The Unexpected Heiress Page 3

Simon’s eyes narrowed. “That’s very interesting.”

  Shoving the last of some buttered toast into his mouth, Phillip pushed away his empty plate and stood up, glancing at Simon as he did so. He’d had quite enough. As he walked from the dining room table, he heard his brother snicker, and it irritated him more than it should have. He didn’t care for Simon acting superior to him, but Phillip was too weary to argue with him.

  In spite of his current state of exhaustion, Phillip hustled up the wide staircase of Devon House, his ancestral home. One day this grand and beautiful house and all its expensive and priceless contents would belong to him.

  Devon House was a bit of a local landmark at five stories high and almost a city block long. The magnificent, white, Georgian-style building possessed tall Palladian windows on the first floor, which led up to gabled windows on the top floor. The well-designed and classic-looking structure had a curving marble staircase that graced an imposing front entrance with double doors of polished mahogany. The interior of the dignified and elegant home was even more impressive than the exterior.

  Yet, Phillip took no notice of any of it as he hurried up the staircase to his bedroom. Being the heir had its benefits, but it also had its burdens. And lately, he seemed to be more burdened by everything in his life than reaping any benefits.

  Nothing seemed to appeal to him anymore. None of his usual interests anyway. Lately, the pressure to be the ideal son, to be the exemplary heir, and to meet all the obligations that were required of him was too crushing and all consuming. He was expected to live up to his parents’ perfect marriage and his cousins’ perfect marriages. He was tired of trying to be perfect. He felt boxed in and hemmed in, as if he were a hothouse plant that had no room to grow.

  He was trapped in a flawless life that was predestined for him, and no one seemed to understand that he had been given no choice in any of it.

  “Ah, there you are, Phillip.”

  Phillip froze with his hand on the doorknob of his bedroom door.

  He had been so close to a clean escape! This was not going to be pretty. He knew exactly what was going to be said to him, and he did not want to hear it.

  With an exasperated sigh, Phillip turned reluctantly to face his father.

  Lucien Sinclair, the Marquis of Stancliff, was a tall man who walked with great confidence and authority as he stepped closer to his son. His dark brows drew together in concern, and something else . . . perhaps disappointment?

  Glancing away, Phillip avoided his father’s disapproving eyes.

  “Phillip.”

  “Father.”

  Lucien stopped a few feet from him. “You’re just getting home, aren’t you?”

  “I just finished having breakfast.” Phillip evaded the question. “I’m going to rest for a bit. I have a crushing headache this morning.”

  His father’s voice hardened. “Yes, I should imagine you would have a nasty headache. One usually accompanies a hangover.”

  There was a weighted pause.

  Phillip remained silent, for there was nothing else to say. He hadn’t the energy to deny the truth. With his fingers itching to turn the doorknob, he stood still. He was mere inches to being in the comfort of his luxurious bed. His entire body ached and throbbed with the need to lie down and hide from the world.

  “I thought I made it perfectly clear last week, and the week before that, how I felt about your behavior of late and of the questionable company you’ve been keeping.” The tone of his father’s voice was ominous.

  “Yes, sir. I recall our conversations.”

  How could Phillip not? He hated disappointing his father and had felt like a miscreant schoolboy those evenings in his study. Was the last time only a week ago? Or longer? He seemed to have lost track of time.

  At some point in the not too distant past, he had promised his father that he would curb his wilder ways. That he would drink less. Gamble less. He had vowed that he’d stop cavorting with Lady Katherine Vickers. He had meant to keep all those promises too. Truly he had. He knew his father disapproved of how Phillip had been conducting himself, and Phillip had meant to change things for the better.

  He knew he was behaving shamelessly lately, yet he didn’t know why he couldn’t seem to stop himself from doing so.

  Phillip had had every intention of coming home at a respectable hour last night. But then one glass of champagne had led to another and another, and he was having such a wonderful time. And he had been winning the game of faro he’d been playing.

  Then there had been Lady Katherine . . .

  She had worn the most daring red velvet gown he’d ever seen. Even for a woman out of mourning for her dead husband, it was quite scandalous. But that was part of Katherine’s allure. The seductive combination of her daring, carefree, and wanton behavior and her lush figure, ample bosom, and silky blond hair seemed to light an unquenchable fire in him, and only she could douse the flames she had set.

  He had tried to end things with her once, but he simply couldn’t. Katherine’s mercurial moods made it too difficult. She was constantly pushing him away and pulling him back. He had believed she didn’t want him any longer, and then, God help him, last night!

  Last night she had clearly made her desire for him known. She’d whispered the wickedest words in his ear while he sat at the gaming table. Last night, he would have followed her into the pits of hell if she had asked him to. Instead, he just followed her into her bedroom . . .

  “Phillip? Did you hear what I just said?”

  Phillip shook himself from his delicious recollections of being in Katherine’s bed and tried to focus his bleary eyes on his father.

  “Yes, sir, I heard you.”

  “I am serious about what I said to you. I shall cut off all your funds if I see you in this condition again. You will not get even another shilling.”

  Surely his father was jesting? He wouldn’t really cut him off financially, just for having a little illicit fun? But one look at his father’s expression told Phillip otherwise.

  “You’re past the age of youthful hijinks, Phillip. We’ve let this behavior go on far too long, and there’s no excuse for it. Your mother and I have been quite concerned about you for the last six months or so. And you’re more than fortunate that your mother didn’t see you in your current state. She’d be heartbroken. We’ve talked about this before. And you promised us you would show some self-control. You should be settling down, taking more than just a passing interest in the estate which will one day belong to you, perhaps even taking a wife.” He sighed heavily, almost wearily. “But you need to do something more productive with your days than sleeping off the liquor from the night before.”

  Staring mutely at his father, Phillip had nothing to say.

  His head was pounding so hard he could barely see straight. Exhausted beyond reason, he closed his eyes for one blessed second. It felt heavenly. Without meaning to, he slouched against the doorframe.

  “I can’t talk to you when you’re like this. Go to bed, Phillip,” his father muttered with undisguised disgust. “This conversation is over. For now.”

  Feeling like the lowest of the low, Phillip pried his eyes open and saw his father taking long strides down the corridor away from him.

  He then forced himself to move, opening the door to his bedroom at last. Without waiting for his valet, he shrugged out of his jacket, kicked off his shoes, and collapsed among the down pillows on his wide, four-poster bed.

  The last thing Phillip recalled before falling into a dreamless sleep was thinking that, yes, he would change. He was quite sorry for how he had been behaving. He would make his parents proud of him again. Soon. He’d change soon enough.

  He would do all that he was supposed to do to be the perfect son . . . when he wasn’t so damned tired.

  3

  You Can’t Judge a Book by Its Cover

  Meredith Rose Remington couldn’t believe her good fortune.

  She had only been in London a few days whe
n she stumbled upon the most charming little bookshop just a few blocks from her aunt’s house in Mayfair. The bells above the door jingled as she walked into Hamilton’s Book Shoppe.

  Immediately, she felt at home in the light and airy store, which was so attractively and invitingly arranged it almost begged for browsers to come inside the shop and look around. Books had always held a special place in Meredith’s heart, and she had practically haunted one crowded and dusty bookshop back in New York.

  But this one . . . this one!

  Hamilton’s Book Shoppe was entirely different. There were comfortable chairs arranged in cozy corners and lovely displays of books artfully placed on polished tables, adorned with fresh flowers in crystal vases. There was even an area with refreshments, filled with baskets of fragrant muffins and scones and pots of hot tea. Elegant signs on the shelves marked each section of books by category.

  As she contentedly wandered about the shop, Meredith breathed in deep, relaxing completely for the first moment since she left New York. It had been a whirlwind of a time, packing up and leaving the only home she had ever known to come to London.

  The saddest part had been being forced to leave behind the beloved writing desk that had belonged to her mother.

  The day before they left, her aunt Delilah found Meredith sobbing over the elegant, cherrywood desk. She did not wish to part with it.

  “It’s all right, my dear. You won’t have to give up your mother’s desk,” Delilah had comforted her. “We shall leave it next door with Mrs. Deane. She’s holding on to a few of my treasured pieces in her attic too. We can send for our things once we’re settled in London and have you safely married. But everything else is being sold with the house as is.”

  Grateful that she wouldn’t have to part with her treasured desk forever, Meredith breathed a little lighter. Vowing to herself that she would send for the desk just as soon as she could, she continued packing the rest of her things with a little less heavy heart.

  Then Aunt Delilah had surprised Meredith by stripping away all of their black mourning clothes.

  “We will not arrive in London in black, looking like a pair of sad old crows,” she announced with a fierceness that took Meredith aback. “Don’t pack a single black dress.”

  “But Aunt Delilah . . . isn’t it disrespectful?” Meredith ventured to ask.

  She was in shock at her aunt’s flouting of such strict societal conventions. Her father hadn’t been gone a month yet. Proper mourning for him required her to wear black for the remainder of the year, at the very least.

  “It is not disrespectful at all. I did the same thing after my first husband died. I came to America without my black mourning clothes. Joseph Remington wouldn’t have given me a second glance back then if I’d been dressed in black, moping about in widow’s weeds. And I won’t wear them this time either. I think your father would agree with me where you’re concerned and your mother, too, for that matter, would agree. You’re far too young and beautiful to be buried alive in such awful black clothing. Since we are starting a new life, where no one knew your father or my husband, we shall not remain in mourning any longer. We are both being fitted for an entire new wardrobe as soon as we get to London. We have just enough money left. It’s all a part of the plan.”

  The plan.

  Delilah’s great plan to save the family was to get them both married to wealthy gentlemen just as soon as she could.

  The plan hung over Meredith like a heavy weight. It was more of a charade than a plan, and Meredith did not agree with it. But before she knew it, they were on a steamship heading for England, without her black mourning dresses or her writing desk.

  Although the sea air buoyed her sagging spirits, her salvation onboard was writing in her leather-bound journal and continuing work on her book, The Edge of Danger. At one point about halfway across the Atlantic, she came to the realization that a change of scenery truly was good for the soul.

  Relishing the journey, she walked the deck every morning and evening, the salty spray of the ocean covering her cheeks. She wrote in her journal each day, worked on her manuscript, read every book she could find onboard, and played games with Harry and Lilly, while Delilah lay miserably in her room, too seasick to do anything but whimper and moan.

  But true to her word, as soon as they were safely ensconced at the London townhouse of Lady Lavinia Eastwood, Delilah had taken them straight to a seamstress to have new gowns made for their grand entrance into London society. The fashionable wardrobe would be lovely, but Meredith would rather have been at home working on her book.

  Instead, she had spent a week going from shop to shop and being introduced to all of Lavinia’s friends, who declared with delight that Meredith would be wed within a month. They were already telling her about the many upcoming social events for the Season, and how Meredith just had to be at each and every one. In fact, her first entrance into English society was to be later that evening at Lord and Lady Braithwaite’s ball, and Meredith’s elegant new ball gown had already been delivered to Lavinia’s house.

  As she sat waiting impatiently in a millinery shop while Delilah was trying on an array of feathered hats, Meredith gazed through the window. That was the moment she first spied the sign for a quaint-looking bookstore. She fairly flew out of the chair with excitement and informed a preoccupied Delilah that she would be across the street.

  And so Meredith ventured forth on her own and found a little slice of heaven in Hamilton’s Book Shoppe.

  It would be wonderful to remain in the shop and browse and read all day, but she took what little time she had, found a cozy chair and a copy of Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles, and settled in. She had heard that the book was a bit scandalous and had meant to read it for some time. It was the perfect thing to take her mind off the plan.

  Delilah’s great plan was worrying her. It involved subterfuge and required Meredith to marry as soon as possible. And, as she had not suddenly discovered a great need within herself to find a husband since she’d sailed across the Atlantic Ocean, the plan filled her with dread.

  “We shall let everyone believe you have inherited a great fortune from your father, so you shall be very sought after. No one in London will have yet learned that the Remington Oil Company is on the brink of bankruptcy, and you shall wed the richest gentleman who offers for you first, Meredith,” Delilah had explained. “It’s the only way to save our family. I shall put myself on the market as well, but Meredith . . . you are the young and beautiful one. You must marry well.”

  “But what do we do when the gentleman discovers that I have no fortune at all?” Meredith asked anxiously. “Surely we can’t keep that a secret forever.”

  Their ruse would most certainly be discovered at some point. How long could she pretend to be an heiress before someone discovered the truth?

  “By then you shall be safely married, and it will be too late for him to do anything about it, and since you shan’t be wedding anyone in dire financial straits, your finances won’t be an issue,” Delilah explained with a matter-of-fact air about her.

  “How do we explain the lie then?” Meredith worried.

  “Once you are wed, we can simply say the lawyers only just told us of our financial situation. We’re simply fudging the timing a little, my dear. And the truth is, a few weeks ago you believed you were an heiress, Meredith. Trust me, this plan will work.”

  Meredith sighed heavily. Her love for her aunt made it impossible to refuse her anything. Delilah had been incredibly kind to Meredith and taken such good care of her all these years, that she had no choice but to go along with her. Delilah Remington was all the family that Meredith had left in the world.

  “It’s not my fault that my husband left me with no money, nor is it your fault that your father left you nothing when we had both been told that we were taken care of,” Delilah went on to say pragmatically. “In this world, women are taken care of by men. To that end, we both need to find husbands.”


  “Can’t we simply be honest and marry that way?”

  “You catch more flies with honey, my dear. And American oil money is the finest honey there is. Men will be buzzing around us. You wait and see.”

  Aunt Delilah’s mind was made up, and Meredith didn’t see another way out.

  The whole idea of being put on the “marriage mart” and being paraded around like a prized cow at an auction was abhorrent to her. But as her aunt indicated quite firmly, not having a home and starving on the street was even more abhorrent. Delilah Remington had a valid point there.

  Meredith certainly didn’t want to be homeless, nor did she want to spend her days living on the charity of Aunt Delilah’s sister either. Lady Eastwood, a slightly older and plumper version of Delilah, had been kind and welcoming to a fault, but Meredith did not belong there in her house. In fact, she didn’t seem to belong anywhere anymore.

  As much as she didn’t wish to have a husband, having a home of her own had an undeniable appeal. Perhaps when she was married and settled, Meredith wouldn’t feel so lost and alone anymore. Perhaps a husband was just what she needed.

  Yet she still did not wish to marry.

  What she truly wished to do was to be a writer and make a life for herself through her books. It was an impossible little dream though and not practical in the least. Still, it was all she longed to do. And Meredith just knew that if she could finish her book and get it published, she would be able to support herself from the income the sales generated. If not at first, then eventually.

  She didn’t need much money or to live in a fancy home. A little place with room for her writing desk would suit her just fine. Surely, she could afford that! Unfortunately, she didn’t have the luxury of time to see her dream through. Her book wasn’t finished yet, and she had no way to support herself in the meantime.

  With a resigned sigh at her lot in life, Meredith glanced around the lovely little bookshop, watching customers come and go, browsing, and making their purchases. For a moment, she imagined her own book for sale on the shelves there. She could picture it so clearly! The Edge of Danger by M. R. Remington would be elegantly bound in red leather and embossed with gold lettering.