Someone to Trust

by Mary Balogh

  The white-and-gold liveried footman who had been seated beside the coachman had jumped smartly down from his perch in order to open the carriage door and set down the steps. His mother was going to get out, then, was she?

  But it was Lord Ede who descended to the road first and looked unhurriedly at Colin and Elizabeth before turning to hand down Colin’s mother, youthful and resplendent as usual in dazzling white with a fine lace facial veil falling from the brim of her hat. She stood beside him and looked benevolently from Colin to Elizabeth.

  “My dearest son,” she said, “and my dear Lady Hodges. You must understand that I really could not bear to be known as the Dowager Lady Hodges. Such a lowering, dowdy word. It would make me feel positively old and everyone would laugh and tell me how ludicrous it was and ask which Lady Hodges was the dowager. That would be tiresome for both of us. So I have changed my name. And my home. I daresay you planned to stuff me into a remote wing of Roxingley and to try convincing me that you were doing me a great favor. Pah!”

  “Your mother married me by special license yesterday, my boy,” Lord Ede said, looking very directly at Colin, a smile playing about his lips.

  “Yes. I am Lady Ede,” Colin’s mother said. “Of course, everyone will marvel that I have chosen an older man and will whisper that I must have married Ede for his money. But that would be absurd, as your father left me a very tidy allowance, dearest. But marrying an older man is perhaps better than doing the opposite, though any number of young men have wooed me in the past eight years. I have always preferred experience to youth.”

  The hubbub suddenly resumed while everyone, it seemed, felt it necessary to congratulate the newlyweds and wish them well.

  “Mother.” Elizabeth stepped forward, both hands extended. “I am delighted for you. I do wish you happy.”

  “Yes,” Lady Ede said. “I daresay you do.”

  Colin was gazing at Lord Ede, who looked back, one mocking eyebrow raised. “I suppose,” Colin said quietly, extending his right hand, “this is not necessarily an answer to my question, is it?”

  “Not necessarily,” Lord Ede agreed. “But I will tell you this, my boy. If I were to have another son—I have two, you know—I could not ask for a better one than you.”

  Their hands met and clasped. His father? Colin wondered. Or not? He would probably never know for sure either way. But Elizabeth was right, he discovered. The past ought not be allowed to cloud the present or obscure the future. Really, it did not matter terribly much. The man he had always called father had never shown him much love or given him much attention, but ultimately he had done right by him. And he had done right by Wren too. He must surely have known that she had a better chance of a decent life with a caring mother figure like Aunt Megan than she did at Roxingley.

  Wren was standing close to the door of the house with Alexander close by. She was half smiling, though she made no move to draw closer—or to duck back inside the house. She was a woman who would surely always stand her ground.

  Colin took his mother’s gloved hand in his and leaned forward to kiss her cheek through her veil. “I wish you well, Mother,” he said. “We must not be estranged.”

  “Oh, hardly that,” she said. “You have always been my favorite, dearest. And you must know that you are a favorite with Ede too. But how naughty of you to have suspected that I might have been unfaithful to your father while he was still alive.”

  “It is not true, then?” he asked her.

  “Of course it is not true,” she said. “Would I lie to you? I abhor lies of all things.” She looked around her, a queen surveying her court. “I thank you all. You are most kind. But Ede and I must be on our way. We are blocking the road and everyone is already saying that I hold up traffic wherever I go.”

  Lord Ede handed her back into the carriage and followed her inside. The footman closed the door, took his place on the box beside the coachman again, and the carriage proceeded on its way along the street.

  “Well,” the Dowager Countess of Riverdale said. “Well.”

  “Fairy,” Sarah said, pointing after the carriage.

  “That is not a fairy, silly,” Robbie said from his perch astride Joel Cunningham’s shoulders. “That was an old lady.”

  Lady Jessica Archer and Lady Estelle Lamarr laughed out loud before Viola shushed them and looked reproachfully at the Marquess of Dorchester, her husband, whose lips were twitching.

  “Oh dear,” Lady Matilda Westcott said. “Whatever has happened to the old rule that children are to be seen and not heard?”

  Colin took Elizabeth’s hand in his. “Are you ready to go?” he asked her.

  “Home to Roxingley?” she said. “Oh, yes, indeed, Colin. I was never more ready.”

  Ten more minutes passed before their carriage finally drew away from the curb, and even then they both had to lean close to the window in order to wave to the family, who might have been seeing them off to the ends of the world for the next eternity or so if their lifted hands and fluttering handkerchiefs and even a few tears were anything to judge by.

  And then they were alone. And on their way. Home.

  Colin turned in his seat to look at Elizabeth and took her hand again and laced their fingers. She was gazing back at him with eyes that both shone and twinkled.

  “The farce at the end of the drama?” he said.

  The twinkle was very close to laughter. “Your mother’s marriage to Lord Ede?” she said. “And her lovely sense of drama in arriving outside the house at that precise moment? It would be unkind to call it farce.”

  He grinned at her.

  And then they were both laughing until they were helpless with it.

  Would his mother lie? Well, of course she would. Did it matter? She was who she was, and his father—whichever of two men that was—was who he was. In the meantime, he was Colin Handrich, Lord Hodges, and he was going home with his new wife.

  Whose face was filled with laughter and joy, just as his own must be.

  He loved her, and she had told him that she loved him.

  He trusted her word, and she knew she could trust his.

  Life, at least in this precious present moment, was very, very good.

  READ ON FOR AN EXCERPT FROM THE FIRST BOOK IN MARY BALOGH’S WESTCOTT SERIES,

  Someone to Love

  AVAILABLE NOW FROM JOVE

  One

  Despite the fact that the late Earl of Riverdale had died without having made a will, Josiah Brumford, his solicitor, had found enough business to discuss with his son and successor to be granted a face-to-face meeting at Westcott House, the earl’s London residence on South Audley Street. Having arrived promptly and bowed his way through effusive and obsequious greetings, Brumford proceeded to find a great deal of nothing in particular to impart at tedious length and with pompous verbosity.

  Which would have been all very well, Avery Archer, Duke of Netherby, thought a trifle peevishly as he stood before the library window and took snuff in an effort to ward off the urge to yawn, if he had not been compelled to be here too to endure the tedium. If Harry had only been a year older—he had turned twenty just before his father’s death—then Avery need not be here at all and Brumford could prose on forever and a day as far as he was concerned. By some bizarre and thoroughly irritating twist of fate, however, His Grace had found himself joint guardian of the new earl with the countess, the boy’s mother.

  It was all remarkably ridiculous in light of Avery’s notoriety for indolence and the studied avoidance of anything that might be dubbed work or the performance of duty. He had a secretary and numerous other servants to deal with all the tedious business of life for him. And there was also the fact that he was a mere eleven years older than his ward. When one heard the word guardian, one conjured a mental image of a gravely dignified graybeard. However, it seemed he had inherited the guardianship to which his f
ather had apparently agreed—in writing—at some time in the dim distant past when the late Riverdale had mistakenly thought himself to be at death’s door. By the time he did die a few weeks ago, the old Duke of Netherby had been sleeping peacefully in his own grave for more than two years and was thus unable to be guardian to anyone. Avery might, he supposed, have repudiated the obligation since he was not the Netherby mentioned in that letter of agreement, which had never been made into a legal document anyway. He had not done so, however. He did not dislike Harry, and really it had seemed like too much bother to take a stand and refuse such a slight and temporary inconvenience.

  It felt more than slight at the moment. Had he known Brumford was such a crashing bore, he might have made the effort.

  “There really was no need for Father to make a will,” Harry was saying in the sort of rallying tone one used when repeating oneself in order to wrap up a lengthy discussion that had been moving in unending circles. “I have no brothers. My father trusted that I would provide handsomely for my mother and sisters according to his known wishes, and of course I will not fail that trust. I will certainly see to it too that most of the servants and retainers on all my properties are kept on and that those who leave my employ for whatever reason—Father’s valet, for example—are properly compensated. And you may rest assured that my mother and Netherby will see that I do not stray from these obligations before I arrive at my majority.”

  He was standing by the fireplace beside his mother’s chair, in a relaxed posture, one shoulder propped against the mantel, his arms crossed over his chest, one booted foot on the hearth. He was a tall lad and a bit gangly, though a few more years would take care of that deficiency. He was fair-haired and blue-eyed with a good-humored countenance that very young ladies no doubt found impossibly handsome. He was also almost indecently rich. He was amiable and charming and had been running wild during the past several months, first while his father was too ill to take much notice and again during the couple of weeks since the funeral. He had probably never lacked for friends, but now they abounded and would have filled a sizable city, perhaps even a small county, to overflowing. Though perhaps friends was too kind a word to use for most of them. Sycophants and hangers-on would be better.

  Avery had not tried intervening, and he doubted he would. The boy seemed of sound enough character and would doubtless settle to a bland and blameless adulthood if left to his own devices. And if in the meanwhile he sowed a wide swath of wild oats and squandered a small fortune, well, there were probably oats to spare in the world and there would still be a vast fortune remaining for the bland adulthood. It would take just too much effort to intervene, anyway, and the Duke of Netherby rarely made the effort to do what was inessential or what was not conducive to his personal comfort.

  “I do not doubt it for a moment, my lord.” Brumford bowed from his chair in a manner that suggested he might at last be conceding that everything he had come to say had been said and perhaps it was time to take his leave. “I trust Brumford, Brumford & Sons may continue to represent your interests as we did your dear departed father’s and his father’s before him. I trust His Grace and Her Ladyship will so advise you.”

  Avery wondered idly what the other Brumford was like and just how many young Brumfords were included in the “& Sons.” The mind boggled.

  Harry pushed himself away from the mantel, looking hopeful. “I see no reason why I would not,” he said. “But I will not keep you any longer. You are a very busy man, I daresay.”

  “I will, however, beg for a few minutes more of your time, Mr. Brumford,” the countess said unexpectedly. “But it is a matter that does not concern you, Harry. You may go and join your sisters in the drawing room. They will be eager to hear details of this meeting. Perhaps you would be good enough to remain, Avery.”

  Harry directed a quick grin Avery’s way, and His Grace, opening his snuffbox again before changing his mind and snapping it shut, almost wished that he too were being sent off to report to the countess’s two daughters. He must be very bored indeed. Lady Camille Westcott, age twenty-two, was the managing sort, a forthright female who did not suffer fools gladly, though she was handsome enough, it was true. Lady Abigail, at eighteen, was a sweet, smiling, pretty young thing who might or might not possess a personality. To do her justice, Avery had not spent enough time in her company to find out. She was his half sister’s favorite cousin and dearest friend in the world, however—her words—and he occasionally heard them talking and giggling together behind closed doors that he was very careful never to open.

  Harry, all eager to be gone, bowed to his mother, nodded politely to Brumford, came very close to winking at Avery, and made his escape from the library. Lucky devil. Avery strolled closer to the fireplace, where the countess and Brumford were still seated. What the deuce could be important enough that she had voluntarily prolonged this excruciatingly dreary meeting?

  “And how may I be of service to you, my lady?” the solicitor asked.

  The countess, Avery noticed, was sitting very upright, her spine arched slightly inward. Were ladies taught to sit that way, as though the backs of chairs had been created merely to be decorative? She was, he estimated, about forty years old. She was also quite perfectly beautiful in a mature, dignified sort of way. She surely could not have been happy with Riverdale—who could?—yet to Avery’s knowledge she had never indulged herself with lovers. She was tall, shapely, and blond with no sign yet, as far as he could see, of any gray hairs. She was also one of those rare women who looked striking rather than dowdy in deep mourning.

  “There is a girl,” she said, “or, rather, a woman. In Bath, I believe. My late husband’s . . . daughter.”

  Avery guessed she had been about to say bastard, but had changed her mind for the sake of gentility. He raised both his eyebrows and his quizzing glass.

  Brumford for once had been silenced.

  “She was at an orphanage there,” the countess continued. “I do not know where she is now. She is hardly still there since she must be in her middle twenties. But Riverdale supported her from a very young age and continued to do so until his death. We never discussed the matter. It is altogether probable he did not know I was aware of her existence. I do not know any details, nor have I ever wanted to. I still do not. I assume it was not through you that the support payments were made?”

  Brumford’s already florid complexion took on a distinctly purplish hue. “It was not, my lady,” he assured her. “But might I suggest that since this . . . person is now an adult, you—”

  “No,” she said, cutting him off. “I am not in need of any suggestion. I have no wish whatsoever to know anything about this woman, even her name. I certainly have no wish for my son to know of her. However, it seems only just that if she has been supported all her life by her . . . father, she be informed of his death if that has not already happened, and be compensated with a final settlement. A handsome one, Mr. Brumford. It would need to be made perfectly clear to her at the same time that there is to be no more—ever, under any circumstances. May I leave the matter in your hands?”

  “My lady.” Brumford seemed almost to be squirming in his chair. He licked his lips and darted a glance at Avery, of whom—if His Grace was reading him correctly—he stood in considerable awe.

  Avery raised his glass all the way to his eye. “Well?” he said. “May her ladyship leave the matter in your hands, Brumford? Are you or the other Brumford or one of the sons willing and able to hunt down the bastard daughter, name unknown, of the late earl in order to make her the happiest of orphans by settling a modest fortune upon her?”

  “Your Grace.” Brumford’s chest puffed out. “My lady. It will be a difficult task, but not an insurmountable one, especially for the skilled investigators whose services we engage in the interests of our most valued clients. If the . . . person indeed grew up in Bath, we will identify her. If she is still there, we will find her.
If she is no longer there—”

  “I believe,” Avery said, sounding pained, “her ladyship and I get your meaning. You will report to me when the woman has been found. Is that agreeable to you, Aunt?”

  The Countess of Riverdale was not, strictly speaking, his aunt. His stepmother, the duchess, was the late Earl of Riverdale’s sister, and thus the countess and all the others were his honorary relatives.

  “That will be satisfactory,” she said.

  * * *

  • • •

  Anna Snow had been brought to the orphanage in Bath when she was not quite four years old. She had no real memory of her life before that beyond a few brief and disjointed flashes—of someone always coughing, for example, or of a lych-gate that was dark and a bit frightening inside whenever she was called upon to pass through it alone, and of kneeling on a window ledge and looking down upon a graveyard, and of crying inconsolably inside a carriage while someone with a gruff, impatient voice told her to hush and behave like a big girl.

  She had been at the orphanage ever since, though she was now twenty-five. Most of the other children—there were usually about forty of them—left when they were fourteen or fifteen, after suitable employment had been found for them. But Anna had lingered on, first to help out as housemother to a dormitory of girls and a sort of secretary to Miss Ford, the matron, and then as the schoolteacher when Miss Rutledge, the teacher who had taught her, married a clergyman, and moved away to Devonshire. She was even paid a modest salary. However, the expenses of her continued stay at the orphanage, now in a small room of her own, were still provided by the unknown benefactor who had paid them from the start. She had been told that they would continue to be paid as long as she remained.

  Anna considered herself fortunate. She had grown up in an orphanage, it was true, with not even a full identity to call her own, since she did not know who her parents were, but in the main it was not a charity institution. Almost all her fellow orphans were supported through their growing years by someone—usually anonymous, though some knew who they were and why they were there. Usually it was because their parents had died and there was no other family member able or willing to take them in. Anna did not dwell upon the loneliness of not knowing her own story. Her material needs were taken care of. Miss Ford and her staff were generally kind. Most of the children were easy enough to get along with, and those who were not could be avoided. A few were close friends, or had been during her growing years. If there had been a lack of love in her life, or of that type of love one associated with a family, then she did not particularly miss it, having never consciously known it.