Kitabı oku: «A Vow For An Heiress»

Chapter One

Having left the ship that had brought them from India, William Barrington, the Earl of Ashurst, escorted the child and his Indian nurse, Mishka, along the busy wharf of the East India Dock. The air heavy with the odour of hemp and pitch, it was a seething mass of noisy humanity. A number of heavily armed Company-owned vessels were at anchor in the deep water. Tall masts and webs of rigging swayed with the motion of the River Thames, the charcoal-grey water lapping at the great hulls. Workshops and warehouses all within a mile of India House stored all kinds of exotic commodities from the east that stirred the imagination. Ropes and barrels were piled high and stevedores carried trunks and crates from the ship.

Dhanu, the five-year-old child, had difficulty keeping up with William’s long strides so he hoisted him up into his arms. Tall, lean and as olive skinned as a native Indian, his hair dark, thick and curling, William was a man who inspired awe in all those he met.

His mind was very much on what he had to do now he was in London. After much deliberation and letters passing to and fro between him and his solicitor, there was only one solution that he could see to satisfy the creditors. He must marry a rich wife, a prospect he little relished after his ill-fated betrothal to Lydia Mannering. Lydia was the only daughter of an Englishman who had made his money in India as countless others had done and continued to do. Lydia was beautiful, witty and fun to be with, he had adored her, believing she would fulfil all his yearnings and dreams and light up his life with love and laughter and children. She was impressed to learn he was the cousin of the Earl of Ashurst and enthralled with the idea of going to London and mixing with the cream of society. Despite his aristocratic connections, William came from the poorer branches of his parents’ respective families. He did not have a private fortune and did not give a damn for titles, when all Lydia’s mercenary heart cared about was wealth and rank.

How utterly stupid and gullible he had been to let himself believe she cared for him. On returning from a long tour of duty he was devastated to discover Lydia had married someone else, an officer whose credentials and wealth far outshone his own.

William was the last in a long line of Barringtons. If he didn’t produce a legitimate heir, the title would become extinct. It troubled him more than anyone realised, and he knew he could not ignore the issue. He would marry with great reluctance, unless he could find a wife who would bear his children and make no demands on him. Hurt and angry by Lydia’s betrayal, with grim determination he had forced himself to come to grips with what she had done, managing to keep his emotions well hidden. Never again would he let his emotions get the better of him, and he vowed that he would not allow himself to be so weakened by a woman’s body and a pair of seductive eyes. His heart was closed to all women.

Apparently his solicitor had a wealthy client, the mother of a man—Jeremiah Ingram—who had made his fortune as a sugar cane planter in the West Indies, and she was looking to marry her two granddaughters to titled gentlemen. He was to be introduced to the eldest of the two before he left the city for Berkshire. William was single-minded and completely unreadable, and at that particular moment he had an uneasy feeling of being watched. His stride was unhurried and, apart from a muscle that ticked in his clenched jaw, there was nothing about him to betray the fact that every nerve and faculty was tense and alert. His sharp, bright blue eyes observed everything that was going on around him, looking closely at individuals and probing the shadows for the dark faces of the two men who had followed him from India on another Company vessel, two men who posed a direct threat to the child.

As he left the docks he was unaware of the two figures that emerged from the shadows. One of the men was Kamal Kapoor. His dark eyes held a steadiness of sinister intent as they followed in William’s wake.

Glancing out of the window of her grandmother’s well-sprung travelling chaise, Rosa Ingram wished the weather wasn’t so depressingly dull and cold, with rain falling heavily. Clouds darkened the sky, obliterating the sun as if it was probably too afraid to show its face.

Rosa felt no attachment to England. With its depressing weather and capital city a confusion of people and noise, it was a world away from the vibrancy and gently waving palms against the splendid vivid blue sky of her plantation home on her beloved island of Antigua, where she and her sister, Clarissa, older than her by two years, had been raised. A lump appeared in her throat when she thought of the circumstances that had brought them to this day, of the anguish that had engulfed them, almost drowning them in a sea of despair when their beloved parents had been laid to rest.

Abiding by their father’s wishes, they had come to England on his demise to live with their paternal grandmother at Fountains Lodge in Berkshire. With just her maid, Dilys, for company, Rosa was travelling to Berkshire after staying with Aunt Clara and Uncle Michael in London.

Their grandmother was resolved to find suitable husbands for both her granddaughters before her death, which, since she suffered ill health, could happen at any time. She was afraid that should it come to pass before she had seen them both settled, as immensely wealthy young women they would be besieged by fortune hunters. It could prove disastrous with no one to guide them. She was assured their beauty and wealth would secure some penniless nobleman.

But how Rosa wished she could put her share of their father’s wealth to better use. Shoring up some penniless nobleman’s estate seemed a dreadful waste of money when so many people were in want. Deeply concerned with the sorry plight of London’s destitute children, Aunt Clara was involved in charity work. It was the kind of work that appealed to Rosa, something she could apply herself to that would be both worthwhile and rewarding. When she had broached the subject with her aunt, much as she would welcome the funds that would benefit her charities, she had refused, telling Rosa that she was far too young to become involved with such things. Besides, Rosa’s father had made his mother, Amelia Ingram, her guardian. It was up to her to decide what she should do.

And so Rosa had set off for Berkshire. Clarissa had protested tearfully against marrying the Earl of Ashurst, openly declaring her love for Andrew Nicholson, a young man she had met on Antigua. He had been visiting friends on the island and had travelled to England to visit relatives on the same ship. His family home was on the island of Barbados, where his father, like their own, also had a sugar cane plantation. The Nicholson family were wealthy and well connected and held considerable influence on the island. Clarissa had appealed to her grandmother to let them wed before he had to return to Barbados, but she had dismissed Clarissa’s entreaties, stubbornly refusing to discuss the matter further.

She believed she had found the perfect match for her elder granddaughter in William Barrington, the Earl of Ashurst. Having distinguished himself as a soldier in the East India Company, he had recently returned to England to fill the role of the next Earl of Ashurst, heir to the vast Barrington estate in the county of Berkshire. Unfortunately it was almost bankrupt. To avoid closing the house and selling land and the Barrington town house in Grosvenor Square, an enormous amount of money must be acquired—and quickly. With no means of his own, William Barrington had agreed to his lawyers’ suggestion that he found himself a wealthy wife.

The Ingram family’s small land portion bordered the Ashurst estate. Miss Clarissa and Miss Rosa Ingram’s widowed grandmother had been in London for the sole purpose of calling on the Earl’s lawyers to propose a match between the Earl and her eldest granddaughter. Matters had been approved but nothing signed, and following a brief meeting between the Earl and Clarissa, their grandmother had returned to Berkshire with Clarissa. Unfortunately, Aunt Clara had taken to her bed with a severe cold. Concerned for her aunt, Rosa had remained behind until she was well enough for her to leave.

The travelling chaise pulled into the yard of a busy inn, where coaches going to and from London stopped for their passengers to partake of refreshment. Rosa uttered a sigh of relief. The journey was proving to be long and tedious, made worse by her maid’s sniffles and coughing. The poor girl did look most unwell. The sooner they reached their destination and the girl was in bed the better.

‘Come along inside, Dilys,’ Rosa urged as they climbed down from the coach, pulling the hood of her cloak over her head to protect herself from the relentless rain while stepping round the deep puddles that had formed in the yard. ‘Something to eat and a hot drink will probably make you feel better.’

The inn was thronged with a rumpled assortment of noisy travellers, trying to get close to the warmth of the crackling fire as they waited to resume their journeys. Seeing her dismay on finding the inn so crowded, the driver sought out the landlord. After speaking to him they were shown into a less crowded room.

Rosa found a quiet corner for herself and Dilys while the driver left them to take care of the horses. After removing her fur-trimmed cloak and bonnet and ordering their meal, she glanced at the other occupants. Her gaze came to rest on a foreign woman and child seated across the room. She was conspicuous in the silk tunic of an Indian lady and she was trying to coax the child of the same race to eat. She was perhaps nearing thirty. A purple silk scarf was wrapped around her head, framing and half-covering her face. She appeared to be ill at ease, her eyes darting around the room and constantly looking towards the door.

Rosa’s observations were interrupted when food was brought to them, but she did notice the gentleman who came into the room and went to sit at the same table as the foreign woman. His eyes flicked around the room. They met Rosa’s briefly and without undue interest, then moved on.

Distracted, Rosa found herself staring at him. She judged him to be about thirty years of age, and he was tall and impressive—over six foot and lean of body—in the athletic sense. His skin was a golden olive shade—almost as dark as those people of mixed race on her island home. His hair was near black and thick, but it was his eyes that held her attention. They were piercing and ice blue, darkly fringed with lashes beneath fiercely swooping brows.

Unlike her sister and most of her friends Rosa was not a romantic at heart, but she thought him to be the most handsome man she had ever seen. He had an unmistakable aura of authority about him, of forcefulness and power. He also had an air of unease and the deep frown that furrowed his brow told her he didn’t appear to be in the best of moods. Her attention was diverted when Dilys was suddenly overcome with a fit of sneezing. The man shot a glance of irritation in their direction before concentrating his attention on the boy.

Having eaten and eager to be on her way, Rosa left the inn. Dilys excused herself and disappeared into the ladies’ retiring room. The yard was busy with carriages and people alighting and some setting off. Holding her skirts free of the puddles, she pushed her way through the people mingling about. The woman and child she had seen inside the inn were among them. Rosa heard the sound of hoofbeats and could feel them pounding the ground. She saw the crowd break up and part and then she saw a coach and four careering madly towards them.

Out of the corner of her eye she caught a movement next to her and two hands seemed to leap out of the crowd beside her. The next thing she saw was the little boy suddenly propelled into the path of the horses. Without conscious thought she leapt forward and grasped the child, pulling him back before the horses galloped past and came to a halt. The child began to cry and the woman, who had been distracted and was looking the other way, turned back and took his hand.

‘What are you doing? You must be more careful.’

The woman spoke crossly in a voice whose faintly sing-song intonation alone betrayed the fact that it was not an Englishwoman who spoke.

The dark, frightened eyes of the child overflowed with tears. ‘I—I was pushed,’ he cried. ‘Someone pushed me.’

The woman focused her attention on Rosa. On seeing the flush on her face and her closeness to the child, she immediately assumed Rosa to be the guilty party, having no idea that she had just saved the child from being trampled to death. She was unable to truly comprehend what had just happened but the look she cast Rosa was cold and accusing.

The small, silent boy, who now had tears streaming down his cheeks, stared up at her, clasping the Indian woman’s hand. He was a strikingly attractive child, his Indian ancestry evident in his features and his jet-black hair. What entrapped Rosa more than anything was the compelling blackness of his eyes. They were large and widely spaced and fringed by glossy lashes. The woman began to drag him away, but not before Rosa had heard the child say in a small, quivering voice, ‘I was so frightened.’

Then the man she had seen inside the inn stepped between them and gently brushed away the child’s tears while bending his head to hear what the woman had to say. They spoke together in a language Rosa did not understand. After a moment he stood up straight and looked at Rosa, anger blazing in his eyes.

Some deep-rooted feminine instinct made Rosa’s breath catch in her throat at being confronted by a man of such powerful physical presence. He had an expression of strength and marked intelligence. His eyes drew another’s like a magnet to a pin. They were so full of life, so charged with the expression of their owner’s awareness. Unexpectedly, she found herself the victim of an acute attack of awkwardness and momentarily at a loss for words, for in such close proximity, his overwhelming masculinity seemed more pronounced. When her eyes locked on his she was quite unprepared for the effect he had on her—her pulse seemed to leap. With his piercing blue eyes and his rich dark hair, he was an extremely attractive man.

‘The child is unhurt—’

She was brusquely interrupted. ‘No thanks to you.’

His words had an aggressive ring to them. Bright colour flamed in her face and her slender figure stiffened and drew itself erect. She stared at him. ‘I beg your pardon?’

He looked at her full in the eyes, fixing her with a gaze of angry accusation. ‘I realise that your carelessness may have been accidental and if that is the case then I advise you to be more careful in the future.’

His condemnation was unnecessarily severe. She thought his anger had been brought about out of concern for the child, but she would not excuse his rudeness. ‘I would be obliged, sir, if you would voice your unjust accusation in a more temperate manner and apologise.’

The young woman’s anger and animosity might at any other time have amused William and, looking into a pair of eyes the colour of green moss in which gold and brown flecks shone and seemed to dance about, he might have taken time to admire her slender form and the flawless beauty of her face beneath the high-brimmed silk bonnet, but now, his major concern being for the child, he did not smile. His temper was not improved by her bold attack, which caused his lean features to darken and his lip to curl scornfully across even white teeth.

‘And I would be obliged if you would see fit to mind your own business.’

‘That is exactly what I was doing and from what I have witnessed, sir, I would advise you to mind yours. It may have escaped your notice, but the inn yard with horses and carriages coming and going is a dangerous place to be for a young child.’

William’s jaw hardened and his eyes snapped fiercely as he fixed her with a savage look. There was a murderous expression on his face and it was with a great deal of effort that he restrained himself. ‘You are an extremely outspoken young lady—too outspoken for your own good.’