Always True to Her (Emerson Book 2)

ALSO BY MAUREEN DRISCOLL

THE EMERSON SERIES

ALWAYS COME HOME (EMERSON, BOOK ONE)

THE KELLINGTON SERIES

NEVER TURN AWAY (KELLINGTON, BOOK SIX)

NEVER DENY YOUR HEART (KELLINGTON, BOOK FIVE)

NEVER RUN FROM LOVE (KELLINGTON, BOOK FOUR)

NEVER WAGER AGAINST LOVE (KELLINGTON, BOOK THREE)

NEVER MISS A CHANCE (KELLINGTON, BOOK TWO)

NEVER A MISTRESS, NO LONGER A MAID (KELLINGTON, BOOK
ONE)

THE POLITICAL SATIRE

DATING GEORGE CLOONEY

ALWAYS TRUE TO HER

By

Maureen Driscoll

To my mom. Now and forever.

On the Road to London, February 1823

It was odd to be back in England after so many years
away. James Emerson was in a carriage on his way to London with his
six-year-old daughter Anna. He was determined to settle a land dispute that
would allow them to return to America, the place he’d lived for the past eight
years.

The journey from his family’s estate in Wiltshire
was both familiar and foreign. When he’d last made this trip, he’d been an
angry young man of twenty, eager to make his way in the world. He’d been
determined to prove to his tyrant of a father that he had worth. It was
ironic, then, that he’d returned penniless. Though he was rich in one way: he
loved being a father.

To say that he was short of funds was an
understatement similar in scope to saying Almack’s might not be the most
exciting place for a young lord to spend an evening. Not that James had been
to Almack’s any time recently, nor, if he had the choice, would he visit at any
point in the future. The only reason for a young unmarried man to visit
Almack’s was if he were in search of a wife. James most certainly wasn’t. Of
course, truth be told, he was hardly a young man anymore, either. He was already
eight and twenty, and felt even older.

As the second acknowledged son of the late Earl of
Ridgeway, James had left home at twenty, setting sail for America and a future
of his own making. He’d spent eight years working hard to survive in a
sometimes hostile land. He hadn’t traded on his name. Quite frankly, Americans
didn’t care if you were a peer. If anything, it worked against you since they
valued honesty and hard work above all else. And those were two things most
peers had very little use for.

He’d trapped, hunted, even worked as a guide for
easterners wanting to have a frontier adventure, but not too much of one. He’d
learned to be a good fighter, though he had no stomach for it. The local
militias has tried on more than one occasion to enlist his help in relocating
natives who were reluctant to leave the land of their ancestors to make way for
the expansion of the white man. But he would have none of it, especially since
“relocation” was usually just a euphemism for “killing.”

In his first few winters, he likely would have
starved had it not been for an Algonquin tribe in New York State. It was
through their teachings that he’d learned enough about the land to make his
living from it, which had helped him move to Kentucky, then Pennsylvania, where
he’d been able to buy a small piece of property.

But his time with the Algonquin hadn’t just made him
a better frontiersman. It had also given him the greatest present he could
ever hope to have: his beautiful six-year-old daughter Anna.

Anna’s mother Alawa had been one of the interpreters
for her people. He’d known none of their language when he’d first moved to a
one-room cabin near their land. She’d been his main liaison with the tribe and
was also one of the most beautiful women he’d ever seen. Six months after
meeting her, they’d begun a discreet affair. He’d missed his family a great deal
and regretted moving to America. His time with Alawa had helped him feel less
lonely. Neither of them thought there was a future with each other. Indeed,
she was the one who ended their relationship. But he would always be grateful
to her for helping him adjust to his new life. He only wished she had told him
she was with child before he left New York.

It had only been six months earlier that she’d
managed to track him down to send word about Anna. Alawa was dying and she
knew their daughter would be better off away from a tribe that could be unkind
to those of mixed race. James had had a brief moment of panic. He’d known
nothing about being a father. His own sire had been a cruel son of a bitch
who’d regularly beaten his children. But despite the panic, James had also
felt an instant connection to the daughter he’d never met. There was no doubt
in his mind that he would raise her. That he would love her.

He’d just acquired a small parcel of land in Pennsylvania
and had not wanted to leave it unattended as he traveled to New York to meet
his daughter. He had the deed, but frontier law often valued possession more
than paperwork. So he’d asked an acquaintance to work the land while he was
away. Cedric Wallace was five years older than James and the heir to Viscount
Ainsworth. They hadn’t known each other in England, but there was a certain
kinship they’d both felt when they’d crossed paths in Philadelphia.

James had set off to meet his daughter, then he’d
stayed to nurse Alawa through the final few weeks of her life. With a grieving
Anna in tow, James had gone back to Pennsylvania, only to find that Cedric had
leased the land to a mining scheme, claiming ownership of it. Cedric had offered
to cut James in on half the profits, but James wasn’t interested in mining or
having a partner. When he’d pressed the matter, Cedric had said it was half or
nothing. James had appealed to the local courts, but the mining company had
advanced Cedric enough money that he’d been able to pay off the magistrate.

James had faced two choices: accept defeat or fight
for his land. But even if he’d been so inclined to walk away – and he’d worked
too hard to do that – he now had a daughter to support. He might be able to
put up with the deprivations of frontier life as he rebuilt his small fortune,
but he didn’t want to subject Anna to it. So he decided to fight for his land,
even though it meant returning home to England.

England. A place with terrible memories, but also
the home of his beloved brothers and sisters.

The Emerson family had been the subject of
ton
gossip
for decades, thanks to the exploits of James’s parents and grandparents.
They’d had affairs, fought duels and squandered the Emerson fortune.
Everything that was not entailed had been sold to pay for their excesses. But
even that had not been enough. When James’s brother Colin had come into his
title after the death of their father three years earlier, he’d also inherited
significant debts.

The current generation of Emersons wasn’t known just
for its financial difficulties – though there were few in the
ton
who
were unaware of them. They were also famous for their close resemblance. The
Emersons had a very distinctive look of black hair and dark brown eyes. At
least that was the case for all but one of them.

At thirty years of age, Colin Emerson, the Earl of
Ridgeway, had the responsibilities and burdens of being head of the family.
Their father had incurred so much debt that Colin had considered marrying an
heiress to restore the estate to rights. But then he’d fallen in love with Ava
Conway, a penniless governess. They’d married only a few weeks after James had
returned to England.

At about the same time that Colin had been born some
thirty years earlier, another boy had been born with the Emerson looks.
Nicholas Chilcott was officially the third son of the Earl of Layton, whose
estate was in the next county. However, it was common knowledge that he was
not Layton’s get, but the result of an affair between James’s father and
Nicholas’s mother. Given the infidelity that permeated
ton
marriages,
it was hardly an unusual situation. And since he was the third son, it was but
a minor infraction of society’s rules. However, when illness took the lives of
both of Nicholas’s brothers, Layton had been enraged. Some said the apoplexy
that killed him was the result of his hatred for both the old Earl of Ridgeway
and the man the law now recognized as Layton’s heir, Nicholas.

James, at eight and twenty, was two years younger
than his brothers. He also had the Emerson looks, but in his case, he wore his
hair straight and past his shoulders, a remnant of frontier life. He might be
in England, but he had no desire to conform to its traditions. He also kept it
long for Anna, since it was similar to how the men in her tribe had worn
theirs. Anna’s long black hair was usually worn in two braids.

When he’d first met his daughter, he’d had no idea
how to be a father. Plaiting her hair was a skill he’d had to learn, only the
first of many. Though his love had been strong and constant from the start, he’d
learned there were many parenting skills that did not come as second nature.
Sometimes he even wondered which of them was the parent and which the child. His
little girl often seemed wise beyond her years.

And he sometimes felt like a man lost in the world.

James’s sister Winifred was four and twenty. She’d
been a beautiful young lady of sixteen when James had last seen her.
Unfortunately, their father had sold her into marriage two years later to a
wealthy merchant. From what little James knew of the situation, her husband
Clarence Pierce was very controlling. The family saw little of her, despite
their best efforts.

Almost nineteen, his other sister, Rosemary, had
grown into a beautiful young woman. Unfortunately, the family’s lack of
resources would prevent her from having a Season, but she seemed content
staying at the family estate in Wiltshire, though why anyone would want to
remain in the county he had not a clue. She was resourceful, having moved the
family to the dower house while Colin had been in London, in order to lease the
manor to tenants. Colin, Nicholas and James all hoped she would find a good
husband one day to treat her as she deserved. It was just unfortunate that
none of them knew a man worthy of her.

Leticia, known to everyone as Letty, was eight. And
unlike every other Emerson, she had bright red hair and dark blue eyes. She
was, as their late mother had boasted to anyone who would listen, not their
father’s get. She had been conceived during a period when James’s parents had
lived on different continents. He believed his mother had deliberately chosen
a lover so different in looks from her husband that there would be no doubt as
to the child’s parentage. Indeed, the old earl had had little use for Letty,
often ignoring her existence all together. But their mother had neglected the
girl, as well. All she’d wanted was to use the child as a weapon against her
husband. Once that became boring, she simply moved on.

Fortunately, Letty’s brothers and sisters loved her
all the more because of it.

That was James’s entire family, along with the
precious girl at his side. He was happier than he’d care to admit to be back
among them, and it pained him to think of leaving again. But he was a man now,
a father. He did not wish to leave his brothers and sisters again, but he also
did not want to be a burden to them when he had no way of supporting himself
and Anna if he stayed in England. That was the disadvantage to being a lord
with neither money nor skills. Well, he had skills, but somehow he didn’t
think he could make a living as a frontiersman in England.

As if he needed a reminder of his lack of funds, he
and Anna were travelling to London in Nick’s coach and they would be staying at
his town house while his brother saw to matters at his country estate.

It had been a tiring day of travel as they entered
the outskirts of London. The smell of coal fires from the city reached them
long before they entered town. The acrid smoke, combined with the cold winter
air, burned his lungs. He’d forgotten what that combination was like. He’d
spent a great deal of time outside in the cold in America. In winter it was
impossible to escape, even indoors. But he’d spent very little time in cities
and certainly never one as big as London. He’d forgotten about the noise, the
traffic and the smells – some much worse than the coal. And as foreign as it
seemed to him, he could only imagine what Anna would think of it.

“Are you all right, love?” he asked her.

Anna turned and studied him with her dark eyes.
They had a slight almond shape common to the native tribes of America. Her
skin was the color of tea and her smile was glorious. Unfortunately, he saw it
all too infrequently. And it was not in evidence now. Yet, there was no
recrimination there, either.

If he were a fanciful man, which he most certainly
was not, he would say her soul was in her eyes. She looked at him like this
often. She asked few questions. She seemed to trust him implicitly. And it
was her trust that terrified him. He would protect her against any threat. He
would give her his last crust of bread to ensure she was well-fed. But he
didn’t know what course of action would make her happy. And he wanted that for
all the world.

She could speak English, but did not talk much. Of
course, Letty had immediately taken her under her wing upon their arrival in
Wiltshire, and with his sister there was very little opportunity for anyone
else to talk. It had heartened him to see the girls spend so much time together.
They’d even shared a room. And it appeared that Anna was coming out of her
shell with Letty, Rose and Ava. But she remained especially quiet when it was
just the two of them alone.

It worried James. But then, as Colin and Nicholas
had reminded him, he wasn’t the most talkative man himself.

But now James and Anna were in London and hopefully
one step closer to regaining his land. The carriage was making its way to
Nicholas’s Mayfair residence. The Ridgeway town house had been sold more than
a year earlier to help pay off their debts.

James hoped the trip would be brief. He planned on
telling Wallace’s family what had transpired in America, hoping they would have
enough honor to convince Cedric to return the land to him. Both Colin and
Nicholas had doubted he would be successful with that tact. Cedric Wallace’s
father was Viscount Ainsworth, a proud man who’d often bragged of his son’s
exploits. It would be difficult for him to admit to such a failure on his
son’s part.