The Madam & Mr. MacLean (Matchmaker Mischief #3)

Chapter 1

SERENITY, NEW MEXICO

Ican’t believe I inherited a…a brothel!

Sheridan DuBois stood in the parlor of the house she inherited and turned slowly, still trying to make sense of the upheaval in her life over the past few weeks.

It all started with a letter—two letters actually—one from Phillip Applebaum, Esquire, her late mother’s lawyer, informing her of her inheritance.

The other was from Mrs. Lucy Hart, welcoming her to Serenity, New Mexico.

She was still in shock. More than just shock, she was dumbfounded. And a whole host of other emotions she couldn’t even begin to name.

Josephine DuBois, her mother, whom she’d been told had died giving birth to her, had not died at all.

She’d been alive up until a few months ago and owned this ‘parlor house’ as Mr. Applebaum referred to it.

It was a lovely house—a mansion really—decorated tastefully—elegant yet comfortable, but no matter what other name it went by, it was still a bordello.

And it was hers now. Her mother had left it to her in her will, with the proviso that she could never close it down or displace the women who lived and worked here. She could sell it though, as long as ‘the girls’, as Josephine referred to them, agreed.

If she had known this was her inheritance, she never would have defied her grandmother and Aunt Estelle to come here. Then again, she couldn’t have given up the chance to know who her mother had been, something she had wondered about all her life.

The sound of bed springs squeaking and moans growing louder from one of the rooms on the second floor made her cover her ears.

She’d heard those particular noises all night, which made it nearly impossible to sleep, not to mention how embarrassed those sounds made her.

She moved toward the kitchen, further from the grand staircase that led to the activity above.

“Well, hello, lass! Did you sleep well?” Eileen Gallagher, the woman who cooked and cleaned, but didn’t go upstairs, as Sheridan had learned, greeted her.

She liked Mrs. Gallagher. She was as round as she was tall, evidence of the tasty food she cooked.

Curly gray hair framed her face, which highlighted the warmth of her blue eyes, and the roses that seemed to bloom perpetually on the apples of her cheeks.

The cook reminded Sheridan of someone’s grandmother—not the one she’d grown up with—but the one she’d always wanted. Her own grandmother, Odette DuBois, had been cold, thin, strict, overbearing, and rule driven. She hadn’t been the least bit affectionate, whereas Mrs. Gallagher was.

So were the other girls. They’d all welcomed her with warm hugs when Mr. Applebaum brought her here, something she just wasn’t used to, and quite frankly, made her uncomfortable, given that she’d never been exposed to that kind of warm regard.

“How can anyone concentrate with all those…noises?”

Mrs. Gallagher laughed. “You’ll get used to it, dear. Let me make you some tea. The world seems better after a nice, hot cup.”

Sheridan sat in one of the chairs around the big kitchen table as Mrs. Gallagher settled a teakettle on the stove. She didn’t speak as she moved about her kitchen in a spritely manner—and it was her kitchen, which she had made quite clear when they’d met.

Mrs. Gallagher was an excellent cook, as Sheridan had learned shortly after she arrived and had her first meal, which begged the question, why was the older woman working at a brothel? “How did you come to be here?”

“Miss Josie.” The woman turned toward her and settled her hands on her ample hips.

“Oh, she was a kind-hearted, generous woman. Full of light and laughter and just…goodness. I adored her. She took me in when no one else would.” A soft smile spread across her face as she moved forward and rested her work-roughened hands on the back of a chair.

“I was accused of killing a man. Oh, it was true, but it was an accident. No one would believe me, though.” She drew in her breath.

“I was a cook for Mr. Charles Jasper, a very influential and rich man in St. Louis. I had never been told when I was hired that Mr. Jasper had an allergy to nuts, so it was an accident. I never would have served him almonds if I had known. His family decided that I had done it on purpose and pressed charges.” She lifted the corner of her apron and dabbed at her eyes to remove the tears that made them shine.

“I spent four years in a women’s penitentiary in Missouri and when I was released, I had nothing…

and no one. I couldn’t find a job as no one would hire me because of where I’d been and what I’d done.

I made my way here, looking for a new life where no one knew me.

Josie took me in, despite my past. Or maybe in spite of it. She was good to me. Incredibly good.”

Mrs. Gallagher turned away and lifted the teakettle off the stove using a kitchen towel.

She didn’t speak while she poured water over the silver tea balls in the cups, but that was all right.

Sheridan watched her, trying to compare the goodness of her mother with what she’d been told by her aunt and her grandmother.

They’d lied about her mother being alive.

What else had they lied about? Had everything she’d been told growing up not been true? Why would they do that?

Sheridan jumped, a little startled, when Mrs. Gallagher placed the teacup in front of her.

“Let it steep for a bit.” Mrs. Gallagher took her own seat and dipped the silver tea ball filled with tea leaves in and out of her cup until she had the desired strength. Sheridan did the same, then added a little milk and sugar. “What else would you like to know?”

She took a sip of her tea, appreciating the heat and the taste. It was exactly what she needed. Mrs. Gallagher was, too. “You said my mother was kind.”

The woman smiled, her light blue eyes, still a little bit watery, crinkling at the corners. “Aye, lass, she was.”

“And good?” she asked, trying hard to understand why she’d been told differently.

So many questions about her mother rattled in her mind, too many to sort out.

It made her angry, almost as angry as she’d been when she’d received Lucy’s and Mr. Applebaum’s letters, telling her about her inheritance and the circumstances of her mother’s passing.

Odette, her grandmother, and Aunt Estelle had refused to answer any questions, simply telling her what they always had—that Josephine had been a fallen woman, a blight on the family name.

“Aye, she was good, too. I miss her terribly.”

“I didn’t know her at all. I was told she died the day I was born.”

The woman nodded, sympathy in her eyes, but didn’t say anything as she drank her tea.

“Why would my grandmother and my aunt tell me that?”

“That I don’t know, lass,” she said, her Irish accent apparent. “You’ll have to ask them.”

“I did. They had no good answer. At least, one that was acceptable to me. All they kept saying was that she’d brought shame to the family.”

It grew quiet in the kitchen, the only sound the ticking of the clock as the minutes passed by.

One couldn’t hear the moans and groans and squeaking bed springs in here.

Or maybe, Susannah’s gentleman caller had finally left.

The other girls were probably still sleeping and would until about noon or so.

“What are you going to do about this house?” Mrs. Gallagher startled her out of her own thoughts.

“I don’t know.” And that was the truth. She just didn’t know. This was a brothel, a house of ill-repute, but she did know one thing. “I shouldn’t stay here. I can’t stay here.”

“Of course, you can, lass.”

“But…people will look at me. Judge me.” It was one of her biggest fears—that someone—anyone—would cast aspersions toward her, whether she deserved them or not.

Mrs. Gallagher laughed. “Of course they will. People will judge you whether you live in a parlor house or not, whether you own it or not. And they’ll gossip.

Oh Lord, will they gossip! Serenity is a small town.

There’s no such thing as a secret here. Everyone knew who you were the minute you stepped off the stagecoach.

There ain’t nothing you can do about that, so who cares? ”

Sheridan stared at her teacup. “I care.”

The lessons Odette and Aunt Estelle had drilled into her head from the moment she could understand were not easy to disregard.

There were rules—Odette’s rules—and the consequences for defying them were grave.

She’d only done so twice. The first time, she ended up being sent to Bouchard’s School for Girls.

Now, she had defied those rules again and ended up in Serenity, New Mexico, owning a bordello.

“I have worked extremely hard to be above reproach, that no scandal would ever be attached to my name. I can’t live here.

That, by itself, is too much of a scandal.

” She frowned then remembered frowning caused wrinkles, another one of Odette’s rules, and forced herself to stop.

“And I know nothing about running a—a place like this. I taught piano and voice at Bouchard’s School for Girls. That’s what I know.”

She looked up from her teacup to see Mrs. Gallagher’s straight-forward gaze, but there was no reprimand in her eyes, just compassion, as if she seemed to understand the strange circumstances in which Sheridan found herself.

She couldn’t remember the last time someone had looked at her with such kindness.

“At the same time, I’d really like to get to know who my mother was.

I feel like I’ve been cheated, now that I know what I’d been told was a lie.

And the only way to do that is to live where she lived, get to know the people she knew—until I can decide what to do. ”