Home for the Holidays (15 page)

“Blast it,” he exploded. “I
can’t
marry you.”

She frowned. “Why not?”

“Because of your father.”

Confusion filled her, and with it, alarm. “What about him?”

“There are things you don’t know.”

“Then tell me!”

“You revere him, Larissa,” he replied. “It’s better if you don’t know.”

She paled, drawing her own conclusions yet again. “He
is
dead, isn’t he? And you’ve known all along. You’ve received proof—”

“No!”
He pounced this time, before she could step back
again, but only to grab her shoulders. He shook her once. “No, it’s nothing like that. Ah, bloody hell, it’s not worth it anymore.
You’re
more important. But your father is only detained. There’s no reason to assume the worst. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if he showed up today at my door—”

The knock at the front door was too loud to miss hearing, and too prophetic not to strongly affect Larissa. She went utterly still. She held her breath in hopeful anticipation. But it was too much anticipation to wait. She broke out of Vincent’s hold, heard him sigh, but ignored it. She ran to the open doorway of the parlor, stared as his butler rushed to deal with the loud visitor.

“I didn’t mean he would literally show up this minute, Larissa,” Vincent said behind her in a voice that was already starting to reveal sympathy.

She ignored him again, wouldn’t listen to denials anymore. This was her
last
hope. Dear God, let it be her father. She’d never ask for another thing, never …

It wasn’t her father. It was a big, burly man standing there, asking if this was where the Baron of Windsmoor lived. She didn’t hear any more after that. A ringing began in her ears. Her vision blurred. She grasped the fact that she was fainting and almost laughed, because she was made of sterner stuff than that. Wasn’t she? She had probably just held her breath too long …

Vincent caught her before her legs completely buckled.
She heard him calling her name, trying to keep her there when her mind was insisting on the oblivion of nothingness. He sounded like her father. Stupid mind playing tricks on her now. He demanded she open her eyes. No, she didn’t want to. No more disappointments. She’d had too many.

“Rissa, please, just look at me.”

Vincent had never called her Rissa. She opened her eyes, then forgot to breathe again.

“Papa?” she whispered. “Is that really you?”

For an answer, she was pulled into an old, familiar embrace, one of warmth, comfort and love, and everything-will-be-fine-now, an embrace she had grown up depending on. It was he. Oh, God, it was he, alive, and home, and alive, alive …

Great, racking sobs of emotion overcame her. She couldn’t help it. Her prayers had been answered. The season of miracles had given her one.

“W
HY ARE MY CHILDREN HERE?”

It was the first thing George Ascot said to Vincent once they were alone. He was a big, heavyset man in his middle years. His light brown hair had a bit of gray at the temples; the trimmed beard had much more. His eyes were disconcertingly the exact shade of blue-green as Larissa’s, with that same warmth indicative of a compassionate nature, falsely so in his case, of course.

Vincent had stood there silently and watched the tearful reunion, witnessed the love and tenderness pouring out of the father for the daughter, which had somewhat surprised
him. But what had he expected? Just because the man dealt viciously with his competitors didn’t mean he couldn’t love his family. Even a devil could love his children if he had any and be no less evil, he supposed.

Larissa shouldn’t have left them alone. She had finished her crying, and finally her laughing, and had run upstairs to fetch her brother to give him the good news. She hadn’t even asked yet what had detained her father. That wasn’t very important to her apparently, now that he was safe and sound—and home.

Vincent could have offered the man excuses. He could have made amends as well. If she hadn’t left them alone, he might have, for he’d already decided that his revenge wasn’t worth losing her. An amazing discovery which she had only just forced him to realize. But as he stood there alone in the hall with the man responsible for his brother’s death, the feelings returned that started it all. And unfortunately, those feelings governed his response.

“You left them without guidance or wherewithal; they had nowhere else to go,” Vincent said.

George would have had to be deaf to miss the disgust in Vincent’s tone, and although he didn’t understand it yet, he still took offense, replying stiffly, “Rissa had ample household funds.”

“When there were panicked creditors hounding her to settle accounts?”

“Panicked? What could possibly—?”

“Rumors that your underhanded business practices led you to financial ruin perhaps?”

“Preposterous!”

Vincent shrugged, unimpressed with the man’s florid-faced indignation. “You weren’t here to prove otherwise, were you? In fact, your prolonged absence only confirmed and strengthened the suspicions that you weren’t planning on returning to England at all.”

“My family was still here! No one in their right mind would conclude that I would abandon them!”

“Someone without ethics wouldn’t worry about throwing his family to the wolves. It happens all the time. Besides, how were your creditors to know that your family wasn’t already making plans to abandon England as well?”

George became infused with even more indignant color. “You sound as if you believe those ridiculous rumors.”

“Perhaps because I do.”

“Why? You don’t even know me.”

“Don’t I? Did you not learn my name before you sent your driver pounding on my door?”

George frowned at that point, explaining, “I come home to find my house empty of my family and all furnishings. My nearest neighbors inform me that I can find
my family, at least, at Baron Windsmoor’s residence and give me the address Rissa left with them. No, actually, I got no more than your title before I hied it here in all haste. Is your name relevant? Just who are you, sir?”

“Vincent Everett.”

“Good God, you aren’t related to that blackguard Albert Everett, are you?”

Vincent stiffened now. “My brother, now referred to as deceased.”

“He’s dead?” George asked in surprise. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

“Don’t be a hypocrite, Ascot,” Vincent said in disgust. “Sorrow from the man who drove him to his death just doesn’t smack of sincerity.”

“Drove him—!” George gasped. “What madness are you spouting now?”

“So now you would claim ignorance? Very well, let me refresh your memory, then. Albert used what little was left of his inheritance to start a business that would support him. Unfortunately, he picked your line of business, and you went out of your way to make sure that he knew the added competition wasn’t welcome.”

“That isn’t—”

“Let me finish,” Vincent interrupted. “You undermined his efforts at every turn, had your captains escalate the bids on the cargoes he was after, so he couldn’t hope to
make a profit on them. You made sure his business would fail, and so it did. You crushed my brother thoroughly, so much so that he killed himself rather than admit to me that he had lost everything. You didn’t really think his family would let you get away with that, did you, Ascot?”

The indignation was gone. The older man was red-faced with fury now, though his voice managed to remain calm as he replied, “You have that a bit backwards, sir. If your brother’s business failed, it was because he was buying cargoes—
my
cargoes, already contracted to me—at ridiculously high prices, so he was unable to sell them at even close to a return on the investment. I had assumed he had an unlimited supply of funds to do this, which is why I gave up trying to regain the markets he was stealing from me, and sailed west to find new markets. I hadn’t heard that he failed, or I wouldn’t have left.”

“So you’re saying that Albert tried to drive you to ruin, and ruined himself in the process?”

“Exactly.”

“That’s rather convenient, you’ll agree, an easy claim to make against a man who can’t step forward to deny it, because he’s dead.”

“The truth is not always easy to swallow, sir, though it can usually be verified. You have only to question my captains, or perhaps the merchants involved, who ignored valid contracts with me to reap quick profits from your brother.
These cargoes weren’t on the open market to be bid upon as you mentioned, they had set prices already agreed upon. Or perhaps question your brother’s own captains, who can tell you that their orders were to obtain cargoes at any costs. Now, whether his captains acted on their own or under his direction, the results were the same. They followed my ships specifically, showing up in all the same ports.”

“So now you would put the blame on his captains?” Vincent said.

George sighed. “Actually, I put the blame where it belongs, on your brother. I spoke to him before I left England, to try to find out why he was throwing away good money on underhanded tactics, rather than put a little effort into finding new markets for himself where he could have made easy profits. In all fairness, he struck me as a man who simply didn’t know what he was doing, but was too proud to admit it. Ironically his tactics would have worked if he had enough money to see it through. Obviously he didn’t have enough, and instead, he ruined himself and nearly ruined me in the process.”

Vincent shook his head. “Do you really think I would believe you over my brother? I know his faults, and he has never denied them, nor his mistakes. So why would he lie in this instance? He claimed that you, and you specifically, caused him to fail.”

“I can’t imagine why he singled me out for blame, and
I suppose I will never know, since he’s deceased. But I’m obviously wasting my breath professing my innocence to you, when you refuse to see beyond the few facts you have been told. So be it. But if you believe all that, why would you help my family?”

“What makes you think I’ve helped them?”

George stiffened. It was the tone that alarmed him. “What have you done?”

Vincent didn’t answer. The moment was at hand, the moment he had worked for, when all he had to say was, “Paid you back in kind,” and he couldn’t say it. He couldn’t go on with this. Not because he believed Ascot; he didn’t. But he was himself as much to blame for Albert’s death as Ascot was. He hadn’t pulled the cords that led to Albert’s decision, as Ascot had, but he had done nothing to influence that decision either.

He hadn’t recognized it before, had merely seen this revenge thing as doing his duty, more or less. But there was guilt involved, his own, for failing to pay more attention to his brother, for failing to develop a relationship with him in which Albert wouldn’t have hesitated to bring even this worst failure of his to Vincent’s attention, rather than give up all hope and kill himself instead.

Their parents had spoiled and coddled Albert so much that he was unable to stand on his own after their deaths. He had needed constant bolstering. Having that cut off
abruptly by their deaths had hurt him. Vincent could have helped, could have weaned him slowly from his dependence, or at least tried to instill some confidence. Instead he had viewed Albert’s weaknesses with disgust, while doing nothing to help his brother overcome them.

“I repeat, what have you done?”

“Nothing that can’t be rec—”

“Having somehow managed to buy our home, he then kicked us out of it so we would have no place else to go,” Larissa said at the top of the stairs in a dull voice. “Then brought us here so he could seduce me—with no intention of marrying me—which he did quite easily. He took full advantage of my vulnerability in thinking you were dead, Father. He used my grief to aid him, because I needed a distraction from it, and he was that; indeed, he was quite the distraction.”

She was staring down at Vincent without expression, as if all emotion had been sucked out of her—or she had no room left for any more. Her brother was standing next to her, staring daggers at Vincent as he slipped his hand into hers to offer comfort. The boy sensed she was in pain even if she wasn’t showing it.

Had they heard everything? Yes, they must have for her to have drawn such an accurate conclusion. But unlike him, they, of course, believed their father without question, that he had done no wrong. And Albert wasn’t there
to prove otherwise, never would be. Not that it mattered; they would still believe their father, despite the fact that it was Albert who had been ruined, not Ascot.

And if Ascot was telling the truth? No, it wasn’t possible, and besides, if Albert had been in the wrong, then Vincent had also been in the wrong to seek revenge on his behalf. That thought didn’t sit well with him at all—indeed, positively sickened him—yet it was no worse than what he was feeling now, looking up at Larissa. Such utter dread. He felt as if he had just lost the most valuable thing in his life, and so he had, her respect, her sympathy—her love.

He
should
continue with his revenge for his brother’s sake, but he couldn’t, because of her. Yet he was going to suffer the consequences either way. Even if he set everything to rights, it would not make a difference with her. He’d sought retribution against a man she saw as innocent, and used her to do it. She’d never forgive him for that. Not even if he managed to convince her that her father was the real culprit. Not that he could, when he only had Albert’s letter as proof, and she could claim that was fake.