Love Finds You in Annapolis, Maryland Read online

  “Anything interesting, Papa?” Sena asked as she picked up a plate.

  Her father lifted one corner of his mouth. “To me? Quite. To you? I somehow doubt it. Only record amounts of snow, temperatures below zero in New England, and delegates still refusing to come to Annapolis because of it. No pirate attacks, no princes in disguise, no knights attacking windmills…”

  “Dull as always.”

  Lark chuckled and helped herself to a warm corn cake. “What is wrong with the world, that there are no longer knights-errant waging war against wayward windmills?”

  “Exactly my question.” Sena slid a sausage onto her plate. “You have read Don Quixote.”

  “Several times. ’Tis one of my favorites.”

  Johnny made a face and shoveled a heaping bite of bread into his mouth. “I despise that book.”

  His father smacked him lightly with his newspaper. “If your mother saw you talking with a mouthful…”

  Johnny swallowed and grinned. “She would forgive it, given the topic. She dislikes Don Quixote as much as I.”

  Breakfast passed in similar conversation. Lark laughed with the others, chimed in with a word here or there, and felt a part of it all despite not knowing these people yet a full day.

  So very different from that last meal with the Fieldings and Moxleys.

  Mr. Randel folded his paper and stood. “Sena, might I assume you and Miss Benton will be paying a visit to the Calverts this morning?”

  “Absolutely, Papa. I must introduce Lark and Kate.”

  He nodded. “Ask them to dinner on Christmas. None of the rest of their family has returned to the city, and I know it will be lonely for them.”

  Lark could only attribute the tears in Sena’s eyes to her habitual exaggeration. Why else should the invitation be so striking?

  “I will, Papa. Thank you. I know they will appreciate it.”

  Mr. Randel nodded, but his expression was a bit odd.

  Lark couldn’t hope to determine why. She drank the last of her coffee. “I have heard of the Maryland Calverts—are your friends related?”

  Sena’s face went sober for the first time since she bowled Lark over the previous afternoon. “Indeed. They are not direct descendants of Lord Calvert, mind you, but close enough. Close enough.”

  Close enough for…what? To be blamed for the family’s ties to England? Perhaps. It made as much sense as anything. But who was she to look down her nose upon someone for their associations? “Well, I look forward to making their acquaintance.”

  “Which you shall do soon.” Sena shook off the sobriety and smiled. “Let us go check on my mother, then head over. Now that I’ve a proper companion, we needn’t even trouble a maid or Papa to see us there.”

  Mr. Randel sighed as he headed for the door. “But you are only to go there and back. No running about the town without escort, Sena. Do you understand?”

  Lark could hardly fathom why he felt the need to issue such instruction…until she saw the gleam of mischief in Sena’s eyes when she said, “Oh, of course, Papa. Of course.”

  * * * * *

  Edwinn Calvert reread the missive for the seventh time, but still the words did not change. His request had been denied. Again. And this time without such politeness as he had received before. Without a mask of manners to soften the slap.

  Perhaps, a clerk from the governor’s office had written,you ought to have considered this before you cast your allegiance where you did.

  Edwinn rubbed a weary hand over his aching forehead and rested his elbow on the desk at which he sat. Not his desk, not his room. Not his house.

  At this rate, he might never see his own home again.

  “Bad news?”

  Edwinn looked over his shoulder as Kate entered the room. His sister offered an encouraging smile, but her cheer could not change facts. He sighed. “They still refuse. I know provisions were included in the Treaty of Paris, but at this point I have my doubts they ever intend to return our property. The war has been over for two years already, and still…”

  Gentle fingers rested on his shoulder. “I know. And if they will not, then we keep on as we have been doing. Return to the plantation or purchase a more modest home here.”

  Yes, but another home would not be their home. The one their grandfather had built, the one they had been raised in. And he couldn’t take them back to the plantation, where Kate all but faded away and stopped speaking. Not to mention they needed to preserve what silver they had left to live on, and to provide a dowry for Kate.

  Assuming anyone in these new United States would deign to marry the bashful sister of a Tory. His reasons for remaining loyal to the Crown were never heard—they all just saw his allegiance and judged. No listening to reason, no prospect of understanding. Were it up to his neighbors, he would be forced from the land entirely, shipped off to England or up to Canada.

  Kate craned forward to look out the window. “There comes Sena—with a friend, it looks like.” Her delicate brow creased with worry. “I do not recognize her.”

  A corner of Edwinn’s lips twitched up. “Well, you know Sena. She could trip over a brick and declare it her newest friend.” He made his voice quiet, encouraging. “Go ahead out and receive them, Katie. You know she would never bring anyone here unless she thought her someone you would like.”

  Kate turned those trusting, loving eyes on him and blinked. “Will you join us? You mustn’t stay in here brooding.”

  What was he to do but pat her hand and dig up a smile? “I shall be out forthwith. I only want to write a letter to Uncle Calvert first.”

  Kate loosed a long breath and nodded. “They will see reason eventually, Edwinn. The Calverts helped build this country—they will not hold our ancestral estates from us forever.”

  He nodded his agreement…but was none too sure.

  As his sister glided from the room, Edwinn considered the stationery and quill before him. Instead of picking it up, he stood. His hand reached for his cane as he slid over to the many-paned window. Through the slight waves in the glass he could see the frosty, windbitten world. The trees, all devoid of leaves. The sky, a low-hanging gray today. The citizens, dashing about with cloaks and hats through snow piles from the last storm.

  Those years during the war that had forced him away from Annapolis, he had felt like a wanderer. Oh, he knew he made the right decision in leaving—the Patriot stronghold was no place for a “Sympathizer of the Crown”—but the plantation in the wilds of Maryland had never felt like his own, and Kate had no friends there whatsoever. They had hastened back to the city as soon as the war was over.

  But their home…it was no longer their home.

  Father God, I know not where to go from here. Is it Your will I live out my days like this? If so, I will. You have been gracious enough to provide the silver to keep us, even as tenants. But please, help me to find a way to become part of society again. Help my old friends to see I am the same man I was before the war, that it was not cowardice that led me away from their cause.

  He leaned on his cane and sighed. A cloud of condensation fanned across the glass of the window, then faded away. When the wind gusted down the street, a draft whistled in. The cold made his leg throb.

  Feminine laughter rang out from the drawing room. That, at least, brought a smile to his lips. In spite of the opinions of Annapolis’s gentlemen, Kate still had her dearest friend at her side, the one person other than family to ever draw her out. Which meant that though he might feel the pangs of ostracism, she did not. Praise the Lord for that.

  Edwinn turned from the window and sat down again, resting his cane against the desk. It took only a moment to pen the latest news for their uncle. He’d let the ink dry while he paid his respects to Sena and her companion, then send it off in the post.

  Giggling met his ears as he stepped from his study. He smiled and moved across the entryway to the room opposite. His cane tapped with every other step, but the young ladies didn’t seem to hear him. He e
ntered unnoticed, giving him a moment to take in the scene.

  Kate sat on the settee, her hand clasped in Sena’s, both with heads thrown back in laughter. He always enjoyed seeing them together, his sister with her russet curls yet even temperament, Sena with her dark locks and sense of adventure. Perhaps an unlikely pair, the spirited and the shy, but ever since they were children, they had been inseparable.

  Except during the war, of course.

  He kept himself from looking at Sena overlong. She would be an easy young lady to admire, but what was the use? Her father now counted Edwinn an enemy. Instead, he set his gaze to wandering to the stranger, who sat on Kate’s other side. He drew in a long breath. She had hair of a warm brown, eyes of an endless, deep blue. A face more sweet than stunning…and sorrow lurking behind an affable mask.

  How well he knew that feeling.

  Perhaps she felt his gaze, for her eyes turned from the girls to him. What was that, that made him feel as if he knew her, though even her name was a mystery? The faintest hint of a blush infused her fair cheeks.

  Edwinn offered a smile and then cleared his throat and forced his gaze back to Kate and Sena. “Good morning, ladies.”

  “There you are, Mr. Calvert.” Sena’s brilliant smile tempted him to let his thoughts dwell on her. “Allow me to introduce Miss Lark Benton of Endover Plantation, near Williamsburg. Lark, Kate’s elder brother, Mr. Edwinn Calvert.”

  Of nowhere. No longer of Calvert Street, no longer at the Briers Plantation. He bent at the waist. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Miss Benton. I do hope you are enjoying Annapolis.”

  She nodded and smiled. “I only arrived yesterday, but I am sure I will enjoy it immensely, thank you.”

  A smile played around the corners of Kate’s mouth, proving this new acquaintance was one she liked. Perhaps one she could grow comfortable with. “Lark will be staying with the Randels until spring.”

  Spring? She would be here for months, then. Long enough for Kate to warm to her, though otherwise it could hardly affect him. No matter how sweet her features, how alluring her eyes, he was beyond seeking romance in every lovely new acquaintance.

  These past years had taught him that if the Lord called him to wed and start a family, he would have to travel into British territory to find a wife. And given how near he was to thirty, and the leg that made travel so uncomfortable…bachelorhood would have to suffice.

  Yet the lecture did little to quiet the whisper of wistfulness. Was it so wrong to wish for a companion? To wish he had the freedom of other, Patriot men, to pay court to the young women around him and discover what match the Lord might have in store for him?

  Edwinn renewed his smile and took the chair across from them. “The three of you will have ample time for mischief, then.” To Miss Benton he added, “It is inevitable when in the company of these two.”

  Her smile was like the unfurling of a rose. “I determined as much the moment Sena knocked me to the sidewalk yesterday afternoon.”

  A chuckle slipped out. “Bowling over visitors now, are you, Miss Randel?”

  “It was all Mrs. Green’s fault, chasing me with a rolling pin as she was.” Sena’s eyes gleamed.

  Miss Benton laughed. “She had no rolling pin.”

  “She must have dropped it in the bushes before you saw her. She was determined I not leave the house without escort, though no one could be spared to come with me, and I was determined to reach Kate before another snowstorm struck.” Her attempt at a serious face gave way to a grin. “Well, perhaps she had only a metaphorical rolling pin. Still, I would not have run directly into Miss Benton had I not been so set on escaping her and her infernal Poor Richard quotes. She was screeching, ‘Glass, china, and reputations are easily crack’d, and never well mended’ from the moment I descended the stairs.”

  He’d heard stories enough of Mrs. Green to laugh with the ladies, though he had met the Randels’ housekeeper—a distant cousin of Mrs. Randel—only a few times.

  “Well, we are glad to have you in our fair town for a while.” Kate graced the visitor with a small but warm smile and stood to meet Mrs. Haslip, who entered with the tea service. “Everyone likes chocolate, correct?”

  After the chorus of agreements, Sena grinned again. “I have yet to tell you the most exciting part of Lark’s presence, Kate. She is a runaway!”

  Coming from anyone else, that pronouncement might have shocked Edwinn into dropping the silver cup of steaming chocolate Kate handed him. Given its source, he merely sipped and waited for an explanation.

  Kate, however, always fed her friend’s dramatic bent. The moment her hands were free, they flew to cover her mouth. “A runaway?”

  He suspected the flush in Miss Benton’s cheeks had little to do with the hot drink she now held. “’Tis hardly the proper word for it. And it is nothing interesting.”

  “Nothing interesting?” Sena accepted a cup and arched her brows. “My dear, you have broken off an engagement and let your family secret you away in the middle of the night—what could possibly be more interesting than that?”

  “Your betrothed has no idea where you are?” Kate poured the last cup for herself and settled between the other ladies once more. She gazed down into her cup. “Will he not worry?”

  Indeed. Edwinn sipped again, not sure if he ought to hold such a thing against this young woman…or if perhaps it spoke to the urgency of her arrival here.

  Miss Benton focused her gaze on her chocolate. “I cannot think he will be overconcerned, and my family approved of my coming to Annapolis to gather my thoughts. My brother was a student of Mr. Randel and served under him in the war. I posted a letter assuring everyone I arrived safely, and I am certain they will let Mr. Fielding know I am well if he asks. But had I not left…” She shook her head and blinked rapidly. “Many would say I ought to have borne the situation. But I could not.”

  “Well of course not! Her betrothed was a genuine villain and betrayed her in the worst way imaginable.”

  Miss Benton greeted Sena’s pronouncement with a crooked grin. “He is not a villain, Sena, only…not in love with me.”

  His first thought—the man was a fool—gave way to one far more certain and more of his spirit than his mind: she still loved this man, villain or not.

  And why should that make him want to sigh? He didn’t even know her. And if she knew him, it would undoubtedly not work to his favor, given that her brother was a Patriot soldier. Her family would be no more welcoming to him than Mr. Randel was. Which meant one more could-have-been that would never be.

  Edwinn succumbed to the sigh and set his chocolate on a table. The Lord obviously had some purpose in bringing this fetching young lady into his life, in opening his senses to her so quickly. And obviously, it was for no purpose other than to be a friend.

  So be it.

  “You are very brave.” Kate drew in a wistful breath and cradled her cup in her hands. “I would never have the courage to end an engagement, if ever I manage to procure one.”

  “Had I not, I suspect my cousin would have managed to end it without my input. But I cannot think you will have a hard time finding a husband, Kate.” Miss Benton smiled with oblivion. “You are so lovely and sweet.”

  His sister blushed. “I thank you. But I am not invited anywhere—”

  “Oh!” Sena all but leapt up and settled on the very edge of her cushion. “That reminds me. Papa asks you both to come on Christmas.”

  For a moment, only the tick of the mantel clock filled the room. Kate met his gaze, a world of meaning in her eyes. Mr. Randel had never forbidden her entry to his home—being a fair man, he had not held her responsible for Edwinn’s politics—but he had not been welcome at Randel House since the Revolution.

  What did it mean, this invitation? Simply that John Randel was showing Christian kindness for Christmas? Or were perceived wrongs finally forgiven?

  Either way, his lips curved up. “We would be delighted. After church?”

  “
That will be perfect.”

  Perfection he was unsure of—but hopefully it was a promise of things to come.

  Chapter Six

  Lark pulled her cloak tighter and stared up with awe at the elegant abode. “I do not understand, Sena. If this is the Calverts’ house, then why…?”

  Her friend pursed her lips and blew a breath out through them. “I doubted you would realize. Their property was seized during the war.”

  That brought Lark’s eyebrows together. “Seized? But why?”

  They started walking again along Calvert Street—named after Kate’s family, apparently—back toward the Randels’. Sena shook her head. “Why else? Edwinn remained loyal to the Crown.”

  Lark came to an abrupt halt and spun back to look at the columns of the house. “He is a…a Tory?” Shouldn’t she have realized the moment she met him? Shouldn’t it have been emblazoned across his forehead, or apparent through a stubborn glint in his eyes, a haughty demeanor? But Mr. Calvert had been the epitome of gentle manners, even humility. The way he had teased his sister and Sena—that look he had given her when he first came in—surely those were not the marks of a Tory.

  There had been families loyal to King George in Williamsburg, of course, but most of them fled when independence was declared, many returning to England. She had met none since the war ended. Hadn’t thought any would dare show their faces.

  Sena urged her onward when a gust of wind whipped over them. “And no one will forgive him for it, though he and Kate are the best people I know. Do you not agree?”

  “They are wonderful.” She had never met a young lady as sweet as Kate, though indeed she had been very shy, especially at the start. And Mr. Calvert—he was nearly as handsome as Emerson with his auburn hair and strong features. When he had looked at her, it was as if he saw her. Really saw her, and approved of what met his gaze.

  Why could Emerson never look at her like that? In all the years they had known each other, not once had he shown as much interest as Mr. Calvert did in that single look. No man ever had. And why should this one, now? Even if her heart were ready for someone else, her family would never approve of a Tory.