Liberty Hill (Western Tide Series) (3 page)

Lucius Flynn was going to run away.

He was wasting away, dying, suffocating in this kind of life. Had been since he was a boy. Work all day, play all night to forget about working all day. He took pleasure in the things that came easy to him, but he and God knew those things were certainly not the best. They were tonics against the great evil of diminishing dreams, and Lucius had all but succumbed to this aimless existence until last summer, when a gleam of hope had stretched forth from behind his veil of despair.

Gold.

Gold was discovered in the West.

A tide was rising, and it was full of dreamers, adventurers, inventors, and entrepreneurs. In the past months, they had flooded into California from across the sea, across the continent, across the world, and with every one of their exhilarating newspaper accounts, Lucius felt the yearning within him grow. His restlessness stirred; the fire that had died within him was rekindled. He did not have to be a slave to his father, or to this life, anymore.

In the beginning, he had tried to talk some sense into Banning, had begged his father to send him west to start a new division of the company. Running ships out of San Francisco would take Flynn & Flynn, which was aptly renamed after Emmett Brennan’s death, to an entirely new level. Why not profit from the gold that was already dug out of the ground?

His father, however, had refused. California gold was alluring, but it was a brief and passing phenomenon. “Flynn & Flynn does not gamble. Silk, opium, and tea are the only dependable treasures of the trade industry,” Banning decreed. “This gold is but a passing fancy. Soon there will be nothing left and California will be naught but an empty land full of abandoned towns, whiskey bottles, and ghosts. We Flynns stick to where the trade winds are always certain to blow: across the Atlantic and over the Indian Ocean.”

            Perhaps Banning was afraid of risk, but Lucius Flynn had found an alternative to becoming a bored, fat tradesman. California was his opportunity for adventure, for the pursuit of wealth under his own conditions.

He was getting married, and along with a wife, he was acquiring the Brennan fortune. Indeed, it was enough money to double his father’s trade, which was what his father intended. But it was also enough to purchase Lucius Flynn’s independence, and it was high time he was free of his father’s rule.

He would go west, lest he regret it for the rest of his life.

Evelyn was shocked from sleep. At first she was not certain the sound had not come from within a dream; but she waited, and presently she heard it once more.

Someone was rapping on the door.

She expected her servant, Beatrice, to enter, for rarely anyone but Beatrice came to call. But it was not her servant who opened the door. It was Lucius, dressed in yesterday’s clothes.

Candleless, his features were vaguely apparent in the dim light of dawn. The vision startled Evelyn, for she had not been alone in a room with him since they were children, and she could not imagine why he would come to her now, in this early hour. Since her father died, they had seen little of one another. Banning Flynn had taken her in as his ward, and she spent most of her time alone or with Beatrice, reading, playing piano, and taking walks, while Lucius spent his days at the docks with his father, and his evenings at various pubs and clubs, playing cards and flirting with women.

Their schedules did not allow for one another, which was strictly intentional, so the sight of him now was unnerving, the imminence of their wedding all too uncomfortable.

What in heaven’s name was he doing here?

Evelyn drew her blankets closer, pulling them to her throat. With one hand she attempted to correct her nightcap, painfully aware of her disheveled appearance, for Evelyn Brennan made certain she was never seen unless she was scrupulously put together.

“My God,” she exclaimed. “Did you just get in? It is nearly morning.”

Lucius coughed.

“I had some business to attend to in town,” he replied.

He winced against his own lie, but convinced himself it was only a bit of an evasive truth. He did not see Evelyn’s eyes roll, as she was well aware of what sort of business Lucius conducted in the darkness of night. As justification for her suspicion, she took a deep breath and caught scent of Lucius’ recent activities.

            “Lord, you reek of brandy and perfume!” she declared, perhaps a bit too loudly. She was not wounded, only greatly perturbed.

            What had her father been thinking when he agreed to this betrothal? Lucius Flynn was bereft of all decency, yet Lucius Flynn was the husband her father had chosen for his only daughter. The sense of the match, if there was any at all, completely eluded her.

            Lucius stopped, unsure of how to respond. He lifted the collar of his jacket and sniffed. Penelope and the German woman- damn, what was her name?- had entered the room along with him, their smell plastered to his clothing.

            “Sorry about that,” he shrugged.

There was nothing he could do about it now.

            Evelyn grunted in disgust.

Lucius moved silently towards her in the dark. She tried to soothe the rapid beating of her heart, for she did not want him to know how utterly unnerved she was at his sudden, untraditional, and improper appearance.

She sat up straight, lifting her chin to peer questioningly down her nose at him, and Lucius almost snorted at her immediate adoption of defiance.

            “I’m sorry to wake you,” he whispered gently, one hand stretched out peaceably in an effort to put her at ease. “Forgive me if I have caused a disturbance.”

            He congratulated himself, for despite the overall discomfort of the situation, he thought he sounded rather debonair. Speaking with Evelyn always required an extra measure of charm, for she was never anything but cold towards him. He suspected this was on account of their years of avoidance, in addition to the rather deserved suspicion that Lucius was at fault for her father’s death. Evelyn had built up quite a case against him, and he knew if he wanted a listening ear, much less two, he needed to thaw her out a little.

He waited stupidly for some kind of response, but she did not give him one. Instead she watched him, her eyes unblinking in the fading dark.

            Lucius’ resolve wavered. He fumbled for words, struggling to remember why he had planned this unconventional encounter in the first place. Evelyn, shocked from sleep by a man she had only known as a boy, wondered the same thing.

            “I know it isn’t proper for a man to see his bride before the wedding,” Lucius sighed, “but I wanted to speak with you before the ceremony. I imagine you are quite frightened by this whole ordeal, and I assure you I am not at all at ease, myself. The truth is I have dreaded this day since I was informed of it. Not by any fault of yours, of course. But you see, I never aimed to marry. Yet you can understand the great responsibility I bear as the only son of my most ambitious father.”

            He said this with a sliver of sarcasm, but Evelyn was not amused. 

Beneath her sharp glare, Lucius’ eyes dropped to the floor, for her gaze lacked the warmth he sought and caused him to falter. Her appearance was distracting as well. He had never seen her like this, hair a little askew and braided to one side, cheeks flushed, eyes bright from waking. For once she did not look like a mannequin. She seemed like a real woman, capable of emotion and soft to the touch.

Lucius cleared his throat.

            “It is true that you and I haven’t known much of each other these past few years,” he continued. “But we were like brother and sister once, growing up together the way we did. And to be promised to one another just before your da passed away… well, that was a terrible thing that happened. To him, I mean. Well, to the both of you. I truly respected him, you know. He was a good man, and I want to do right by him. He would have wanted the best for you and as much as I have fought it, that responsibility has fallen to me. It means that today, of course, we must marry. He wished it, and he must have had a good reason.”

He set his jaw firmly, as if this statement was the closing verdict of an argument he had with himself. Evelyn listened, her face flushed at the mention of her father. She recalled the day he had come to her with the news of this betrothal. She had fought hard to remain composed before him, waiting to come undone until after he had left. She had given no argument, had only nodded her head in quiet acquiescence, though fear and disappointment caused her every muscle to tremble with tension.

She was a dutiful daughter. Obedient. She had never once lied to her father, dishonored him, or refused him; and in consequence, she was now required to surrender her independence to a reckless, wild, and frivolous prat.

She shut her eyes against the unfortunate reality. Indeed, her father
must
have had a good reason, but she could not see it then, and she could not see it now.

            “I want you to know that there is no other option for you,” Lucius told her. “This is the way of the world, and we all must accept it. We’re fortunate, I suppose, in some sense. There are young people married off every day. Much younger than us, too. But I have to be honest and tell you I have tried to fight this. My father would hear none of it, of course. There are conditions for his blessing, and they include new ships and new goods. He has big plans for us, you know. For the company. And he’ll be damned if I screw them up.”

            The room brightened as the sun rose. Lucius’ face was washed in a pale blue, his eyes luminescent in the slowly growing light.

            “However, I
do
have a plan,” he said then, his voice lowering to a soft whisper. Evelyn could barely hear him and struggled to watch the movement of his lips as they formed the words.

            “And unfortunately, it goes far beyond my da’s blessing. No doubt you have heard talk of the gold discovered in California?”

            Her eyes shifted slightly, telling him she had. The servants could be heard whispering about it from time to time, and every week the papers carried stories of young aristocrats heading west to seek adventure. But what on earth would induce Lucius to bring it up on the morning of their wedding?

He stepped closer to his bride in the pending light. “Today you will be my wife,” he murmured, growing bolder as he spoke, the excitement of his plan giving him a new burst of confidence.

The word
wife
caused Evelyn’s breath to catch in her throat.

“And as such,” Lucius continued, “all your earthly possessions become mine.”

            So. That was it. Lucius had come to her for money. She flushed, her temper rising. The audacity of his brazenness rendered her speechless.

She sat up a little straighter and narrowed her eyes at him.

            “We will have a fortune together,” he went on, “and with fortune comes the responsibility to invest. I have decided where we should place our money, and it is not with Flynn & Flynn. I want
adventure
, and I won’t find it here in New York or across the sea in Ireland. No, California has what I want, and I mean to take it for my own,” he concluded with a theatrical swipe at the air. 

            California! With
her
dowry! She should have known the moment he crossed the threshold that Lucius Flynn was motivated by some moronic idea or another. She had suspected he had found some cunning way out of their engagement, but she had given him far too much credit. Lucius Flynn was not that smart. Lucius Flynn just wanted to have a good time, even if it cost her inheritance.

            “You would have my father’s blood pay for your silly fool’s errand?” she spat at him. “You pompous greenhorn!”

             She set her mouth in a straight line. The room was bright enough now for Lucius to see her fury.

            “Don’t pretend you don’t know what’s going on here,” he countered, offended. “Today Brennan money becomes Flynn money. All the coins go into one big pot, and my father wants everything that belonged to your da, Evelyn. Everything. If we don’t take that money now, he will spend every last dollar of your inheritance on new ships. You and I will not see a penny. Not a penny! And we will live the rest of our lives answering to
him
. Is that what you want?”

            “You stupid arse!” she replied. “You just want to run away, and that’s the truth of it! I will have nothing to do with this. Your father has never done any wrong by
me
.”

            “He would have had you on the streets the night your father died!”

            Shocked, Evelyn’s mouth dropped.

            Lucius continued, wishing he didn’t have to.

            “You are nothing but a piece of property to him, Evelyn, and he has waited all these long years to hold the deed. He has wanted you for your money since before you were born. Your father was a wealthy man with a wealthy history. Much wealthier than mine. If not for your fortune, my da would have found some other way to make a profit off you. Everything my father owns is an asset to him, Evelyn. Even me.”

            He was silent a moment, as the truth of what he had said settled upon his betrothed. Evelyn recalled the morning Lucius went to the docks with his father for the first time, the way she had missed him all that day, the exhaustion he had exuded that night as he sat at her father’s supper table, spent from the day’s work.

            Lucius was immensely valuable to his father, and not only because he was his son; just as Evelyn was immensely valuable to Lucius, and not simply because she was going to be his wife. They were both of them useful, their intrinsic worth dispensable in light of their monetary merit. They were pawns; a fate Lucius could change, a fate Evelyn could not.

            “I see,” she replied presently, resignedly.

            They were silent a moment. Lucius sensed the disenchantment that had settled upon her, and he immediately grew sober. He did not wish to cause her pain. He merely wished to convince her of the benefits of his scheme.