The Valentine Legacy (Legacy 3)

“That’s odd. Usually Spears heads up this cast of meddlers. Where the devil is he, Sampson?”

“He is here, Master James. Not immediately here, you understand, such as he isn’t at present standing here beside me, but he’s in residence, just as he should be, just as he wishes to be.”

James waved his hand through the air again. Then he jerked his fingers through his hair, standing it on end. “I keep getting off the track here, and the good Lord knows I’ve rehearsed everything I was going to say to you over and over again the past seven weeks. Now I can’t keep everything straight, and it’s all your fault for being so damned different. I was expecting you to be you, not this female I couldn’t have imagined even existing. Are you even wearing stockings?”

Without hesitation, Jessie lifted the beautiful yellow silk skirts and petticoat to show him pale yellow silk stockings.

His eyes crossed. “Pull your dress back down. A simple yes would have sufficed. You don’t know how to behave. You’re as much a lady as the Duchess is a gin-soaked sinner in Soho. Now, why the hell did you run away, Jessie? Yes, that was the first question I’d planned to ask you. Thank God I finally remembered it. Why, Jessie?”

“It’s a stupid question. You know very well I ran away because I was ruined. Everyone knew that. Glenda paid me three hundred dollars to leave. She also promised to give me some gowns and a cloak, but she didn’t. She thought I was going to Aunt Dorothy in New York, but I didn’t.”

“Yes, that is what Glenda tearfully announced to all. She said you knew you’d disgraced yourself and thus had left, not wanting to bring more shame upon your family. I never thought you’d go to Aunt Dorothy. That old besom is more a terror than my dear mother. You’re an idiot, Jessie, but I’ve never believed you were stupid. I immediately went to the docks and found out what ships had sailed for England. The Flying Buttress had sailed the morning you’d disappeared. One of the dockhands remembered you, seen you race a number of times. He told me you were all garbed in your trousers, trying to look like a man, but not fooling anyone. Damn you, Jessie, you didn’t even bother to leave me a note. You didn’t even leave your father a note. You just packed your damned breeches and left. I told Oliver I was coming over to England to get you. He told me he wanted you back. I don’t know why he would, but he does.”

“Papa might want me back, but Glenda is right. No one else does.”

“That’s nonsense and not true. By the time we get back to Baltimore, no one will even remember that you were lying on top of me, your hands all over my face, your mouth not an inch above mine.”

“Actually, Master James,” Sampson said, moving just a bit closer to Jessie, “Mr. Spears, Mr. Badger, Maggie, and I have discussed this thoroughly and it is our opinion that Jessie won’t ever be accepted again back in the Colonies. At least not in her current condition.”

“I would agree with that. Just look at her. This current condition of hers would bring her countless propositions. Men would lose all sense just looking at her.”

That, if Jessie wasn’t mistaken, in no way resembled an insult. “What sort of propositions?”

“Be quiet, Jessie. Sampson, go away. At least back up three steps. I’m not going to strangle her—not yet, anyway. Thank you. Now, Jessie, this was the most foolish thing you’ve ever done. Wait, I remember in one race you wanted to beat me so badly you refused to take the longer way around. You tried to jump your horse over a tree that had been uprooted the night before in a storm, but your horse didn’t make it and you went flying into a ditch filled with water.”

“Yes, I was riding Abel. I remember you laughed until your belly must have ached. I remember you stopped your horse, didn’t even finish the race, and just stood at the edge of that damned ditch and looked at me and laughed and laughed.”

He remembered too being so scared he’d nearly lost his breakfast until he’d seen her floundering in at least three feet of water, looking like a drowned sheepdog, her red hair all plastered over her face, with nothing broken. Only then had the laughter bubbled out of him. Only then. He grunted.

“But it’s done, James. I’m here and now you’re here and I want to know why you’re here.”

“I don’t care what your father says, what anyone else says. I’m not responsible for ruining you, Jessie.”

“Of course you aren’t. I told everyone that, including my father.”

“That doesn’t matter to him. He’s made me feel guiltier than hell. I had no choice but to follow you here and fetch you back home. I had to leave Marathon, I had to leave Alice, who I hope will keep herself away from Mortimer Hackey, I had to leave Connie. All for you, Jessie, you damned female, who just happened to shoot Mortimer Hackey in the foot and fall on top of me.”

“I saved your life, James. I also saved you from Glenda.”

“That’s true, but it doesn’t matter. What matters is that I hadn’t planned to come to England before the end of the year, and now I’m here. Just to fetch you back home.”

“I’m not going home. Nothing’s changed, James, nothing at all. I can’t go back.”

“We all agreed, Master James,” Sampson said. “She can’t go back in her current condition. As I said before, all of us have discussed this thoroughly and agree on this.”

“That’s right, James. Nobody wants me back except that man who tried to take liberties with my person.”

He banged his fist against the wall and yelled at her, “You will do as I bloody well tell you!”

“Cease your ranting. You have no authority over me.”

“Think of me as taking your father’s place. He wants you home. I am his emissary.”

“Ha. Forget it, James. I will do as I please, and what I please to do is remain here. I’m employed now. I have a job and important responsibilities. Don’t you dare sneer at me, James Wyndham.”

“Is that so? And just what do you do?”

“I’m Charles’s nurse and Anthony’s horse nanny.”