Marry Christmas (Zebra Historical Romance) Read online

  Chapter 2

  England, Four Months Earlier

  Randall Blackmore, ninth Duke of Bellingham, stared in disbelief at the letter before him, a letter that instantly solved his problems. One million pounds, an impossible amount of money, would be at his disposal if only he agreed to travel to America and marry a girl he’d never laid eyes on.

  It was so damned tempting. As well as humiliating and insane. But after meeting last week for the third time with the family solicitors it just might be the only thing between salvation and complete ruin. He wanted to ball up the letter and toss it in the fire grate. He wanted to, but he knew he wouldn’t. He let out a curse which encouraged a chuckle from Lord Hollings, Earl of Wellesley, his most trusted friend.

  “You’ve been handed a miracle, old boy, and all you can do is take the Lord’s name in vain,” he said, tsking mockingly. Edward poured his friend a generous splash of fine French brandy. “You can afford this now, Rand,” he said, laughing. Edward Hollings had been with Bellingham in the Life Guards, where they’d both enjoyed being part of the most elite military regiment in England. That is until Hollings’s uncle had died and he was forced to take on his duties as heir, but that was as far as his commiseration went. His family estate, Meremont, was not nearly as encumbered as Bellewood. Hollings was able to sustain his home and live a life, if not of luxury, then of leisure. Such a life was out of the question for Bellingham. Until now.

  “What the hell is wrong with the chit if her parents are in such a hurry to rid themselves of her? I hear she was brought around the continent and dangled out in front of several cash-hungry members of the peerage. No one took the bait, of course,” Rand said, his eyes still glued to the words: “one million pounds.”

  Hollings shrugged. “You met the mother. Did she hint at some strange disease? Or perhaps she’s fatally ugly.”

  Rand gave his friend a withering look. “I’m so glad you are having such a grand time with my misery.”

  “What did her mother look like, then?”

  Rand frowned. He had met her at the opening of an art exhibit in London perhaps one year ago, and noted at the time how grateful he was that her daughter had not been with her and how very disappointed she’d been that he would not get to meet the girl. Ever since inheriting the title, Rand had been beset with mamas, all of whom apparently did not care that he was practically a pauper. He should have known a pauper with a title was still a grand catch.

  If he remembered correctly, Alva Cummings was hardly a pretty woman. At best, one could call her handsome if one was extremely generous. “She must be ugly, then. Hideously so, for this price.”

  “One million pounds can go a long way to making her beautiful.”

  The idea of marrying for money was extremely distasteful. Still, he didn’t know what he was going to do. Bellewood was in shambles. His tenants, already driven to poverty because of the agricultural depression, were suffering needlessly. Cottages were in disrepair, farming equipment was completely outdated, young men were leaving for London, for America, all because the two former Dukes of Bellingham had dipped so deeply in the well of prosperity, it was now bone-dry. As much as Rand had admired his father and loved his brother, he could not fathom why they had allowed the situation to become as dire as it was. He truly had no other choice but to marry an heiress.

  “Don’t look so glum, old boy. Get your heir and leave her be. With that money you can buy a little cottage somewhere for her, say in Scotland, and get on with your life.”

  “One million pounds,” Rand said, feeling desperation pull at him. “It would mean everything.”

  “It’s just marriage,” Hollings said blandly. “Go see her. You can always change your mind.”

  Rand looked at his old friend and gave him a grim smile. “I can hardly afford passage.” He closed his eyes and let out a long breath. “I really could throttle my father and brother. And would, too, if they weren’t six feet under.” His words were blasé but the pain inside was anything but. His father and brother had shared a bond that he could never breech. It was as if they were part of a whole and he was simply an extra bit that fell off and was not needed at all. His brother had taken pains to spend time with him when he was very young, and a boy could not have asked for a better big brother.

  Then, Rand had been shipped off to school when he was nine years old and from then on he never felt a part of anything at Bellewood. All he had were wonderful memories and a sometimes aching desire to go home.

  Now they were both gone, so he could only speculate why they had behaved the way they had, tossing away a vast fortune on nothing.

  Hollings took a long sip of his brandy. “If it makes you feel any better, I don’t know a single peer who hasn’t had to start looking for money. Some in unusual places. Lord Dumfrey is director of twelve companies.

  Doesn’t do a thing but collect the cash and lend out his good name. And don’t even think that you’re the only peer who has married an American for her money. Done all the time these days.”

  Rand tried to take heart in Hollings’s speech, but he couldn’t help wishing there was another way. If it was just a matter of raising the money to repair Bellewood, he could do that. He wasn’t opposed to working for a living; it was becoming common among the more desperate of the peerage. But he could never pay the enormous amount of debt left behind by his brother. Not without a substantial bit of help. He refused to sell Bellewood; he’d only get a fraction of what it was worth. Besides, Bellewood had been in his family for generations and he’d be damned if he’d be the duke to lose it.

  God, how he wished he were back in London with his regiment, happily unaware that his brother, the eighth duke, was dying of consumption. By the time he found out, his poor brother was near death and Rand was looking at a future far more grim than the one he’d expected. But not as grim as his brother’s, and for that he was somewhat grateful.

  He didn’t want to be duke. He didn’t want to marry some American. He didn’t want to produce an heir and a spare. Not yet. Hell, he was only twenty-seven years old. He’d thought he had at least another decade of work in the military before settling down to a calm country life with a pretty English girl. English, being the key word. He would happily have been Lord Blackmore for the rest of his life. Now he would be something else entirely. Good God.

  He’d had to sell out his commission with the Life Guards and return home to take up his new duties, only to find out that his first duty as duke would be to find a way to save his beloved Bellewood, one of the grandest estates in England. At least it used to be. Now, thanks to poor investments and outrageous expenses, Bellewood was a shell of what it had been. When he’d been called home to his brother’s deathbed, he’d been shocked by what had happened to the great house. The library, filled with nearly forty thousand volumes dating back to the fifteenth century, had been decimated. Paintings, furniture, tapestries, all sold to pay for enormous debt. Indeed, Bellewood resembled a large and quite empty museum. The staff had been nearly all dismissed, which left the house to fall into disrepair, not to mention that vast amounts of dust floated everywhere.

  Worst was the stables, the pride of his grandfather, whose love of horses surpassed all else. Bellewood was famous in the British Isles for producing some of the best racers in the world. The stables, the pride of the Blackmores, were an empty shell, the horses long ago sold off to pay for debts or God knew what else. His childhood memories of Bellewood were centered around the stables, hanging about the tolerant stable master and the intolerant grooms. Rand had been happiest in those stables, watching foals being birthed, hefting hay, oiling the tackle. He hadn’t realized he shouldn’t be in the stables at all, never mind working there. Walking into those stables, hearing nothing but the wind hissing through a hole in the roof, had been heartbreaking.

  The grounds were overgrown, the beautiful gardens his mother had taken so much pride in, nearly obliterated by neglect. Strangely, it was the loss of his mother’s garden that
affected him the most. It might have been his fond memories of his mother doting over her roses, the warm afternoons when he, as a young boy, would escape his tutor and find her there. His mother had been a strict disciplinarian in most things, but she never could bring herself to give him up when he found his way to her. Looking back, he supposed she justified allowing him to stay by giving him a lesson in horticulture. He would pretend interest when all he really wanted was to be near her.

  Rand hadn’t yet told his mother that to save Bellewood he would likely have to marry an American heiress. The Dowager Duchess was such a stickler about everything, except little boys who wandered into gardens. She had envisioned for him the daughter of an earl or duke from a family she knew and respected. No doubt, she’d had a list for his brother, one, to her great frustration, Tyler had chosen to ignore. Rand never knew why his brother had not married. Perhaps it was the knowledge that he would die before he was ready. It wasn’t as if the dukedom would be lost or go to some unsavory cousin, for he had a younger brother. Rand had never talked about marriage with Tyler. They’d talked of women in general, the need of them, and horses, the joy of them. Now that he was dead, Rand would never know how Tyler had felt about leaving nothing behind, no legacy but unending debt, no children to remember him. Nothing but a brother, who didn’t want to be a duke, and a mother who’d been crushed by his death.

  His mother was blissfully and almost tragically unaware of his financial difficulties. Shortly after his brother’s death she lamented how she wouldn’t be able to hold her annual ball. “I talked with your brother about it before he grew so ill and we’d agreed that this year we’d spare no expense. I’m so sick of watching every penny we spend. Of course, now that he’s gone…” Her voice had trailed off, overwhelmed with the realization that never again would she plan even the smallest event with her oldest son.

  Rand had felt his body go completely numb, for he’d just learned from his solicitor that the only way to pay off the astronomical debts accumulated by his father and brother was to sell every bit of property they owned, including the dowager house where his mother had happily lived since his father died three years before.

  He found he could not do it. He could not sell his mother’s home from beneath her and put her in something far less grand. His mother was a duchess from the diamond-encrusted tiara on her head to the silk stockings on her legs. Those diamonds had long been replaced with paste, to pay for a new breeding mare his brother had to have, but his mother’s eyesight was so poor, thankfully she could not tell the difference.

  Already the family’s London town house and three country estates had been sold to pay for too many years of extravagance and ignorance. It had been a shock, but perhaps it should not have been. If he had spent more time at home, more time paying attention to what was happening around him, he would not have been so blindsided.

  And now he would have to pay for two generations of neglect by marrying an heiress, and an American heiress at that.

  Chapter 3

  August 1892, Newport, Rhode Island

  Elizabeth stared in the mirror and tried out a smile. It had been so long since she’d used those particular muscles, smiling felt foreign to her. Her eyes were no longer red rimmed and swollen, but her face was unusually pale, her eyes missing something. Life, perhaps. Still, she did finally have something to smile at. Her long, tedious imprisonment was about to end. The Duke of Bellingham was set to arrive today to meet the woman who would most likely be his wife.

  Elizabeth still could not believe what was happening to her. All her life she’d not been allowed to make even the simplest decision, being reminded again and again that she was incapable of such a task. Now, though, she would be married, in charge of a vast house in England, directing servants, taking care of tenants, planning parties and balls and so many other things she couldn’t even fathom. This she was expected to do when even now her mother wouldn’t let her pick out the gown she would wear for tonight’s dinner with the Duke.

  “Ruled with an iron fist, that one is,” she’d once over heard a maid say to another. The servants pitied her, even the lowest scullery maid would look at her with sorrow clear in her eyes. As many times as she’d been humiliated by her mother, this by far eclipsed them all.

  “You look lovely,” Alva said from behind her. “I knew that blue would suit you.”

  Indeed, the blue of her gown matched the color of her eyes. It might seem a wonderful coincidence unless one was present when her mother was picking out the fabric in France a year ago. It had taken nearly an hour, and Elizabeth had sat there, back straight, hands folded on her lap, as the poor girl held swatch after swatch against her cheek.

  “Thank you.”

  “Your hair,” Alva said, narrowing her eyes. “I wonder if that’s the best we can do.”

  Her maid had spent nearly an hour on the intricate style, threading delicate strands of impossibly tiny pearls through it. By the end, her hands had been shaking with the effort and Elizabeth had to tell her to stop, that her hair was beautiful and could not possibly be improved.

  “I suppose, given the horrible brown you were born with, it will have to do,” Alva said, and Elizabeth wondered if her mother was even aware that Alva’s hair, before it had become salted with gray, was exactly the same color as her own. Still, she sent up a silent prayer of thanks that her hair had passed inspection.

  “The duke will arrive within the hour. I think we should be in the Rose Salon,” she said, as if she hadn’t choreographed the entire evening a dozen times in her head. “You should sit in the cream chair. When His Grace enters the room, stand and curtsy. Let me see it,” she commanded.

  Elizabeth stood gracefully and gave a small curtsy, looking up at her mother expectantly.

  “Perhaps a bit deeper? Oh, I don’t know of these English things. Curtsies and the like. Just be polite. And silent unless he or I address you. This is by no means final, and you could still ruin it by saying or doing some thing foolish.”

  “Yes, Mother.”

  “Try to be pleasant. And smile. You do have a pleas ant smile at least.”

  Elizabeth forced a smile that she knew was not the least bit as pleasant as she was capable. Alva gave her daughter a sharp look before turning away. “I expect you in the Rose Salon in five minutes.”

  Five minutes. And then she would meet the man who would most likely be her husband. She would share her life, her house. Her bed. She closed her eyes in a hope less attempt to stop the panic in her heart. She was so sick of thinking about the “if onlys” in her life. But she couldn’t help but think about how different she would feel if it were Henry she were planning to marry on Christmas Eve instead of a man she didn’t know, a man who lived in another country. She wondered if Henry knew the duke was in Newport, if he understood how desperately she longed for him.

  It was foolish to think of such things, and completely useless. She could not marry Henry without putting his very life in danger and perhaps her mother’s as well. She believed with every fiber in her being that her mother would follow through on her threat to hurt him, perhaps kill him. Her mother’s health had made a quick recovery once Elizabeth finally agreed with this marriage, and she’d thrown herself into planning an impressive welcome for the duke. Henry had been put from Alva’s mind, for she knew her daughter would never thwart her.

  And to Elizabeth’s great shame, she knew her mother was right.

  “His Grace, the Duke of Bellingham.”

  Even now, when Rand heard that announcement and realized it pertained to him, he gave a small inward start. But hearing it in the flat accent of an American, it was almost surreal. In fact, this entire journey didn’t seem quite real, so he was slightly relieved to find Sea Cliff had an English flair to it and would not have seemed out of place in the countryside back home. He’d found Americans either completely unimpressed by his title, or so in thrall it was disconcerting. Rand entered the so-called Rose Salon bracing himself for the worst. His ey
es scanned the room, taking in Alva Cummings, who curtsied when his eyes rested on her, and Jason Cummings, the girl’s father, who gave the briefest head-nod bows before coming over to shake his hand. Jason Cummings was a rotund man with thick wavy hair parted precisely in the center. His face was soft, and a fine sheen of sweat shone near his hairline making Rand wonder if the man was nervous about this meeting. He almost felt like laughing aloud, for if anyone should feel nervous and foolish, it was he.

  “Welcome to Sea Cliff,” Cummings said. “I’d like to show you my yacht if you’ve the time. Got her four weeks ago. She’s sitting at anchor right now, but it’s just a small row out to—”

  “Jason. Introduce your daughter,” Alva Cummings said sweetly. But there was nothing sweet about the expression on her face and Rand had a sudden understanding of why the man before him looked so harried.

  Jason smiled tightly. “Of course, dear. Your Grace, my daughter, Elizabeth,” he said, giving a little bow toward a bank of windows.

  Thank God. That was the first thing that came to his mind when he first laid eyes on the daughter. She was pretty, remarkably so. Her features were small but for her eyes, which seemed far too large for her delicate face. She curtsied nicely and smiled, and again Rand was struck that her smile, like her mother’s, didn’t reach her eyes.

  “Miss Elizabeth,” he said, nodding toward her. She immediately darted a look to her mother, as if she was at a loss to know what to do or say. Apparently, the mother must have communicated something silently to the girl, for she curtsied again, and said, “Your Grace.”

  It was about as warm in the room as an icebox, and Rand was regretting his trip to America with all his being. Humiliation washed over him as he realized that everyone in this room knew why he was here, knew he’d come hat in hand begging for money. “You have a lovely home,” he said, even though it was so cluttered with furniture and paintings and flowers he could hardly see the room itself. He was painfully reminded of Bellewood’s cavernous emptiness thanks to his brother’s attempts to raise money.