Beautiful Tempest(102)

He wasn't sure what to say to Mrs. Wright when it had been so apparent on his earlier visits that she disliked him. Perhaps he could begin by reassuring her that she could keep her job if her disposition would improve.

"Come for even more gains?" was whispered spitefully.

"What the devil does that mean?"

"For someone who didn't know this family at all, you have gained from it rather substantially."

He turned to face her and said just as quietly, "I would rather have gotten to know my grandmother, to have had at least one damn conversation with her where she didn't think she was talking to someone else of her acquaintance. Do you honestly think I'm glad about her death?"

"Why wouldn't you be? She would have hated you as much as she did your mother-if she even knew you existed, but she didn't."


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"Why would she hate me?"

The woman clamped her mouth shut. He'd seen her do that before. It meant she wasn't going to say another bloody word. She was beyond infuriating!

He tried to curb his anger, but his voice was still sharp when he told her, "I'm not going to fire you, despite your disagreeable nature, but I do insist you tell me what you have against me, and whatever it is, it needs to end now."

"I would as soon leave your employ."

"Just to avoid telling me the truth?"

"Neither you nor your mother were ever to be welcomed here," Mrs. Wright hissed at him. "She came and wasn't let in the door."

He sucked in his breath and demanded, "My mother came here? When?!"

"Many years ago, but as I said, she was turned away at the door."

"As I would have been? Because grandmother couldn't remember her own daughter?"

"Oh, no, that was before Lady Reeves started to forget the people she knew. My lady was not a forgiving woman."

"What did my mother do to cause such strong antipathy that it would be extended to me?"

"Why don't you ask her?"

"Bloody hell, I told you before I don't know where she is and you wouldn't tell me!"

Mrs. Wright looked behind him. "I suppose she read of my lady's passing in the newspapers."

Damon immediately swung around. Another carriage had just arrived, and a well-dressed middle-aged gentleman was stepping down from it. He was tall, black haired, and had an air of importance about him. The woman with him pulled the black veil down from her hat to cover her face before she took the hand he offered to assist her to the ground. But Damon saw her face in the moment before she covered it. She was still beautiful despite the years. He'd cherished that face his whole life.

He felt such a welling of emotion, he wasn't sure he could move, but it shattered when he heard Mrs. Wright nastily say, "If she thinks she can get in the house now, she can't. I know my lady's wishes-"

"Shut up, Mrs. Wright. You're fired."

He approached the couple and stepped in front of them, blocking their way. But standing this close to his mother, words failed him. He thought he'd never see her again! And she was crying quietly. Did she still love the woman who wouldn't even speak to her and had struck her from her will? She must. The bad feelings had apparently all been on Agatha's side.

But his mother's escort drew his own conclusions about Damon's standing in their way and said sharply, "If you think you can stop her from attending the funeral-" 

Damon threw up a hand to halt the diatribe. He didn't even look at the man, couldn't take his eyes off Sarah, his mother. But he realized she must have brought a solicitor with her, thinking she would be prevented from seeing her own mother buried. An understandable assumption when she hadn't been let in the bloody house when she'd come here before.

He wanted to draw her close, give her a thousand missed hugs, but breathless, all he could do was say, "Mother."

She said nothing, and through the veil he thought he saw an expression of curiosity on her face. Oh, God, she didn't recognize him. Of course she wouldn't! She hadn't seen him since he was a child.

The solicitor hesitantly asked, "Damon Ross?"

His mother collapsed in a faint.

Damon leapt forward to catch her, but so did her escort. It was an awkward moment, but at least they kept her from falling to the ground.

Alarmed, Damon told the man, "Step aside," as he picked his mother up in his arms.

"Put her back in the carriage," the man suggested. His proprietary manner was beginning to annoy Damon.

"Is something wrong with her that I should know?"