But he tamped down the desire. He knew he was being set up.
He could just imagine Finnea firing off a note with some trumped-up excuse to see him. Then his mother had insisted he personally return the bracelet to her. Of course Emmaline had said the Winslets and not specifically Finnea, but Matthew was wise to his mother. First she had demanded he attend the party; now she insisted he return the bracelet after receiving a note.
Finnea wanted to see him, and his mother was making it happen.
Well, he had news for both of them. He had not been amused when Finnea walked into his parents’ house last night and allowed herself to be introduced to him without so much as a blink of recognition. And now this blasted bracelet. He was not a man to play coy games, as Finnea Winslet was about to learn.
Marry Finnea.
A flash of unexpected desire swept through him. He cursed into the wind and wrote the desire up to rage. He would never remarry. He would make that clear to his mother and to Finnea Winslet.
Matthew entered the Winslet home. The house was new by Boston standards, no more than thirty to forty years old. It was ostentatious as well. Imported marble floors in the central hall, receiving rooms on either side with plush upholstered furniture and extravagantly draped windows. Fluted door casings and crenellated, gold-gilt crown moldings. A marble staircase ascending to the upper floors, and a lavish crystal chandelier to highlight it all.
After seeing Finnea last night, Matthew had learned that her mother and brother lived off the income of Winslet Iron Works, as did Finnea. The company was a prosperous family concern with shares controlled equally by Nester and a board of directors in trust for Finnea.
But it wasn’t income or trusts that he was thinking of when he entered. It was the smell. A curiously pervasive odor that filled the house that he couldn’t quite name. Like the outdoors, or a garden. Or cooking, perhaps, with ingredients not normally used in Boston.
Matthew was shown into the east receiving room on the right. But before the butler had a chance to announce him, Finnea dashed into the room.
As always, she had the infuriating ability to take his breath away. She was all dazzle and shimmer, movement and light. She was dressed in a perfectly proper gown, but even the most expensive silks couldn’t quite hide the wildness about her.
He forgot about his aching shoulder. He forgot about his frustration as he felt an insane desire to dip his head to her lips and taste her.
But he stopped himself short. He was not interested in Finnea Winslet.
He cocked a brow and studied her. “I see you were expecting me,” he drawled insolently.
His words brought her up short, and she whirled to face him, her eyes widening as if she were surprised.
“A nice touch, I have to admit,” he stated. “You look quite fetching standing there acting as though you have no idea why I’m here.”
“Why are you here?”
His eyes narrowed with impatience. “Enough of your games, Miss Winslet. I’m here because you sent word.”
“I did?”
A fissure of doubt crept in, but his jaw tightened against it. “Stop playacting. I’ve brought your bracelet. Now, why did you really want to see me?”
The sudden sound of heels clicking on marble echoed in the high-ceilinged foyer.
“Who are you talking to, Finnea?”
Leticia’s voice echoed much like her heels as she came to the receiving room. Nester and Hannah followed in her wake.
“Mr. Hawthorne,” Leticia called out in an excited rush. “Your mother is so kind to respond to my note so quickly. Did she find the bracelet?”
Matthew watched Finnea, who stood to the side, an unrelenting glimmer suddenly sparking in her eyes, one graceful brow raised in challenge.
He cleared his throat. “Ah, yes, Mrs. Winslet, she did.” He extended the jewelry in a stiff, clipped movement that had little to do with pain and everything to do with the fact that he didn’t like the smug look on Finnea’s face.
“Where did you find it?” Nester asked, his voice scathing. “In the soup tureen?”
“Nester, please,” Leticia admonished.
Matthew saw the teasing gaiety in Finnea’s face grow brittle. But he was surprised when she seemed to swallow back one of the sharp retorts he had become well acquainted with on the train, and merely smiled.
“Again, thank you, Mr. Hawthorne,” Leticia said. “We were just about to have luncheon.” The woman’s body tensed, and Matthew knew she felt the need to invite him to join them but didn’t want to. “Would you care to stay?” she offered belatedly.
“No, but thank you.”
Nester shook his head. “He doesn’t want to stay because the whole house smells to high heaven from all the tinctures and concoctions Finnea has been making to heal anyone and everyone who comes within a mile of her. Before we know it, she’ll hang a sign out front to advertise. If I had somewhere else to go, I would. In fact, I think I’ll have luncheon downtown on my way to the office.”
Moments later he strode from the room, his mother and grandmother following.
Matthew turned back to Finnea. “You’re a healer?” he asked, an odd pounding flaring in his head.
Clearly distracted, she shook her head. “Not really. I simply learned a bit about herbs from Janji.” She looked at him. “Janji is the healer.”
“Ah,” he said as the pounding ceased. “Well, I suspect I owe you an apology for the… misunderstanding.”
“Misunderstanding?” The mischievous gleam returned. “I’d say you didn’t misunderstand; you out-and-out jumped to the wrong conclusion.”
A slight smile tugged at his lips and he stepped closer. “Perhaps.”
She was like a flame, drawing him in. Her form was slender but curved. His hands itched to trail across her body to cup her breasts, full and rounded; to brush against the rosebud nipples to bring them to taut peaks beneath her proper gown.
In that second, he gave up trying to understand why he wanted her. He only knew that he did.
“Jumping to wrong conclusions appears to be a habit of yours.” Her expression was impish. “As I recall, you did the same thing on the train.”
But at the mention of that day, her lips straightened into a bloodless line and she looked away.
Thoughts of kissing her fled. “So you still don’t want to talk about the train.”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” she answered, her chin rising as she busied herself brushing nonexistent wrinkles from her gown.
“So you said last night.”
A stillness came over her as she drew a deep breath. She gave one final dash to the soft cashmere, sighed, and looked him in the eye. “Oh, all right, if you must have it. You saved my life. I’m indebted to you. I can never repay you, but I suspect I’ll have to try. There, do you feel better now?”
He stepped back sharply, his reaction swift and angry. “I don’t want payment.” He wanted her out of his thoughts, out of his life. “That wasn’t what I meant. I was simply inquiring after your well-being.”
“I’m fine. Perfectly fine.” She moved her leg around in proof. “See?” Then she met his gaze. “And I will repay you, somehow. Just like you said about yourself in Africa, I repay my debts, too.”
He wished he had never brought her the bracelet. “Forget it,” he said tightly.
Finnea pressed her eyes closed. “If only I could,” she whispered, surprising him with the despair he sensed as much as recognized.
“Could what?”
She didn’t answer at first. “Nothing. I just wonder if I’ll ever get used to it here,” she equivocated as she walked to the window and looked out. “Buildings everywhere. People racing about. Carriages hurtling through the crowded lanes. And not a goat roaming the streets, or a chicken in a yard. It is all so strange.” She paused. “But intriguing,” she added with an unexpected laugh.
It had been that way last night at dinner as well. One minute she was filled with delight over some new discovery. The next, she looked like a doe, startled by the dazzling lights around her.
And if she was unsettled by Boston and its inhabitants, there was no doubt that Bostonians were equally unsettled by her. If he hadn’t already been indoctrinated by the custom in some parts of Africa of placing a hand under one’s armpit when shaking hands, he would have been shocked as well.
But it went beyond mere differences in customs. People were intrigued by her, or rather, people watched her like passersby watch a terrible accident. They didn’t want to see but couldn’t look away. And in truth, Matthew understood. Her boldness had surprised him in Africa, but seeing her here, in Boston, made her seem even wilder—standing out so sharply in contrast to the restrained ways of this puritanical town.
“I’m intrigued, but that isn’t enough,” she said quietly. “I don’t fit in here, and I’m afraid I never will. I don’t know how to learn what is expected of me.”
She swayed from side to side and did some sort of dip that he could only guess was supposed to be a curtsy. Practicing. Trying to learn. Beneath her sheen of wildness there was a raw, stunned quality about her, as if she were trying hard to be strong but not quite succeeding.
He hated to see her like this, and before he knew what he was doing, he said, “That’s not true.” The words amazed him, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself. “Of course you can fit in.”
She didn’t look convinced, and why should she, he thought grimly. Based on what little he had seen of her behavior, he stood a better chance of becoming a proper lady than she did.
But his tongue and his brain seemed to be out of touch. “If you want to be a lady,” he told her firmly, “you can.”
She bit her lower lip. “Are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure.” He nearly choked on the lie, but then she smiled up at him with such innocence and purity and a desperate desire not to give up hope that he found himself adding, “You can learn everything you need to know.”
“Oh, Mr. Hawthorne,” she cried out with joy, “I take back every unkind thing I ever thought about you!”
His brow furrowed indignantly.
But she only laughed. “Thank you, thank you! And thank you for returning the bracelet. Now I must go. I have a million things to do.”
She flew out of the room much as she had entered, in a whirl of skirts. Matthew was left alone in the receiving room with a wry grin and a shake of his head.
He left the house, taking the three steps down to the walkway before he stopped beside his carriage, which waited at the curb. He turned his face into the winter sun as it broke through the pewter-gray sky. It was at moments like this that he felt almost normal again—the past pushed back.
A smile broke out on his face. She did that to him. Despite his determination to put her from his mind, Finnea Winslet had the uncanny ability to make him smile. And he couldn’t imagine why. She wasn’t a beauty by Boston standards. She was too vibrant for that, her hair too red, her manners too bold.
But somehow she made him forget about the ache in his shoulder and the stabbing pain in his head. All he could think about when he saw her was the sheer mesmerizing force of her eyes when she made—no, forced her way through every encounter like a wave crashing onto the sand.
He shook his head and chuckled, then started to turn. But he was caught off guard when a rock hit him in the head. Pain flashed white in his eyes, blinding him, and he staggered back. Through the fog in his mind he saw two young boys hiding behind a bush just beyond the walk.
“You touch him,” one hissed.
“No, you touch him!”
“Baby!”
“I am not a baby,” the second boy cried.
“Then touch him!” the other taunted.
“Not on your life! He’s a monster!”
Unsteady, Matthew stood like stone as a wave of icy humiliation raced through him. He forced himself to breathe, the boys’ bickering and taunts a backdrop to the returning hardness in his heart. He tried to block them out, telling himself he didn’t care. But another rock hit him, and the scar that ran down his arm beneath his shirt and coat turned to fire, making his head spin.
He fell back against the carriage, his horse tossing its head when its guide reins jerked. Matthew counted. He breathed. He had to get home before someone saw him like this. But when he tried to straighten, a wave of stomach-churning heat washed through him and sweat sprang out on his forehead.
Breathe, damn it, breathe, he told himself.
He concentrated, aware of nothing other than steadying his mind, and he didn’t hear the boys whispering. It wasn’t until he felt another rock pelt him in the back that he whipped around with a roar of frustration and pain.
The boys were right behind him. Their eyes went wide with fright, and they screeched, knocking each other over in their haste to be gone.
Two women, dressed in elegant winter day gowns and heavy capes, must have heard the boys’ bellows and hurried toward them from around the corner, their eyes wide with fear. At the sight of their terrified sons and of Matthew standing there like a wild man, they gasped and grabbed the boys’ hands, racing away as fast as they could go.
Matthew’s mind reeled. Humiliation snaked through his pain. He had known both of the mothers for a lifetime. Nan Penhurst and Corrine Adams were women he had danced and laughed with for more years than he could count. Their boys were friends of his daughter’s. Now he scared them away.
He started to shake. Breathing deeply, he threw himself into the carriage, steadying himself on the plush leather seat. His entire body burned, pressing in on him. The glimpse of sun was gone, the sky closing up. The wind gusted, ringing in his ears. He turned the horse by sheer instinct toward his house on Marlborough Street, barely noticing the people who hurried out of his way—barely noticing the tiny little girl wrapped tightly in a coat and hat who stared at him in shock.
He sped along with no thought for traffic, ignoring the shouts and curses when he cut in front of careening dray wagons.
Mere blocks seemed like miles, but finally he crashed through the front door.
His butler rushed forward. “Mr. Hawthorne!”
At the sight of his employer, the man gasped. “Dear God, let me get the doctor!”
With a ravaged remnant of strength, Matthew grabbed Quincy by the lapels. “Tell no one,” he commanded through the blinding pain. “I’ll be fine; do you understand?”