but before she could speak, Anthony and Celia returned, flush with love for their baby, who had indeed been sound asleep. They described at great length how adorably he slept in his cot, and Patrick could only smile and nod even as his heart felt like lead in his chest.

  On impulse he excused himself and went to his room. If she’d set her mind against him, it would be easy for her to dismiss, but he had nothing to lose now. He went back to the drawing room, where Celia was sitting at the pianoforte, laughing, and Anthony was holding up pages of music, teasing her about which one she should play.

  Patrick’s heart twisted at the sight of the love they shared. He thought he’d been on the brink of the same himself, and now he feared it would all come to naught. At the age of fifty, the odds of falling in love with a different woman were slim. It had seemed like a bloody miracle when he met Rosalind and felt that odd sort of silly happiness poets described, for the first and only time in his life.

  Rosalind was smiling at the musical antics as she stitched. Patrick paused in front of her and bowed. “Here,” he said gruffly. “’Tis all I can offer in testimony to what I told you.” He held out the packet, and, looking startled, she took it.

  He went over to the pianoforte and chased away his nephew. Would Rosalind read the letters, all those letters he’d written to her since the summer? Would it change her feelings, to see how puzzled and then worried he’d become at the absence of replies from her? Would she forgive him for being such a stupid idiot not to catch on that Nettie, with her wild accusations and crying fits, had been so determined to punish him that she stole what he valued most?

  No, he didn’t want to see if she read the letters or threw them on the fire. Instead he sang while Celia played, eventually allowing Anthony to join him. The fire crackled, the air was scented with greenery brought in, and occasionally the snow blew hard and furious against the windowpanes.

  And all Patrick could see was Rosalind, barely visible from the corner of his eye, her sewing put aside and his letters in her hand.

  She read them. All of them, from what he could tell. But she didn’t look at him or speak to him the rest of the evening.

  He wondered what she was thinking. He himself had been shocked when he discovered them in Nettie’s sewing basket, some with needles stuck through, some with childish scrawls of ink across them. His secretary had muttered about papers being mislaid for some time, but MacLeish was getting rather old now, and Patrick had been too distracted by the fire and spoilt batch of whiskey, his prized estate product, to do more than tell him to take more care where he put things. Only when poor Mrs. Carrigan had fallen seriously ill, and told him that she suspected Nettie of putting henbane in her soup, had Patrick finally seen the truth. His cousin had gone mad in her grief and turned on him.

  That was a failing of his, he acknowledged. Just as he hadn’t believed Ned capable of any serious harm, he’d never thought Nettie, who had been his childhood playmate, could nurture such hatred and spite that she tried to kill a woman.

  When the singing was done and the fire had died down, everyone said good night and retired. Patrick paced his room, wondering if he should try to speak to Rosalind or wait for her to approach him. It would be dashed awkward to live in the same house with her for the next three weeks without clearing the air, and then he thought he should just go back to Anandale if she had no interest in clearing the air.

  But no; he would not admit defeat until she told him definitively. He must wait a few days, for the sake of a peaceful holiday, and then he’d ask, simply and directly, and see.

  A knock at the door startled him. When he opened it, Rosalind stood there, the packet of letters in her hand. “What did you do?”

  He tensed. “What do you mean?”

  She held up the packet. “When you realized she’d taken these, and done… all the rest.”

  “I sent her to Virginia, to be with her son.” He heaved a sigh. “We played together as children. She’s gone mad, I’m sure of it, but I couldn’t put her in an asylum. Perhaps with Ned, she’ll be restored. Perhaps they’ll both be restored to sense. Once, they were dear to me, and I hope some shadow of those creatures still lives inside them.”

  Slowly she nodded. “There are seventeen letters here.”

  He had written to her at least once a fortnight, even when he thought she’d stopped replying, describing the chaos at his estate, explaining reasons for his delay in returning to London, asking increasingly worried queries about her regard for him.

  “She filched all but the la
st one.” He peered at her closely. “Did you read the last one?”

  Color rose in her cheeks. “I did.”

  “And did you like it?” He all but held his breath. The last one was an anguished excoriation of himself, for being blind to Nettie and to Ned, for having let so much time slip by without suspecting the truth. It ended with a vow to explain himself if she ever granted him the chance. He’d written it the day before Anthony’s invitation arrived, and then decided to deliver it himself.

  Rosalind tilted her head, nibbling her lip. “It was a start.” She put out her hand. “Perhaps you’ll come tell me more.”

  “Everything,” he said fervently, closing his door behind him and taking her hand, to follow her into her sitting room across the corridor.

  3

  Rosalind sat bolt upright with a start, her heart racing. The room was dark, the fire died down to coals, and for a moment she simply sat, frozen with alarm and uncertainty.

  There was a stirring beside her. “Is aught amiss?” whispered a gravelly voice she knew so well.

  He was here. Her pulse calmed a bit. He should not be here, of course, in her room, on her bed, but for a moment, she’d feared that the whole prior evening had not happened.

  They had sat in her sitting room talking until the small hours of the morning. As shocking as the story had first seemed to her, Rosalind knew he was not a liar.

  Nor had his interest in her ever wavered. Those seventeen letters had unfolded his constancy and determination to care for his estate, then his struggle to find a compassionate solution for his deranged cousin. Each one had ended with his hope that he would soon be free to return to England and see her.

  And Rosalind had fallen headfirst back into that charmed state, just listening to his voice and watching the way his face changed as he spoke. When she’d been unable to keep her eyes open, he’d walked her to the bed and given her the sweetest kiss goodnight…

  “You’re still here,” she whispered in relief. “Patrick—“

  “You’re beautiful when you sleep.” His fingers grazed her cheek. “I only meant to look on you for a minute, and then another, and then I fell asleep myself.”

  “That’s how it always is with you,” she said, but smiling. “One minute, then one more, then another, and before I know it you’ve wormed your way in and I can’t get rid of you.”

  “Persistence is my only virtue.” With a rustle, he got off the bed and made his way across the room. She heard the flint strike, and the glow of a candle illuminated his face.

  Like herself, he was fully dressed. His cravat was askew, and his ginger hair was ruffled on one side of his head, but when he grinned hopefully at her, she couldn’t help but smile back. She swung her feet over the side of the bed, only then realizing that he’d draped a blanket over her. No wonder she’d slept so long. “Never again shall I stay up so late.”

  “Fear not, lass. If ever you did, I’d carry you to bed and tuck you up safe.” He came over and put the candle down on the table near the bed. “If you’d want me to, that is.”

  Reluctantly she smiled. “Who else would?”

  “Whoever did would be the luckiest bloke in the whole of Britain.” He went down on one knee and took her hand, holding her fingers lightly. “I still hope to be that lucky bloke, you know.”

  She couldn’t imagine it being anyone else. “You’re a devil, Patrick Murray, a silver-tongued devil who manages to tempt me into throwing away my good sense.”

  He brightened and slipped his free hand into the pocket of his waistcoat. “That’s encouraging. Can I tempt you into saying yes once more?” He held up a ring. The candlelight made the sapphire glow.

  Rosalind looked at it, then at him. “Have you had that in your pocket all night?”

  “No,” he said. “It’s been in my pocket since July, waiting only for a chance to offer it to you.”

  She blinked. “July…”

  “Why’d I go all the way back to Anandale? I had to fetch it. All the Warfield brides have worn this sapphire. My grandmother took it from my grandfather and wore it thirty-seven years. Then my mam wore it the next forty-two. ” He tilted her hand back and forth, studying her fingers. “I hope you’ll wear it for the next thirty years at least.”

  “Is that a marriage proposal?” she asked in a daze. Of all the times she’d pictured receiving one from him, it had never been like this.

  “Of course it is,” he said a bit acerbically. “I don’t go about giving jewels to any woman who strolls by, not even for Christmas. Only you, lass.” He grinned up at her, endearingly abashed. “Will you have me, Rosalind? To have and to hold, to love and to scold? For I do love you, lass. Might have done since the day I met you.”

  She took the ring and held it up. “You’d better not run off to Scotland without me again.”

  He scoffed. “I’ve no interest in leaving you. If you put that ring on your finger, you shall have my loyalty, and my honesty, for all time. Even if I must write letters every day to prove it.”

  “Letters?” She did like the ring. It was beautiful, and she found it very touching that it had been his mother’s and grandmother’s. “Where will you go that you’ll need to write letters?”

  “I suppose I’ll have to go back to my room before morning, to avoid causing a scene.” He grinned. “I could write the first one there, as a gift. It’s Christmas morn now.”

  Rosalind raised one brow. “A letter from across the hall!”

  “I can compose it now.” He cleared his throat. “My darling duchess. I love you. I love you madly. Marry me, please. Your devoted servant, Warfield.”

  She slid the ring on her finger to see how it looked. “I suppose you’d have to bribe a footman to deliver it.”

  “No doubt.” He tilted his head, grinning hopefully. “Will you keep wearing the ring?”

  Rosalind pursed her lips. “Yes, Lord Warfield, I think I shall.”

  His eyes grew brighter. “And…?”

  “Yes, Patrick,” she amended. “I will marry you.” And she leaned forward, cupping his handsome face in her hands, and kissed him. “For I do love you, too.”

  Read Anthony’s and Celia’s story in A Rake’s Guide to Seduction.

  Grace’s Christmas Hero

  1

  1802

  Grace Finch first met Oliver Ford at a party at her aunt's house. Aunt Sarah had invited the Fords because Mrs. Ford had recently passed away, and it was the father and son's first Christmas without her. They were neighbors, although distant ones.

  Despite being reserved, Oliver was quickly absorbed into the group of children, who were bent on playing hide and seek in the elaborate gardens behind Holkham House, now glittering with a crust of snow, before darkness fell and they would be sent to the nursery for dinner.

  "What are you doing, Gracie?" asked her older sister Daphne in amusement as Grace struggled with her boots.

  "Going out to play in the gardens, with you."

  Daphne laughed. "Of course not! You're too little. You must be at least seven to go outside."

  Grace's eyes went wide. She was six, and had been counting the days until this party. "I am not! I'm going, Daphne, I am!"

  Still laughing, Daphne only shook her head and went out with their cousins Lizzie and Frederick. They were all eleven, five years older than Grace, who could only watch impotently. She couldn't manage her boots alone yet. Amelia, James, and George were already outside, running and shouting in delight as they threw snow at each other. It would be such fun, and a tear slipped down her cheek at the thought of missing it all, stuck in the house with babies like her sister Willa, who was only two.

  "Here," said a kind boy's voice. Oliver knelt at her feet and tied first one, then the other bootlace. "Now you can go out," he whispered, his blue eyes shining at her from under his untidy mop of blond hair. He even winked at her.

  "Thank you." Grace beamed at him, and ran into the garden.

  Lizzie won the game, but Grace remembered t
he kindness.

  2

  1808

  When she was twelve, Grace's mother said she could sit at the lower table at Aunt Sarah's, with the other cousins who were too old for the nursery but not yet adults. Nervous but eager, Grace chose her best dress and brushed her hair one hundred careful strokes. She promised to bring Willa a cracker from the table and went down to eat, hoping she wasn't seated next to Frederick, who liked to tease.

  Oliver Ford was there, down from Oxford, tall and lanky at age seventeen. He and his father were regulars at Christmas dinner now. He wasn't the most talkative boy, but he still had a friendly grin and an easy laugh, and Amelia and Daphne seemed to find him far more interesting than ever before. Grace watched her sister and cousin monopolize his attention with a frown. She wanted to talk to him, too. Oliver always talked to her, year after year. He never put snow down her neck or pulled her hair when her braids fell down, like Frederick did.

  But her hopes were rewarded when a last-minute ruckus ended with him and Frederick changing seats, putting Oliver beside her. "Happy Christmas, Oliver," she wished him shyly as the servants brought out the roast.

  "And to you, Miss Grace." His blue eyes shone. "All grown up now!"

  She laughed, pleased. "Not really. Not like you." She glanced at her sister and cousin, who looked annoyed. Frederick was between them now, and he was being obnoxious, tossing spoons back and forth across the table with James in spite of his mother's commands to stop. "But more than Frederick," she couldn't resist adding.

  Oliver grinned. "You're far more mature than Frederick." His voice was deeper this year, she realized. It suited him.

  "Everyone is," she told him, earning a laugh.

  They talked the rest of the meal. It was her favorite Christmas dinner ever.