"Oh, Riggins," I whispered with tears in my eyes. "What does this mean?"
My heart was breaking, yet filled with hope. These had to be worth millions. Even the bra straps were covered with diamonds. Damn Rose. I wouldn't let her win.
I would wear these beautiful things for Riggins and win his heart. I carried the jeweled lingerie to the bed, where I should have been wearing them and making love with Riggins. I set them gently on the bed next to me. I was overwhelmed with emotion and new discoveries.
To my relief, the letter from Clara Wares White, the woman who was supposedly my great-grandmother, to Rans, the Duke of Witham, was still on the bed. I hadn't thought Riggins had time to grab it. But I had a moment of panic that he had. That he'd been angry enough to grab and destroy it. Believe it or not, it was as precious to me as the glittering underwear in the box next to me.
I grabbed my cell phone and snapped a picture of the letter and emailed it to myself. Just in case I ever needed proof. Then I saved a copy to my online cloud storage. That's how determined I was not to lose it.
I took a deep breath, gently smoothed the letter out, and read it again. Slowly this time. Trying to understand. Letting myself be transported back in time to another era. To a time when an unwed mother was shamed and the baby punished for the sins of its parents.
Dearest Brother-in-law, dear Rans,
It appears you're going to outlive us all after all. It must be your steady English blood and stiff upper lip that keeps you going. God knows you've endured enough heartache to kill several men of less hearty constitution.
I'm dying, Rans. Quickly, I hope. I have an aggressive form of cancer that we caught late. I will be dead by the time you read this letter, per my wishes. My lawyer has instructions to mail it only after I'm gone. Very dramatic, isn't it? Like something out of a novel.
But I rather enjoy being dramatic at my age. There isn't much more to live for or much fun to be derived from anything except what's in my mind. Anyway, there is a point to this letter. A reason I'm writing you on my deathbed. I made a promise to my sister, your beloved Helen, many years ago. The time has come to make good on it. I thank God my mind is still clear and sound enough to remember the promises I made in my youth.
Maybe this will give you some comfort. In any case, I hope you won't blame Helen. That this won't sully your memory of her or diminish your epic love. I can't think of any way to tell you this but straight out and then explain.
My daughter Gloria is adopted. She's your daughter. Yours and Helen's. Congratulations, you have a girl, old bean!
And now you have a new baby great-granddaughter, too. Just born. Has the Wares good looks, fortunately.
What you do with this information is up to you, of course. I'll be gone and unable to interfere with whatever you choose to do. I would ask that you respect them. My granddaughter is happily married, happily middle class, happily American. Please don't upset her life.
Now that I've dumped this on you in my final hours, I owe you the particulars. You always were one for details.
You broke Helen's heart all those years ago when she went to England the first time. It's still hard for me to believe Papa sent her to England to catch a member of the aristocracy. He was hoping for as much as an earl, I'm sure. That she landed a duke, or so it seemed, was beyond his wildest expectations.
My sister was always a romantic, a follower of her heart, a lover of passion, a giver. Easily seduced, as you well know. Easily hurt. But headstrong and just plain strong, period. You made love to her. Made her fall in love with you. When she realized you wanted her only for her money, not herself, she came home broken. You never saw that part. The hurt little girl, her rosy view of the world and romantic love shattered.
She hadn't been home long when she became listless. She looked pale. Wouldn't eat. Lost weight. Slept all the time. Papa and Mama thought she was depressed and spent their hours trying to cheer her up. Only I saw through it. Maybe trying so desperately to get pregnant all those years made me keen to recognize the symptoms of pregnancy when everyone else was blind.
Helen knew, though. And was terrified. What was she going to do? She'd disgraced the family. Papa would be devastated. Ruined. His health had already begun to fail. I, on the other hand, had come to terms with being barren. Now I saw my opportunity. I wanted the baby. I made my case to Helen. We both agreed it was for the best, the perfect solution for everyone.
We cooked up a plan and sent Helen away to New York and the East to "cheer her up" and mend her broken heart. She was gone a long time. Over nine months. In the meantime, I made plans to adopt a baby from a "friend" who was in trouble.
It all worked out. We were exceedingly careful and clever. But I'm still amazed we were never caught or found out. You were the one fly in the ointment. All those damned letters of yours that began arriving with a fury. There were times, many of them, when I thought Helen would relent and open one.
Would you hate me very much if I told you I encouraged her not to? You must understand. I wanted that baby with my heart and soul. With every ounce of my being. What right did you have to her?
But no force on earth could make Helen do something she didn't want to. And she was too hurt to want to hear from you. She had the baby, my beloved Gloria. Who was truly my daughter. I have loved her as my own and cherished her all my life. She has been my greatest gift. Her and her daughter and now her granddaughter. I hope that's some comfort. Though maybe my confession will only make you jealous and angrier.
Bygones, Rans. It was a bygone era. It's now a bygone life. For me, anyway. You'll probably live to be a hundred. What would you have done with a daughter? She wouldn't have been the precious male heir you so badly needed. But I have loved her.
Anyway, back to Helen. We got lucky. She popped back into shape and good spirits, seemingly none the worse for the wear, as they say. No stretch marks. No scars. After she gave Gloria to me, the baby was my daughter. She was her auntie. Helen never looked back. And neither should you.
Mama and Papa were thrilled to have their sunny daughter back. And then you showed up to reclaim Helen. You with your Clark Gable good looks and your English charm and title—how could she resist you? Especially when you were finally determined to have her. You have always been a force to be reckoned with. Damn your charm, Rans. You took my sister away.
I don't think you ever knew what it cost her to choose you. Although she was content to play auntie, I know she would have loved to watch Gloria grow up. To play an active part in her life. If only you hadn't come back, she could have married one of her many local suitors, stayed in Seattle, and watched her girl become a woman. Instead, you swept her away with you and she was doomed to watch from afar.
I don't believe Helen ever stopped loving you. Not during that long absence and first pregnancy, nor any time after. Does that satisfy your vanity? Give you faith in true love? She finally came to believe you really loved her. I have to give you credit for that.
I don't know whether it pained Helen to keep your child a secret from you. I don't know whether she ever cried for Gloria. I'm not sure you would have found anything suspicious about her great fondness for her niece.
There were worries, of course. I thanked God every day that Gloria looked nothing like you, while dreading that some resemblance would eventually show. But she looked too much like Helen and me. I shrugged off the resemblance as a happy coincidence and hinted that my "friend" was a distant cousin.
If Mama and Papa ever suspected the truth, they never mentioned it to me.
And so there you have it, Rans. The truth, finally. You do have an heir, an American heir. Not that it does you any good, all of your children and grandchildren being female. And Gloria being illegitimate. But if it's any comfort, your line lives on.
I do have one favor to ask. I've lived a long and full life and enjoyed myself immensely. What I haven't done is accumulate wealth. Whatever I got from Mama and Papa is long gone. I have nothing to leave the next g
eneration.
I'm asking you to leave something to your grandchildren when you go. For Helen's sake. It's what she would have wanted. It doesn't have to be much. Some valuable bauble of Helen's, perhaps? Or enough cash to give them a sound start in life. You've always been smart. Even if you decide not to reveal your true identity to them, I'm sure you can find a way to leave them something without arousing suspicion.
A letter is old-fashioned. I suppose I could have called. But letters are our way, aren't they? A thing from the past. And they can be destroyed, burned in the fire, and no one will be the wiser.
Do what you will, Rans. Take this secret to your grave or go meet the newest member of your family line. In case you have any curiosity about her, I've enclosed a picture of your great-granddaughter, Haley. She's a little beauty if I do say so myself. Looks a lot like Helen did as a baby.
It's been a grand life, hasn't it?
Good luck, Rans, whatever you decide.
All my love,
Your devoted sister-in-law,
Clara
I took my time rereading the letter. By the time I finished, I had tears in my eyes. And a lump in my throat from seeing my name mentioned. I reread several key passages over and over.
There was no picture of me remaining in the envelope. I wondered what he'd done with it. Where could he have put it? Finding it in this monstrosity of a house would be next to impossible. Or had he tossed it? Torn it up?
I carefully folded the letter and put it back in the Bible with trembling hands.
My great-grandmothers, both of them, had loved me extraordinarily. Helen, enough to give my grandmother up so generations of us could have good lives and her family's good name could remain intact. Clara enough to love me as her own great-grandchild.
And Rans? What had he thought when he'd read the letter? Why hadn't he jumped on the first jet to America to see me? Why hadn't he introduced himself as who he really was? Why had he kept the secret all these years? Had it given him comfort to know we existed? Or caused him pain? How could he stand missing out on our lives? And yet he had called me here now.
Maybe I should have been furious with him. Maybe I was too forgiving. But I'd come to love the old Dead Duke, flaws, eccentricities, and all. Maybe it was in our blood to understand each other. Or maybe he'd simply done a superior job of laying out his case for me.
I understood. He was granting Clara's last request on a grand scale.
I shook my head. I still couldn't think of him as my great-grandfather. That was surreal. He was much too larger than life to be a mere great-grandpa to me. I was torn between regret that I never got to meet him and intimidation at the thought.
Whatever he was, he was making things up to us. And making sure his bloodline, the rightful line, continued in the ducal line. It was ingenious and cunning. Almost diabolically clever.
I realized with a start just how many years he'd been planning this. Had he been watching over us like a benign grandfather all along?
Thoughts rattled and bounced around my mind, seemingly random, and yet a pattern emerged. I remembered, vaguely, my parents needing money. I was young. The details were foggy from first memory. I just remembered the hushed conversations and worried looks on my parents' faces. Would they lose the baby?
Sid!
It was when they were trying to adopt Sid. They got the money from somewhere. Where? Where?
I squinted, deep in thought.
An unexpected windfall. Some distant relative had died and left them just what they needed!
"Damn."
My heart raced. My hands shook. I held the Bible tightly and shook my head, trying to remember. I was only four when we got Sid. All the memories from then were fuzzy first memories of life.
I took a deep breath. The Dead Duke. It had to have been. If he gave Mom and Dad the money, then he knew what was going on. Was there more to it than that? Had he gone as far as setting up the adoption?
I was both giddy and sick at the thought.
Was that why he knew how to find the cure for Sid? Because he'd arranged the adoption in the first place? And if he had, why had he picked a Chinese orphanage? A half-Chinese, half-Caucasian girl?
Oh my God. What if Sid was half British? What was the connection to Witham House and the Dead Duke? There had to be a connection.
I took a deep breath and reminded myself to breathe slow and steadily. I was onto something. I was getting closer to the thing Rans wanted me to find. To Sid's cure.
Just how far into my life did the Dead Duke's tendrils entwine? If he'd set up Sid's adoption, like I suspected, had he also planned this marriage from the beginning? Had he figuratively stood over my cradle like a fairy godfather, or a feudal king, and decided to arrange for me to marry his heir?
Had he watched me grow? Kept tabs to see if I was worthy to inherit? Looked for ways to bring Riggins and me together from the start?
I probably should have felt like a puppet in the Dead Duke's game of life. Instead I was filled with a sense of awe and destiny. I'd been deemed worthy to carry on the Feldhem line. I'd been given great wealth and responsibility.
I wouldn't let my great-grandfather down. The Dead Duke could count on me to take care of our dukedom. Not even Riggins could stop me.
I smiled to myself and realized I was grinning at the Bible. I had to keep this letter safe. I slid to my feet. And what better way to protect it than hiding it in plain sight? In the library. Out of order, of course. Sorry, Dead Duke!
I put my slippers on. And then, on a whim, I texted the photo of the letter to Riggins. He deserved to know who and what he was up against. He thought the Dead Duke was determined to get his way! He hadn't seen anything yet.
Chapter 3
Riggins
I gave the woman two million dollars' worth of lingerie and she sent me a damn thank you text. And a picture of an old letter. To be technically correct, I'd left the valuable lingerie behind. So was it a gift? Or a statement about how much she'd lost by her deceit and betrayal?
I was still shaking with anger and hurt as I lay in bed and stared up at the canopy above me. Everything in this damn castle was ornate and antiquated. I longed for the sleek, modern lines of my home in Seattle. I didn't want to live in another century. I liked the twenty-first century just fine.
I wanted my old life back. The one where I expected people to let me down and women to sleep with me for my money. It was the betrayal that hurt the worst. Haley had seemed so honest.
Oh, shit, of course I knew who was behind the leak to the media. Rose. Who else? Haley would have told me about the baby, probably sooner rather than later. I didn't know Rose's exact motives, but revenge was a probable cause. She didn't understand that I wouldn't want her, even if given the opportunity. I could have chosen her, had I been inclined. Or so I'd thought at the time.
As nasty as it was, I couldn't get the niggling concern out of my mind that Haley had gotten pregnant on purpose. Yeah, I knew I was complicit. But…I shouldn't have had to wear a condom every damn time when she'd assured me she was on the pill. Was that all a ruse?
I read her text again.
Don't say it. Don't ever say that you don't want this baby. You'll regret it forever.
I swallowed hard, gulping back my guilt and thinking about my old man. Did I have any sympathy for him now? What if he hadn't wanted to be a father either? Was that an excuse worthy of not manning up to the task?
Was Haley right? Would I regret it? Anger was a nasty, blinding beast, and I was furious right now. There was more to her text.
You can say whatever else you want to me or about me. Yell and scream. Call me names. Even threaten to throw me out. But don't reject your child. Don't pass that legacy on.
And whatever else you're thinking or imagining, I didn't plan this pregnancy. I didn't trap you into anything. I'm as surprised as you are.
Surprised, was she? I was in shock.
But I'm already in love with this baby. Partly because it's
yours. Yeah, you big douche. Get over yourself and I think you'll come to your senses.
I know. It's the shock. I've had longer to get used to the idea. Give it some time to sink in and you'll realize this is the best thing that ever happened to you, too. This isn't how I wanted you to find out, but it is what it is.
And as for you and me, read the letter. We're fated to be together.
Thanks for the bra and panties. Won't they be a scandalous addition to the duchess' jewels?
I smiled despite myself at her attempt at humor, picturing future duchesses parading around in their tiaras and diamond underwear. Very dignified. The other dukes may have had their extravagances, but diamond and jeweled lingerie? That was a new excess.
My amusement was short-lived. I scowled. Damn her. My heart pounded. I swallowed hard. I wanted her worse than anything. So desperately I was feverish for her. I wanted her to be guileless and telling the truth. I needed her to be the Haley I'd fallen in love with. Which raised the question—assuming Haley was telling the truth, how did our birth control fail?
I read Clara's letter for the third time.
Rans, you dead bastard, we've both been taken in by women. Two women who look eerily alike.
Haley
I called Sid, still trembling. I had to tell her about the baby before the news reached her. I'd always imagined telling her in some fun way. Curses on Rose for ruining things.
I glanced at the clock. It was the middle of the afternoon in Seattle. Sid would be out of class and hopefully someplace she could talk.
When she picked up on the second ring, I nearly collapsed with relief.
"So. Are you wearing that diamond-crusted bra Riggins is rumored to have bought before he jumped on a plane and raced to you?" she said.