Untamed (34 page)

But in the main her focus was Rourke. She’d spent the past few days struggling over what to give him as a gift. What
did
one give the man who apparently had everything? What she really wanted was to give him her heart, the whole of it, but she didn’t yet dare. She could be brave about many things, but she’d yet to shore up sufficient courage for that.

In light of her dilemma, his early gifting was a fortunate thing. She could take her cue from him and gauge her own gift accordingly. “What is it?”

He rolled his eyes. “If I tell you, it wouldna be a surprise, now would it?”

“Not even a hint?”

He shook his head. “My lips are sealed. You’ll just have to come outside and see for yourself.”

Kate wiped her floury hands on her apron front and stepped back from the block. A few weeks ago it never would have occurred to her to allow something as frivolous as a gift get in the way of completing a task. Spending time with her husband was having a positive effect on her in more ways than one. Rourke wasn’t a shirker by any means; his industry was evident from long hours he spent in his study at night bent over his ledgers and business reports, but he also knew how to be spontaneous, how to play.

She lifted her coat off the wall peg. He helped her on with it, and together they stepped out into the walled kitchen garden. “Where are you taking me?”

He grinned and squeezed her hand. “You’ll see soon enough.”

They started walking in the direction of the stables. There was a thin crust of snow on the ground, and the air was what she’d come to think of as crisp rather than cold. Scottish winters took some getting used to, but Kate fancied her blood was beginning to thicken.

They drew up to the paddock. She glanced over at her husband. Apparently they had reached their destination. On the other side of the fence, Mr. Campbell led a small pony inside the gate. Even from afar, Kate could see the animal wasn’t young. The swayed back and gambling gait were telltale signs of age, but the patchy coat and ribs protruding from her sides bespoke of neglect, even abuse.

One booted foot resting on the rail, Rourke turned to her. “What do you think?”

She cast a sideways look at her husband. He was beaming. Who was it that said never to look a gift horse in the mouth? She glanced back to the horse. Mr. Campbell was walking her over to them. As the animal neared, understanding dawned. The white blaze; the big, intelligent eyes; and the nut-colored mane she’d once braided with multicolored ribbons fit for a …

“Princess!” Tears filled her eyes, spilled over her bottom lashes, and ran down her cheeks. “Oh, Princess, sweetheart, can it really be you?” She climbed up onto the top fence rung and reached out to the horse.

Princess sniffed, nostrils working. She nickered and shoved her nose into Kate’s neck and hair, “grooming” her as if only a day had gone by rather than almost seventeen years.

Beside her, Rourke explained, “I telegraphed your father and asked after the neighbor who’d … acquired her. It turned out it was a local squire with lands just outside of Romney. From there, it was a matter of tracking the bill of sales to several owners. I put Sylvester on it. She’d ended up in Edinburgh as a costermonger’s cart horse.”

She looked up from the horse and over to her smiling husband. “I can’t believe it! All these years I’ve dreamed … How can I ever thank you? You can’t know what it means to me to have her back. She’s a greater gift than diamonds or pearls.”

More tears skittered down her cheeks, crystallizing in the cold. He reached inside his coat pocket and produced his handkerchief. Handing it to her, he said, “I’d shower you with those, too, if only you’d let me, but for now I’ll leave you two to your reunion.”

He turned on his heel and strode away. Watching him go, Kate had the silly thought he was nearly as moved as she. She turned back to the horse and confided, “Well, my fine girl, just as you were a princess disguised as a coster’s hack, that big, rough-mannered Scot who just left us is my true Prince Charming.”

Two happy hours later, Kate emerged from the stable, cold, covered in muck, and happier than she could ever recall being. Determined to make up for the years of neglect and abuse, she’d set out on a protocol of pampering, including brushing the dust and scurf from the horse’s coat, mane, and tail, and taking a hoof pick to clean out her encrusted hooves. Princess wasn’t only old, but she was in very poor condition. Years of abuse had taken their toll. The state of her teeth shocked Kate. It was in examining them that she came across the scarring on the animal’s sensitive gums. Obviously someone in her long line of owners had used a cruel snaffle bit to excess. She also found white scars on flanks—crop marks. That her precious Princess had been used so cruelly brought fresh tears to her eyes, not happy ones this time. For the future, though, there would be no more snaffle bits or whippings or even the weight of a saddle to be borne upon that poor swayed back. Princess’s retirement days would be filled with lumps of sugar and brushings, with pets over the paddock fence and sweet nothings whispered into her dear ears.

She was on her way to seek out her husband and thank him again when she crossed paths with her house-guest. Felicity came from the direction of the orchard. In the dead of winter, the orchard wasn’t much to see, but then Kate was given to understand from Bea that her new friend had grown up in Scotland. The tall redhead still wore her carriage costume with the jaunty purple-feathered hat. The color made for quite a contrast with her flame-red curls.

Kate didn’t really care to stop, but the woman was her guest. She couldn’t be rude. “Did you have a pleasant walk, Miss Drummond?”

The taller woman raked her slanted green eyes over Kate from head to toe, making her mindful of the less-than-pristine state of her clothes. “Aye, and please, call me Felicity. Under the circumstances, I feel like we’re old friends.”

Kate found the remark odd, as they’d never met before that morning. “You must mean because Bea and I are sisters, of course?”

Felicity quirked her mouth as though she were struggling not to laugh. She shook her head, setting the dyed purple plume bobbing. “Actually I was thinking more so because of Rourke.”

The foreboding Kate had felt ever since the hansom cab drew up increased tenfold. “You know my husband?”

There it was again, that sly, slanted look. “Oh, aye, we go back several years. We’re old friends, Patrick and I. Ah, well, it was lovely chatting with you, but I must be getting back. I promised Bea I’d help her with her hair before the tea.”

She swept past Kate on the path.

Kate stood staring after her, the surety of her conclusion rooting her in place. Felicity and Rourke had been lovers. For a horrible, heart-stopping moment, it occurred to Kate to wonder if Felicity’s arrival with her sister might not be happenstance. Surely Bea must be in the dark, but what about Rourke? These past weeks, had he only been dallying with her, biding his time for his mistress to arrive? Perhaps
dallying
was too strong a word. Among the ton, it wasn’t unusual for a gentleman to have a wife and mistress both. Was it possible Rourke saw taking a mistress into keeping as just another trapping of success, not appreciably different from keeping a coach-and-four or acquiring a castle?

Were he and Felicity lovers still?

There was only one person whom she could ask: her husband.

Kate found Rourke in the library. When he gave the call to enter in response to her knock, his voice sounded tight, annoyed if not precisely angry. She entered, determined to broach the subject of Felicity Drummond, though she wasn’t quite certain how best to begin. Delicately, she supposed. Delicate or not, she had to know.

Her husband sat behind his desk, drumming his pen on the blotter. He seemed put out, angry. Gone was the warm-eyed man who’d left her at the paddock fence a few hours before.

He stared at her a long moment and then blurted out, “Why didn’t you tell me our housekeeper is pregnant?”

He could have knocked Kate over with a feather. Not certain whether to be relieved or annoyed herself, she said, “I was going to tell you … eventually.”

“Eventually,
hmm?”

She swallowed hard. She could already see this wasn’t going well. “I wasn’t sure how you’d react.”

“And you naturally assumed that, great ogre that I am, I’d turn her and the babe out to starve?”

Rather than answer that, she posed a question of her own. “How did you find out?” Servants’ halls, country kitchens, both were notorious mills for gossip. If lesser servants were telling tales, Kate wanted to know.

“She told me herself a while ago.”

“Hattie came to you!” Kate was stunned.

“Aye,
she
at least felt I’d the right to know.”

The implication wasn’t lost on Kate. Apparently she wasn’t as good at this marriage business as she’d thought to have become.

She sighed. “Will you let her, them, stay?”

He nodded. “Hattie and her babe are welcome for as long as she wishes to remain. But I’m your husband, for Christ’s sake, the very first person you should turn to in trouble, not the last. Why didn’t you come to me? Why didn’t you trust me with the truth? Is it so very hard to believe I might be a reasonable human being? Do you think me a tyrant?”

Kate bit her lip against pointing out that their marriage had, indeed, begun with him presenting himself in a tyrannical way. She liked to think in the past week they’d moved beyond the play to establish a true marriage.

“It’s not that. It’s only that I’m used to managing matters on my own. The less my father knew of the workings of our household, the better it was for all concerned.”

Staring at his wife, Rourke was torn between fury toward her scapegrace father and an odd tenderness toward the brave little soul he’d married. Poor lass, she’d fended for herself and her sister so long she was afraid to let anyone else in, to let anyone else lead, let alone help her to shoulder the burdens that life brought her way.

“Christ, Kate, we’re wed, in case you’ve forgotten. What do you think a husband is for if not to protect and cherish you and be there in your time of need, as well as to help celebrate the good times, too?”

When she didn’t answer, he rose and rounded the desk. He found her shoulders with his hands and drew her against him. Even now, he was amazed that such a tiny body could house such a wealth of will, such a treasure of soul.

“Whatever else you may think of me, whatever my many faults are, they dinna include gaming or drinking to excess or purposeful cruelty. You can trust me to be there for you in your hour of need, be that hour in the light of day or the dead of night. I want to be the one you come to with your joys, your fears, and your troubles, too. I mean to be there for you always and forever. You can trust me, sweet Kate, not only with your confidences, but also with your heart.”

What do you think a husband is for?

Kate stepped out into the corridor, closing the door behind her. Patrick hadn’t seemed angry with her, so much as frustrated and hurt. Likely that was why she found herself giving serious consideration to the question. Other than the financial aspect of their arrangement, she hadn’t given their respective roles all that much thought. She already knew how to supervise a household. Beyond knowing how, she was good at it. As for a husband’s job, she’d never given it a great deal of thought. All her father had ever seemed to do was drink, hunt, and wager away their worldly goods. From what she could tell, he’d never been a helpmate to her mother, let alone a soul mate. To Kate he’d been a neglectful tyrant and now a burden.