Page 45 of Reckless Kiss

“He’s cute,” she said, reaching for it.

Archer handed it over, picked up the box, and placed the photo album inside.

“I went everywhere with it as a kid, and when I became too cool for cuddly toys, he sat on my shelf in my old bedroom.”

Erica stood and stepped to Archer, the box the only thing separating them. “Did you hear what I said before?”

“About keeping us a secret? Yeah, I heard you. I get it. I’m sure you don’t want your friends and family knowing about the man you married with oil under his fingernails.”

She shook her head and then dropped her chin for a few beats before she speared him with a stern stare.

“My darling Archer, how little you know about my family or me. I’d be proud to marry someone who worked for a living, who came home dirty from a long day’s work. Please don’t make any judgments about me. You’ll hurt my feelings. My desire to keep things quiet and secret is to protect you and not me.”

Archer’s watch beeped before he could ask his question. When he saw the alarm alert him to forty-five minutes until he needed to meet his aunt, his question about her needs left his head.

“I have to go, Erica. My aunt doesn’t like tardiness.”

“She’ll hate me. I seem to be late for everything. I’ll keep Peter hostage until you return to retrieve him. If you feel you can’t come back this evening. I’ll see you at the pool tomorrow.”

Erica leaned across the box as much as she could to kiss his cheek and then turned to walk back into her cottage, leaving him alone with a single box of his most precious possessions.

After a shower and a change of clothes, Archer hurried below stairs to the kitchen to swipe up whatever Maggie had baked. Now that he was back in the house, she’d taken to baking in the afternoon. Archer thought she’d have to up her game if his siblings returned, as they all had a sweet tooth. Today was cookies, and by the time he’d run up the stone steps and into the foyer, he’d eaten two. He brushed the crumbs off his shirt and checked his reflection in the front door’s glass before striding across the stone floor to the morning room.

Bailey was waiting at the door, checking his pocket watch. Archer had arrived bang on time. With a nod from Bailey, he opened the door for Archer. Archer entered the room and saw his aunt on the far side. The morning room was vast, with a dozen sofas set facing each other down the long galley-style room. On one wall was a fireplace so big you could roast a hog over the flames. On the other side of the room were lead-lined windows. Usually, as the name suggested, the family only spent the morning in the room and then moved around the house chasing the sun. Therewere two places Archer could find his aunt if she weren’t resting in her room. The greenhouse where she cultivated exotic flowers or the morning room.

At four in the afternoon, the sun was high in the sky but shining on the other side of the house. He felt the chill in the room from the old bricks and regretted not wearing a pullover.

“Good afternoon, Aunt Cynthia,” he said in greeting.

She sat in a wicker chair facing out the window. The lawns from her vantage point were vast and plain until they reached the tree line obscuring the ocean beyond.

“Please sit down. Bailey is fetching Earl Grey tea for us.”

He wasn’t an Earl Grey tea drinker, and she knew it. But she was, so that was all that mattered to her. Archer accepted this was her house and her rules. So tea for two it would be. He hoped there was a third cookie coming his way.

“Open the box, will you, Archer?” she asked, pointing to the large mahogany box on the tall table a few feet away.

Archer stood and walked to where she indicated and lifted the lid. Inside were rows of rings nestled in purple velvet. The delicate bands with small, medium, and large jewels balanced on top. These looked old, much older than he expected the family jewels were. Most of them were for women, but with their age, they could’ve been for men in the 1700s and early 1800s. He couldn’t imagine how much money he was looking at in the velvet-lined box. And one day they would belong to him. Running his finger along the raised benches, he searched through the dozens of rings, counting as he went. When he got to thirty, he stopped and picked up the gold ring.

“Ah, I see you’ve spotted it,” she said from her seat, not getting up. “That’s the family’s signet ring. Your fathernever wanted to wear it. Your grandfather was the last to wear it. If you find a wife and take over the wedding business, I expect you to wear it.”

“Is that a condition of the contract we struck?” Archer said, half turning to look at his aunt.

“It’s not a deal-breaker, but I want to know you’ll take the Turner business seriously. Hundreds of years of history exist in this building and on this island. My brother didn’t care for any of it, but he was in line to inherit it. It broke my heart to see him shun all the old ways.”

“Why didn’t you inherit as the eldest?”

“My father had decided.”

Archer waited for more, but his aunt remained tight-lipped.

He didn’t wear jewellery and never had, but if it made his aunt happy, he would. He was getting married, and he wanted to wear a wedding band. What was one more ring?

“Which hand do I wear it on?”

“Your grandfather wore it on his left hand on his pinkie finger. His father, your great-grandfather, wore it on his right hand on his forefinger. Your father didn’t want to wear it at all. He told our father that it would never be worn as it would get in the way of his work on the oil rigs. But he told me privately he wanted nothing to do with old ways. He hated the way his father paraded the family wealth.”

“It’s a bit ironic, isn’t it, seeing as no one can have any of that wealth until the older generation has gone? It’s not like its shared wealth.”

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