Page 3 of Liaison with the Champagne Count
‘I’ve never met anyone like you, Emma. I know it’s only been a few weeks, but I want to marry you. I cannot imagine a life without you.’
Like the man himself, his will went straight to the details, bequests and the division of assets. There were no surprises but hearing the words made it no less sad. Robert would have Oakwood and most of its contents, which were both entailed with the baronetcy. The stripping had begun. It wasn’t the things she minded losing. It was the memories they represented. That’s what she was being deprived of: the right to live among those remembrances. Mr Lake looked up from his reading, eyeing Robert over the top of the documents. ‘Lady Luce is to be allowed to claim whatever items she desires from the house.’
‘DowagerLady Luce,’ Robert corrected, staring at Mr Lake, refusing to look at her. ‘Mywife is Lady Luce.’ Robert was plundering mercilessly today. She should have expected such callousness. Robert had been jealous when his father had remarried, fearful of sharing his father’s love and perhaps more fearful of sharing his father’s money and status. After all, his father had given her, a woman of no real standing, a title he himself could not have until his father died. She supposed it stood to reason Robert would take even her name from her—her married name—the name that said she was Garrett’s partner.
Mr Lake was not intimidated. He gave Robert a stern look. ‘Those are your father’s words, Sir Robert.’
‘Of course.’ Robert’s glance flicked in her direction with more disdain than consideration in his dark eyes. ‘I am sure we’ll come to an agreement. After all, several of Oakwood’s unentailed contents aremymother’s.’ Emma met his eyes with the full steel of her own. She was not fooled. His polite words were the barely veiled throwing of a gauntlet. He, who’d not been interested in Oakwood’s contents for years, would now use the shield of his mother’s memory to argue every unentailed knick-knack, every piece of china, every chair and every picture. He wanted her to beg. But Emma Greyville-Luce begged no one, especially not a man who wanted her on her knees. She’d learned that lesson early at her father’s knee. There was money, and then there was gin money, and no number of attempts to do clean gin business could wash away the stain. Society had wanted James Greyville to beg for their acceptance, but her father had refused. A Greyville had nothing to be ashamed of. Now it was Society begging him. She would not beg Robert for a single thing. Instead, she would flank him with Mr Lake in the room as witness.
She gave Robert a hard look, her terms ready. ‘I want only the Baccarat glassware, and the chandelier we purchased on our honeymoon in France.’ The collection was extensive but it would not beggar the estate of drinking glasses.
‘I think that is reasonable,’ Mr Lake put in swiftly, using Robert’s own argument against him before he could interject. ‘Surely, Sir Robert, you have no attachment to that? I can make a note of it today so it’s on record.’
Estelle tossed her blond head. ‘Let her have it, Robert. It’s not even Bohemian crystal. We’ll want something with a little more...lineageto it.’ Emma let the snub go. Baccarat was not old but Garrett, always future-focused, had seen great potential in the French glassblower.
Mr Lake turned to her. ‘Is there anything else, Lady Luce?’
‘No, nothing other than my personal affects, jewellery and clothes.’ She’d resigned herself to leaving much behind in exchange for her pride. She would not haggle with Robert like a fishwife, even if there was artwork and china she could rightly claim beyond the Baccarat. She did not expect Robert and Steven to be grateful though. And they weren’t.
‘We have an inventory of the family jewels,’ Robert began as if they were a ducal family with a vault instead of a family in possession of a baronetcy for a mere ten years.
‘Iknowwhat’s on the list.’ She cut him off sharply. ‘Rest assured, I have no intentions of cheating you out of a single pearl.’ It felt good to fight, to feel something, anything, even if it was anger, in her veins again. No wonder Fleur had relied on anger to get her through the early days of their loss. The last of the numbness that had enveloped her since the flood was losing its hold. Estelle gasped at her rudeness as if her own husband hadn’t been insulting his father’s widow since he’d arrived two days prior and taken up residence with an astonishing sense of entitled permanency.
‘Well, so do I,’ Robert retorted.
Mr Lake cleared his throat. ‘Shall we move on? There are stocks and other assets to go through.’ He dangled the carrot of funds and both Steven and Robert bit. The business investments were split between the brothers with the option to share ownership. She’d not expected it to be otherwise, although she’d be lying to herself that she didn’t feel a sense of loss at watching her hard work being handed off. She’d helped build those companies as much as the Luce men had, spending her days with the ledgers. She’d been the one to tell Garrett he was being overcharged for his oak wine barrels at the chateau. She was the one who’d set up the dinner that resulted in Garrett winning the shipping contract for a large tea importer. She’d been an active and successful part of Garrett’s business life as much as she’d been part of his private life. Still, one could hardly expect a woman to run a shipping empire even in this modern age. A woman at the helm of such a business would likely sink it and such an outcome did not honour Garrett’s hard work. Hope whispered: there was one industry a woman might participate in—wine, champagne. If his sons had the British businesses, surely they were satisfied? Surely, Garrett would have saved her something, would have known what she wanted, where she could be successful on her own...?
‘Lastly, there is the issue of the chateau in France.’ Mr Lake’s words had her sitting up stiff and ramrod straight, her body wound with tension. A glance passed between Robert and Steven that made her nervous. Everyone was bracing themselves. For her, this was the moment that decided everything.Please, please,please...The word became a litany in her mind.
Mr Lake’s gaze was on the papers, inscrutable as he read. ‘“The chateau near Cumières in France is not part of the entailment and as such it and its lands are left to the care of my beloved wife, Emma Greyville-Luce, in the hopes that it will be a place of remembrance and renewal for her as long as she desires.”’ The knot in her stomach eased and her eyes smarted with tears. So many words. At last, a little poetry, a little flowery language Garrett-style. This was her husband’s idea of a love letter and her heart squeezed. He’d not forgotten her. He’d known how much the chateau had meant to her. He’d not just lavished her generically with his wealth, but he’d given her something that held meaning for her, something she could build with her own efforts. He believed in her.
Mr Lake looked up and Emma did not imagine the satisfaction on his face. ‘“All accounts and papers associated with the chateau should be placed directly into her possession.”’
‘No.’ Robert’s voice cut through the peace that had settled on her.
‘Excuse me, Sir Robert?’ It was Mr Lake who spoke, his brows arched in perplexity. ‘No, what?’
Robert’s face was thunderous. ‘No,shedoes not get the chateau in France. I will contest this.’
Whatever numbness remained dissolved at this new threat. Fire began to burn slow and sure in her veins. ‘Why do you care, Sir Robert?’ she said with deliberate challenge in her voice, not waiting for Mr Lake. ‘You’ve never even been there. You know nothing of the wine business.’ And she did, or at least she knew the libations business through her father. Selling wine was not much different than selling gin, although producing it was. Like Antonia, she would figure it out as she went.
Mr Lake quietly came to her defence. ‘There is nothing to contest, Sir Robert. The chateau is hers.’
‘Fine, it’s not as if it’s a huge money-maker. It barely breaks even. It’s an expensive hobby just so my father can import his own wines to his dinner table. I’ve been telling him to sell it for ages.’ Faced with a twin front, Robert settled into his chair, fuming. His gaze landed on her, and Emma braced. Robert had been bested. He needed to save face. Whatever came out of his mouth next would be cruel, designed to hurt. ‘Pack up your things, then. If you want that chateau so badly, be gone in the morning. I don’t want your fortune-hunting shadow darkening the halls of Oakwood longer than necessary. This is not your home any longer.’
Mr Lake slid Robert a disapproving look and took out a packet of documents. ‘These are yours, Lady Luce. You’ll find the deed and other papers for the chateau. I will send for my wife to help with your packing. It would be my pleasure to make travel arrangements for you and a pleasure to give you a farewell supper at my home tonight once you’ve completed packing. You can leave from our place in the morning. There’s a coach that departs from the inn for Dover in the morning if that’s sufficient. My wife and I can send the Baccarat on later if need be.’
‘Mrs Lake’s company would be welcome, as would your kind offer.’ Emma smiled her gratitude. This was an unexpected kindness. She would not be left here alone to endure Robert’s and Steven’s glares and the indignities of having every item she packed questioned.
Upstairs in her room, Emma shut the door behind her and allowed herself a deep breath—a breath to steady herself against the emotions of the afternoon, and another breath of relief. It was settled. The chateau was hers. Life was starting again—herlife was starting again. After fourteen days, five hours, and thirty-six minutes, there was something to look forward to. Although, this was not quite the leave-taking Emma had imagined when she’d pictured departing Oakwood.
In her mind, she’d thought of it as a slow, gradual process, a chance to walk the house, to take out her memories one last time and savour her life here as if it were a fine wine. Instead, Robert’s hatred of her had tried to turn ‘seeing her off’ into ‘running her off.’
Perhaps it was better this way. After two weeks of time standing still, of being trapped in a nightmare comprised of tragedy and the unknown, everything was happening at lightning speed. Within days, barring difficulty with travel and tides, she’d be in Paris. Within the week, she’d be in Cumières. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the door, doing the travel timetables. She whispered to the room she’d once shared with Garrett, ‘Thank you, my love.’
Chapter Two
Julien Archambeau had been born to love the land.La femme la plus difficile qu’un homme puisse aimer.The most difficult woman a man could love—hisgrandpèrewould say. And yet Julien knew he’d choose no other, especially on a sharp, clear March morning with rare blue sky above him and the promise of spring lurking in the veins of his beloved vines.
