Chapter Seven #2
Ian’s voice was icy and detached because he’d learned to become that way about his father. It was the only way to process his grief and frustration over the mess he’d left Ian to handle. “Father must have had some reason for believing you wanted to marry Jared.”
“He wanted to unite his business with Rives Shipping.”
“There are plenty of other ways to secure that without arranging a marriage.”
“Not when the businesses were so unequal in their financial holdings,” she argued. “The board of Rives Shipping would never have accepted a merger, and Jared would never concede to an acquisition.”
“Then why on earth did you agree to marry him!”
His voice was still reverberating in the room when she lifted her chin and said calmly, “My mother.”
It took Ian a moment to check his surprise. Diana’s mother had contracted a wasting disease when they were children. It happened three years after his own mother died from a terrible fever. Harry Rives had been so stricken with grief, they’d invited no one to the funeral.
And fifteen years later, no one talked about Diana’s mother, including Diana.
That she mentioned it now was weighty. He’d have to treat it delicately.
With care, he took her empty glass and refilled it.
She accepted the drink with a small huff of resignation. “When your father had the first episode with his heart, and then couldn’t leave his bed, Papa was so worried. Until then, I never appreciated how close the two of them were.”
Ian hadn’t either. But when his father’s health declined suddenly—and Jared had been unreachable doing God knew what on the Continent—Ian had left his studies at Cambridge to oversee Holt & Company.
Harry Rives had generously advised him on more than a few matters.
His father had left their business in a dire state.
Ian spent months trying to dig out of years of mismanagement.
When Jared finally returned, his brother had forced him out of the boardroom. And he’d refused to pay Ian’s fees to finish Cambridge, claiming Ian had a duty to serve the business by overseeing the docks.
“It was easy to convince Papa that I should go to London and call on Mr. Holt. And you know my reasons for coming,” Diana continued.
“Since your father was feeling well, I offered to read to him, hoping it would buy me time until you arrived. We were only a few pages into a Trollope novel when he stopped me. He said he was glad that I was the one who visited and not my father because he had something to show me.”
Her fingers tightened around the whisky glass. She’d barely taken a sip of it because she was a far smarter creature than he.
“I respected so many things about your father,” she said softly. “He knew he was dying, and he wanted to put his personal affairs in order. When he was sorting through some files, he’d found a letter that had never been unsealed. It was from my mother.”
Ian’s mouth parted. “I wager it wasn’t some unopened dinner invitation.”
“He had it tucked into his journal, and when he showed me…” She shook her head and rubbed her chest a little frantically.
If he were another man and she another woman, he would have stilled her hand by clasping it in his own.
Hell, he would have taken her into his arms.
But he was who he was, and he had a faint sense that if he made one move toward her to acknowledge the slipping of her mask, she’d retaliate. Violently.
“What did your mother write?” he asked gently.
“That she was ill, and she was afraid she wouldn’t survive much longer. She wanted to ensure that her family was taken care of, and she had a vision of her daughter having a place beside him and his family one day.”
She took a small sip of her drink. “It was haunting, seeing those words in her handwriting. To be honest, I was stunned.”
He would have been. “She’d never spoken of such a thing before, to you?”
“Never. Her departure from us was…abrupt. When I said nothing in reaction to the letter, your father took my hand. He said he’d watched me with his family over the years and he knew my mother was right.”
She drew a breath. “‘Promise me, lass,’ he said. ‘Promise me you’ll honor our wishes. Marry my son.’”
Ian knew that part was true because he and Mrs. Turner were in the hall, approaching his father’s room. They’d heard his father’s request, and Diana’s soft reply of acceptance.
He’d been so angry about the impending loss of his father.
And his own dreams. There was so little in his control, he’d seized on the pledge he’d made to defend the emeralds and protect his family and he’d made it his calling.
His father hadn’t minced words about what would happen if he failed.
Ian knew the man wouldn’t have wanted Diana mixed up in any of it.
And he'd swindled her into believing that the promise she made was about Jared, because he’d convinced himself it was.
“I couldn’t refuse your father,” Diana said. “I was reeling from hearing my mother’s wish, from beyond the grave. With all of that spinning through my head, I wasn’t thinking clearly when you walked me home that night. If I had, I would have noticed the men in the shadows.”
“I should have seen them. And I don’t regret what either of us did to defend ourselves.”
“Neither do I. But I am sorry about the way we parted, and what happened after.”
Diana took a step closer. A faint flush rose over her cheeks.
“I never intended to marry Jared. I planned to call off the engagement, but when someone leaked it to the papers, a miraculous thing happened. Men stopped hunting me.” She gave a short laugh. “It was the first taste of freedom I had since my debut, and it was glorious.”
He couldn’t find relief in her confession because her proximity and the whisky were making his blood heat.
“My father might have been happier than me.” She laughed again, this time with affection, as she brushed her eyes.
“He wanted Jared nowhere near Rives Shipping. It was his idea to keep up the charade of the engagement until I was ready to call it off. The ruse gave me the chance to learn his business. It allowed me to step in when his own health began to falter.”
She’d had years with her father, which Ian envied. “Still, after he died, you had the entire mourning period to end the engagement. There was no need for such a dramatic exit from your betrothal.”
Her small sigh carried an edge of exasperation. “I’m not as Machiavellian as you think. I expected Jared to overindulge the night before the wedding, and I’d planned to confront him about Polly this morning. But he went missing, and I needed to know what happened. You did too.”
He didn’t want to believe her explanation. It made it too easy for him to surrender to his desires, and he couldn’t betray his duty to his father.
“Where do we go from here?” he asked.
“I need some time to think through what happens next. Away from London,” she replied. “Will you help me with the final stage of my escape?”
She sounded tentative.
He hated that their constant jockeying with each other made her believe he’d willfully refuse her anything. “Tell me where you wish to go, and I shall escort you safely there.”
The smile she rewarded him with was so bright and so quick, it momentarily blinded him. “I must visit my man of business at the shipping office.”
“I’ll have Hepburn hail a cab on the high street, while you gather your things.”
Hepburn also produced an overcoat and hat for Diana. As she pulled the coat around her, she squirmed. “I must have missed a button.”
“No, it fastens from the inside.” As Ian reached inside the lapel, his fingers grazed her breast.
Her breath caught on a soft hiss.
He froze.
With one small motion, he could lean over and claim the kiss they should have shared eight years ago. The one that had consumed his dreams and his waking fantasies.
It would be sweet. Too sweet to stop at merely a kiss.
And if he acted on the impulse, it would make their impending separation unreservedly brutal.
He quickly fastened the inner clasp of the coat, and then the outer buttons, and stepped aside to lead her out the back door.
They darted through the dark street and took turns glancing behind them to ensure no one followed them. At the corner of the high street, Hepburn had a hack waiting. Diana threw the valet one of her dazzling smiles, and they climbed into the carriage.
As the taxi lurched forward, she remarked, “Hepburn is exceptionally talented. I hope you pay him well.”
“He’s undoubtedly the most overpaid valet in London.” Hepburn was also more than a valet. Which he suspected Diana knew.
“I left the dress in your guest room,” she said softly.
“Hepburn will see to it,” he assured her.
“There was one thing I thought you should look after.”
Diana took his hand. He hadn’t put on his gloves yet, and the bare touch of her fingers burned his skin as the cold weight of the emeralds filled his palm.
She folded his fingers over to cradle the gems. “Now I can be certain that you’re staring at me and not some shiny object.”