Alice felt sad to leave France. It had been a wonderful interlude, a time in which she wasn’t required to think about anything back home. But she knew it couldn’t last. Her work required her back in London. But she feared what a return to their normal lives would bring to the growing closeness between her and Nick when each returned to their work.
She was afraid to depend on Nick’s attentiveness and thoughtfulness. What would he be like when he was pulled by the demands of his business? Would he even have time for her, much less a little boy, who’d grown dangerously fond of him?
As soon as she returned to her office, she put the final touches to the gala dinner for Nick, which was to be held that evening.
Even the lord mayor was going to be present. She smiled in satisfaction as she eyed the acceptance she’d just received in the post. It would be a grand event, a fitting event for Nick. No one deserved it more than he, who’d worked hard to achieve the success he was enjoying now.
She was looking over the menu in her office when she heard a throat clearing. She looked up to find her brother in the doorway.
“Hello, Geoffrey, what brings you here?” Her brother never came to the Housing Society office.
He walked into the office with barely a nod and took the chair opposite her desk. “I thought it the best place to find you this time of day.”
She frowned at his grim tone. “What is it, Geoff? You sound as if you’d had some bad news.”
The chair creaked under him as he leaned forward and removed his top hat and placed it on his lap. As usual he was impeccably dressed in a black frock coat and charcoal trousers. He fiddled with the brim of his hat.
“Are you still seeing that Tennent chap?”
She put down the pencil she’d been holding. “If you mean Nicholas Tennent, he is a friend of mine.”
He frowned at her. “Is it true he showed up in Deauville at the same hotel you and Macey were at?”
“Yes.” Who had told him? And why did she feel defensive as if she were still twenty-one?
He nodded at her as if he knew something she didn’t. “You’d better have a care. Elizabeth Raleigh and her husband said they saw you there in his company quite a bit.”
A British couple she’d seen one afternoon there. She shook her head at how quickly gossip traveled. “Mr. Tennent was very good company. He made himself very useful with Austen.”
Geoffrey’s lips thinned. “Careful he doesn’t start looking at him as if he’s his papa.”
She looked down at her pencil, considering how she would answer. “Would that be such a bad thing?”
He made a choking sound. “I cannot believe you are even contemplating such a notion.”
She looked at him steadily, her irritation changing to real anger. “Geoffrey, in case you’ve forgotten it, I am a full-grown woman who needn’t consult with you about whom I am seeing.”
“Except when it’s an upstart scoundrel who is trying to muscle in on our family’s firm.”
“What are you saying?”
“He’s bought out Steward.”
She stared at him, the words making no sense. “Old Mr. Steward?” That was Father’s principal partner, a silent partner who’d always left her father in full control of the day-to-day business of the company.
He nodded grimly. “Alistair was a trusting simpleton. Tennent seems to have charmed him at his club and convinced the doddering old fool to sell him his partnership. You know what this means?”
She didn’t dare hazard a guess.
Geoff rubbed a hand across his chin. “He now owns fifty percent of our company, the firm our grandfather established and our father built up to what it is today.”
She looked down at her desk, the papers she had been studying before her brother had walked in making no more sense to her. “I don’t believe it. There must be some explanation.”
Her brother gave a dry bark of a laugh. “Oh, Alice, don’t be so naïve. There’s an explanation all right. Tennent wants to get back at us for some slight that happened over fifteen years ago.”
He jumped up and began to pace. “He’ll stop at nothing until he destroys this family. Well, I won’t have it!”
“What are you talking about?” Now, she was truly alarmed. Her normally stolid brother was acting positively choleric.
“Father sacked him. For what I don’t know. Probably incompetence.” He stopped in mid-stride and looked at her, thrusting his hat at her to drive home his point. “I spoke to Father’s old secretary, not Simpson, but the man he hired to replace Tennent when he up and left Father.”
She waited, dreading what her brother might say to destroy her newfound hopes for happiness.
“He says Father gave Tennent the boot without so much as a reference. It was right after that accident. He was in his rights to do so, since Tennent had only been with him a few weeks.” Geoffrey shook his head in disgust. “It was then he took off for America. Now that he’s made good, he probably wants to get back at Father.”
Alice sat back in relief. “He already told me about Father. But he was almost thankful for it now. It was the reason he emigrated.” She waved a hand. “My goodness, he’s amassed a fortune. He doesn’t need your company!”
Her brother wasn’t listening to her. “It’s clear Tennent has had it in for us since he has returned the wealthy American. He’s out to prove something. He’s got to be stopped or he’ll destroy all our family has worked for for three generations—as well as your heart and reputation if you let him.”
“You’re wrong, Geoff.”
Geoffrey pinioned her with a look. “This concerns you as much as it does me. This is Austen’s future. Do you want some upstart secretary muscling his way in and stealing your son’s inheritance?”
She gave an outraged laugh. “Nicholas would never do that!”
“So, it’s Nicholas now? Gone as far as that, has it?”
She clamped her mouth shut. Seeing her brother’s grim look, she relented enough to say, “Mr. Tennent wants to marry me.”
“Hah! He not only wants to take over our firm, but he wants to have you, too! The filthy scoundrel. How dare he!”
Alice stood. “I won’t have you saying such things about him!”
He leaned over the desk. “He doesn’t care a whit for you! He just wants to humiliate us! He’s out to prove a point!”
She put her hands to her ears, not wanting to hear any more.
“Don’t you see, Alice? He just wants you in order to steal control of Father’s firm.”
“But you still have half the company. There’s nothing he can do to buy you out!”
He leaned closer, his knuckles white atop the desk. “You own ten percent in the company. All he needs to do is marry you and he’ll control the firm.”
“What are you saying?” she whispered. “Father disinherited me.”
Geoff moved his head slowly from side to side like a pendulum, his gaze never leaving hers. “Not entirely. Victor persuaded him to allow you ten percent. It was small enough not to make a deal of difference. Victor said we would merely invest your profits and keep them for Austen when he reached his majority. That’s the only way Father would be satisfied to change his will.”
She fell back in her chair, feeling numb. “Why was I never told this?”
“You can’t let yourself be used like this!” Geoff jabbed a hand through his hair, his voice cracking with desperation. He’d never been so distraught, not even when she’d married Julian.
She stared at her brother. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because it was the only way Father would agree! You disobeyed him. Be thankful for Victor who championed you. Besides, the shares have made nothing this past year.
“All that’s neither here nor there now. You’ve never lacked for anything. I’ve given you Father’s house, you’ve a houseful of servants. What’s of concern now is Tennent. He wants to ruin us, I tell you. He’s bought up the company behind a front.”
“What are you talking about?”
He gave a harsh laugh. “While he woos you, he’s quietly bought the shares using another company, so none of us—least of all you—will know he’s behind it.”
It couldn’t be. “There must be some explanation.”
Geoffrey continued pacing. “Now all he needs is your ten percent, which he’ll get as soon as he marries you. You haven’t gone as far as agreeing, have you?” he asked, swiveling around to her.
She didn’t bother answering, but continued trying to sort through it. “B-but Nicholas wouldn’t know about my shares. How could he know?”
“Oh, doesn’t he?” he barked out a grim laugh. “He’s made sure to find out everything about our firm.”
Her world was cracking under her and she had no idea how it had come about. She leaned her head into a hand, trying to think clearly.
Geoffrey’s voice grew quiet. “One of the board members came to tell me this morning. They’re going to force me out as president and chairman of the board.”
She drew in her breath. “How is that possible?”
“All he needs is full control and he’ll demand my full resignation. I know it.” He ran a hand through his hair, his eyes darting left and right.
“Why should he want to do that?”
He pressed his lips together, a sheen of perspiration covering the top of his lip. “Because he’s a ruthless scoundrel. You’ve got to stop him.”
“Me? What can I possibly do?”
“Don’t let yourself be tricked by him. He can’t think he can take us all over. He only wants you to solidify his hold on our business.” He grabbed her hand. She’d never seen desperation in her brother’s eyes. “You’ve got to help me. It’ll mean my ruin otherwise.” He looked away from her. “I’ve made some poor decisions.
Then his bloodshot eyes focused on her again, and his hand squeezed hers painfully. “Don’t let him use you! He only wants to take you as the crowning achievement to his insatiable greed. Don’t let yourself become his trophy! He cares nothing for you, only what your name represents. It’s only his pride because Father thwarted his ambitions so long ago.”
She broke away from her brother’s hand. “Leave me, please leave me.” Her voice cracked and she turned away from her brother.
She had to see Nick. That’s all she knew after her brother left and the office grew quiet, broken only by the ticking of a clock on a shelf nearby. She didn’t know how much time had passed as she sat there staring at her desk, unseeing.
Could Geoff’s accusations be true? Was Nick only interested in getting back at her father through her? Had he pretended some attraction to her, was his kiss only pretense? Thinking back to it now, had what she took for expertise been in truth the carefully controlled performance of someone proceeding with his calculations, weighing everything as he did in business? Had he been playing a role, a role he may indeed have found distasteful?
She stood from her desk, unable to bear her thoughts.
But what need had Nick to stoop to feign an attraction? He was rich and powerful. He could have any woman he wanted. Why bother with her family?
She stood at the window looking through the film of curtain at the street beyond. Her thoughts went back to that summer she’d first met him. How infatuated she’d been.
All the fears of abandonment following his disappearance, of thinking herself unlovable, came to flood her now.
Oh, dear Lord, show me the way. Show me the truth. Is this man worthy of my love? she prayed.
She had to know. Like an automaton, she picked up her gloves, hat and handbag, glancing down at her bare finger before donning her gloves. She’d removed her wedding band when she’d come back from Deauville.
Had she betrayed Julian’s memory for someone so wholly opposed to his values? No, she wouldn’t think it. It couldn’t be.
She stumbled toward the omnibus stop by sheer instinct, her thoughts all consumed by Nicholas Tennent.
The omnibus was crowded with people and she squeezed onto the wooden bench between two women, a heavy-set one whose clothes reeked of sweat, and another who barely moved to make room for her. Alice held her lawn handkerchief to her nostrils, feeling sick as the omnibus began to rattle and sway over the cobblestones.
Bitterness and doubt crept into her thoughts, try as she might to suppress them, not least because of Nick’s absence from Austen. Austen had asked for him every day. They’d seen little of Nicholas since their return from Deauville. He’d sent her a note the day after their arrival in London that he’d found several things pending at his office which would take him a few days to clear up. Had one of them been the takeover of her father’s firm?
When she arrived at the number on Nick’s business card, she glanced up in surprise at the imposing office building. Expecting a modest office within the building, she was further taken aback to discover the whole five-story building housed Tennent and Company.
She opened the polished wooden door, its brass plaque glowing. Inside, clerks bustled to and fro, others bent over their high desks, all looking important. It reminded her painfully of her father’s firm. The few times she’d stepped across its threshold, she’d been confronted by the same hum of activity—of money being made, she’d always told herself. Now, it gave her a feeling of foreboding. Had she really stopped to think about what gave Nick’s life meaning? All that she’d repudiated.
A young clerk cleared his throat beside her, and she jumped. “May I be of service, madam?”
“Yes. Yes, please. I should like to see Mr. Tennent.” She handed him her card.
He glanced at it and gave her a slight bow. “Very well. Would you care to wait in a more private chamber?”
“No, thank you. I shall wait here.” She clasped her hands over her handbag and edged against the wall.
“Very well, madam.”
In a few minutes, he returned. “Mr. Tennent will see you, if you’d care to follow me.”
He led her to the lift and held the door open for her. With a bang, he slid it shut and the brass cage began to rise with creaking sounds. She was calm enough by then to notice it went to the top floor. Up here, everything was hushed. The building featured more modern devices and more opulence than her father’s. Oil paintings lined the corridors on the top floor and a thick Turkish carpet covered the anteroom floor. They stopped before a heavy mahogany door at the end of the corridor.
The clerk knocked and immediately entered. He stayed at the door and motioned her in. “Mrs. Lennox to see you, sir.”
When Alice entered, Nick had already risen from the large desk and was advancing toward her, his hand held out. “Alice, how good to see you.” He gave the clerk a curt nod. “Thank you, Jeffries, that will be all.”
She heard the heavy door click behind her and felt at a loss as to what to say. The sight of Nick overwhelmed her. In the scant few days she hadn’t seen him, she already missed him unbearably, and she realized in that moment she didn’t want to feel this way about a man. The risks were too great.
He took her hand in his and she fought the impulse to draw back. But she detected a look of puzzlement in his features, and for a second she thought he would stoop down and kiss her. But he let go of her hand and stepped back.
“I was going to stop by Park Lane this evening to call on you.” He ran a hand through his hair and half-turned away as if embarrassed. “I bought something for Austen.”
“You needn’t buy him things to assure his affection. He already adores you. Indeed, he has been asking for you every day since our return.”
A frown formed at her words. “I’m sorry. I’ve been meaning every day to stop in at least for a few minutes, but it seems I’ve been tied to the office until late each night.”
She looked down. “Yes, I understand.” She’d grown up with such a father.
Suddenly, she didn’t want to confront Nicholas. She wanted him to confide in her. She shouldn’t have to be questioning him. He should be open and honest with her. There should be nothing hidden between them if they were to have a future together. She didn’t realize the pleading look in her eyes as she looked at him silently, clasping her hands in front of her.
He took a step toward her. “What is it?”
She shook her head.
“You must have come by for a reason.”
She gave a short laugh. “Do I need a reason?”
He touched her arm. “Of course you don’t. But you seem, I don’t know. Something’s happened.” He scanned her face. “Is it Austen?”
At the shake of her head, he continued. “Something with the dinner? It’s still set for eight o’clock?”
The gala dinner. She’d forgotten all about it. What was she going to do about that?
His sharp tone penetrated her confused thoughts. “What’s happened? Has there been a hitch?”
“No.” She swallowed. Before he had to ask anything else, she said, “How is your business these days? You said you had much to do since your return.”
“Yes.” He gave a shrug and embarrassed laugh at that. “I’ve never taken a holiday before and didn’t realize how much I’d find piled up at my return. Not that I wouldn’t do it again. Not to worry, though, I’ll have everything up to date in a few days and will have more time to spare.”
She looked at him sadly. Would this be her future? Living with a man whose priorities were just like her father’s? Without thinking, she found herself saying, “Geoffrey came to see me today.” This was his chance to tell her.
He raised an eyebrow. “Is that unusual?”
She shrugged and approached his massive, oblong desk, its ebony surface like a mirror. So much like her father’s. “It is when he comes to my humble office.”
“Maybe he missed you while you were away.”
Was that cynicism in his tone? She glanced back at him. He hadn’t moved and he reminded her of a silent statue, his features as if carved in stone. “Perhaps.” She turned to study his desk once again. Lots of papers covered it but they were all neatly arranged. Were some of them concerning Shepard and Company? Now, Shepard & Tennent. “You seem to be very busy.”
“Yes.”
“Do you have much to do with my father’s firm?”
He said nothing until she was finally forced to turn to him once again. She was struck by the intent way he was looking at her. “Why do you ask?”
She shrugged imperceptibly. “No reason, merely curious.”
He walked around his desk to stand by his chair. “Shepard and Company and Tennent & Company are competitors, and in that sense, would have little direct involvement with each other.”
“Yes, I see,” she murmured, looking down at his papers again, feeling a disappointment so profound it almost wounded her.
She took a deep breath and looked up with a bright smile. “Well, I must be going. I have much to do and…and…you’re busy.” Her voice broke and she turned away quickly and hurried to the door.
Nick stared at Alice. What had happened? Before she had a chance to turn the door knob, he realized she was going to walk out without telling him.
“Wait!”
The word came out a brusque command. It succeeded in stilling her hand. In a few strides he was at her side before she had a chance to tighten her hand on the knob once again.
“What is it?” he asked, hardly daring to touch her sleeve.
She lifted stricken eyes to him. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
What was she referring to? Was it because he had scarcely been to see her or Austen since their return? He wanted to make it up to her.
He searched his brain, but the only thing that came to him was his maneuver with her father’s firm. She couldn’t know about that. Could she? As the seconds ticked by, a sick suspicion spread in his gut. How had it been discovered?
“Tell you what?” he asked steadily.
She turned away from him as if she’d received a physical blow from him. He dropped his hand. “You know,” she whispered.
The feeling in the pit of his stomach grew. “Does this have to do with your brother’s business?”
The look in her eyes as she raised them to his gave him the answer he needed.
He shoved a hand through his hair, wondering how to explain. “Who told you?”
She gave a strangled laugh, turning away from him again. “Who told me? Does it matter? Isn’t it more important that I didn’t hear it from you? When exactly were you planning to tell me?”
He stared at her, finding it hard to believe—and yet, all too easy to believe—that she was doubting him. “Sometime after we were married.”
She stared at him open-mouthed then began shaking her head. “You were going to calmly put my brother out of business and tell me about it after we were married? You are a worse scoundrel than Geoffrey claims.”
He gave a short, bitter laugh. “I should think he would know what it takes.”
Her voice rose. “You go behind his back and plan to take over his firm and you have the temerity to call him a scoundrel?”
He stared at her, hardly believing she was so quick to judge him against her brother.
“You’ll swallow him up with no thought to how it might affect me?” she whispered, eyeing him as if he were a monster.
He kept his voice deceptively soft. “Careful you don’t draw the wrong conclusions.”
“What other conclusion can I draw if I’m not given any?”
“You could trust me.”
“A man who was treated badly by my father? A man who might be courting his daughter in order to gain full control of his business?”
Each word was like a slap in the face. He felt the accusation hit deep.
“Is that why you looked me up, Nicholas? Is that why you bothered to befriend Austen?” Her voice began to quaver. “You could have done anything to me, but why—why—” she wiped angrily at her eyes, her voice breaking “—why did you have to gain Austen’s trust? It wasn’t worthy of you!”
She turned back to the door. He planted his palm against it, not believing she would really leave him like this.
“Do you really think I would hurt you and your little boy?”
Her tear-filled eyes looked up into his, but she said nothing. “It’s too late to cancel the gala, but I must tell you I shan’t be present. I can’t bring myself to honor someone who would stoop to dishonor my family in such an underhanded way.”
He dropped his hand from the door, staring at her. Could she really doubt him to this degree? If that was the case, there was nothing left for him to say.
“Why, Nick, why?”
He stepped away from her. “I’m a ruthless businessman, remember?”
He watched her leave the office.
As the echo of the door faded, Nick continued staring at it, not believing the woman he’d waited for so many years had truly thought so little of him.
The image of her first husband, a saintly man, came to taunt him. She must have been measuring Nick against the curate all along, and finally found he couldn’t measure up.
He felt his eyes begin to fill, and he stepped back, aghast to find himself crying—over a woman. He never cried, not since he’d been a lad of about four and seen how little time his poor mother had for sympathy for such things as scraped knees and cut fingers.
He swiped at his eyes angrily.
When he reached his desk, he stood staring down at the papers lying there before sitting down. The evidence before him was irrefutable. Shepard and Company owned and had owned for years—behind the front of other firms—a number of housing blocks in the slums, of the kind Alice had pointed out to him, of inferior quality.
Complaints had been pouring into the city officials of sinking floors, flooding, leaking roofs—without much response from the government, since the tenants were people of little political or economic clout. But a few conscientious journalists had taken up the cause of the tenants and written about some of the worst complaints.
Nick sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. He hadn’t yet decided how to break it to Alice. She’d caught him unprepared. He’d wanted to gather all the evidence before presenting it to her—and show her how he planned to rectify the faults of her family.
He sat down and slumped over his desk, all energy leaving him.
Since the day he’d seen Alice again, he’d allowed himself to believe their love might have survived over a decade, that there was a woman worthy of his trust, a woman like no other, who was willing to forsake all for their love.
She’d declared she’d been willing to forsake her family for him fifteen years ago.
But, now that her trust had been put to a test, she’d proven incapable of believing in his honor and integrity. Whatever she’d felt for him had not been strong enough to withstand her brother’s poison.
He hadn’t realized until this moment how much he’d wanted her trust. Did he want anything less of his future wife?
Alice spent the rest of the afternoon frantically seeking Macey. Now that she’d renounced her attendance at the dinner, she needed to inform someone. After all, she was the hostess.
When she finally found her at her small flat, Macey stared at her. “You’re what?”
“I can’t be at the dinner tonight. You’ll have to do the honors for me.”
“Tell me what this is about.”
“I’d rather not.” She turned away from her, unwilling to talk about Nicholas to anyone else yet, when she, herself, was still too hurt and confused.
Her friend sat down. “I’m sorry, my dear, but I will do nothing for you unless you tell me the real reason you can’t be there tonight.”
Alice finally sat down next to her with a long sigh. “I can’t talk about it. Suffice it to say, I just found out something disquieting about Nicholas. It involves Father’s firm.”
Macey remained serious. “Who told you?”
“Geoffrey came to see me today.”
“I see.” Her friend was quiet a long time. Then she turned to her. “I don’t know what it might be about. I know nothing of your family’s firm. All I know is are you quite certain what he has told you about Nicholas Tennent is the truth?”
Alice searched her friend’s eyes. “I don’t know. But he wouldn’t lie about something so serious. I would soon know the truth. Besides, you didn’t see him. He sounded desperate. I’ve never seen him in such a state.”
“Have you talked to Mr. Tennent about it?”
Alice looked away. “I went to his office. I’ve just come from there. I had to know from him if there was any truth to it.”
“Well?”
“He as good as admitted it! What am I to do?” She squeezed her eyes shut. “All he said was to trust him!”
“Maybe you ought to, my dear.”
She turned to look at Macey. “But how can he ask that of me? I have Austen to think of, too. What if Nick is no different than Father was? How can I think about joining my life to his—to someone who stands for everything that I find so unworthy?”
Her friend covered her hands. “Only you can answer that. But be careful you don’t misjudge Mr. Tennent. He seemed an honorable man to me.”
“I don’t know…” Alice rose. “I must think…”
Macey joined her. “Yes, think and pray. I’ll be at the gala. I’ll do anything you need me to do, but think long and hard before you leave him there. It would be a terrible humiliation for someone like him.”
Nick sat at the head table, ignoring the buzz of voices around him and the clink of silverware on china. Miss Endicott sat beside him, in the place that had been reserved for Alice.
He eased his standing collar away from his neck with his finger, wondering how much longer before this cursed event would be finished. The meal was finally over and now the meeting would convene.
Miss Endicott patted his hand. “You’re doing fine. Now, you’ll just have to sit back and listen to a number of items being presented before we’ll discuss the donation. Then after a few more speeches of appreciation and acknowledgement, I will present you the plaque and only then may you abscond.” She said the last with a smile.
“All this for the privilege of having a donation accepted?”
She smiled sadly. “We Brits like to stand on ceremony. You must indulge us in this. You are the prodigal returned home—well, if not the prodigal, then the boy who made good.”
“Where is Alice?”
His abrupt question gave her pause. “I don’t know. She had a lot to think about.”
He looked away, saying in an undertone, “Only one thing as far as I’m concerned.”
“What is that?” she asked softly.
He turned back to her. “Would I do anything to hurt her?”
“Maybe you are asking a lot of someone who was abandoned by you once before.”
He frowned at her. “I never willingly abandoned her.”
“She might know that with her head, but her heart might still feel the pain of abandonment.”
The words caused him much thought.
After that they spoke no more.
The speeches began, business colleagues speaking about the needs of the growing city, others lauding him for his contribution to the business world. Finally, he was presented with his plaque.
It should have filled him with joy, but it left him cold. The one who would have made the evening truly meaningful for him was absent.
He would have long since left, but Miss Endicott had proven a true ally and he wouldn’t dishonor her that way.
Afterward, people crowded around him, all vying for his attention. He answered as many questions as he could, smiled at people’s expressions of gratitude until he felt his lips would crack.
“Excuse me, Mr. Tennent, would you answer a few questions for The Daily News?”
He braced himself for the journalist’s questions. “Yes, of course.”
“This is a sizeable endowment to one single charity. What made you select the Housing Society?”
“I was acquainted with Mrs. Lennox years ago and felt confident that any charity run by her would be a worthy one.”
He continued asking Nick questions about his time in America and his decision to return to London. Nick answered each one in as general terms as possible, not disposed to have all his personal reasons in print for all to read.
“My invitation stated that Mrs. Lennox, as head of the Housing Society, would present the plaque to you herself. If she was the main reason you decided on this charity for your donation, may I enquire why she was not present this evening?”
The question only made him more aware than ever what others must be asking themselves about Alice’s pointed absence.
“I don’t know. You shall have to ask her. If you’ll excuse me, I need to speak to some others.” He turned away and made his way out of the room, ignoring any more requests for his attention.