The Hostage. Сьюзен Виггс

night, and as a reward, he expected twice the bride price he and her father had settled on. “Then you will be pleased to know that you won’t have to pay him a cent,” she said, keeping her voice firm even though she wanted to die. She loved her father, honored him, on occasion felt close to worshiping him. The times she had crossed him were few and far between, but now was one of those times.

      “What in tarnation do you mean by that?”

      “I’ve decided not to marry Philip,” she stated.

      That got his attention. He froze in the midst of ramming notes and certificates into the leather satchel and turned to face her. “That’s not amusing, Deborah.”

      “I’m not trying to be amusing. I’m trying to—” She paused. What was she doing? Her future, indeed her entire existence had been defined by the fact that she was going to be the wife of one of the most socially prominent men in the country. Without that, who was she? Until now, that question had never occurred to her but suddenly the answer seemed vital. Closing her eyes, she took a leap in the dark. “I won’t marry Philip Ascot.”

      “You’re getting cold feet before the wedding,” her father said reasonably, his face softening with an indulgent smile. “Common enough in a bride, or so I’m told.”

      She tried again. “It’s not a matter of cold feet. My mind and my heart have changed. Irrevocably. Until yesterday…I thought marrying Philip was the future I wanted. I didn’t know any better. I…I’m sorry.”

      “The wedding will go forward as planned,” he snapped, his temper pushing through fatherly indulgence. “You’ll learn to govern your infantile tantrums and behave like a true woman. Everything is settled. The guest list includes everyone up to Mrs. Grant herself. You don’t simply tell the First Lady—”

      “I’ll tell her myself,” Deborah promised, though the prospect terrified her. “We’re talking about the rest of my life, Father. I won’t live it with Philip Ascot.”

      Anger blazed in his eyes. “You’ll live your life as I say,” he stated. “I have always acted in your best interest.”

      “I know you believe you have,” she conceded. “But this time, I must trust my own judgment.”

      “You will trust me. Haven’t I always given you the best of everything? Haven’t I spent a fortune turning you into the sort of young lady a man of quality dreams of marrying?”

      “What about my dreams?” she asked, but she spoke so softly that he didn’t hear.

      “You have no understanding of what your life would be if I simply let you have your way,” he went on, his face flushing a deep, unhealthy red. “You’d be hopeless, no better off than a saloon girl or a farm wife. Thanks to me, you’ll never know struggle, never know hardship. Your children will have the world at their feet. But only if you provide a proper family background—as an Ascot.”

      Deborah began to pace the long, carpeted room. “You arranged this marriage with no regard for my wishes. Do you realize I was never asked? You and Philip met over brandy and cigars, and the next day I was presented with this.” She held up her hand, pale in the gaslight, a very large diamond winking obscenely.

      “You seemed perfectly delighted,” he pointed out.

      “Because you were, Father. I should have objected long ago.” But she hadn’t. She had been as dazzled by Philip’s good looks and charming flattery as her father had been by his social standing. “Don’t you see that when human hearts are involved, you can’t simply make things happen?”

      “Balderdash. What are they teaching you at that school?”

      “Clearly not enough to help me make you understand,” she said.

      “Arranged marriages are the hallmark of a civilized society. Love doesn’t happen overnight. You must show patience and understanding, and above all, obedience to those who know what is best for you.”

      “I will never love Philip. Ever.”

      “The opportunity to marry into the Ascot family doesn’t arise very often. Philip’s an only child, and he has no cousins. You need this marriage, Deborah.”

      “No, you need it. And Philip needs it. For all his blue-blooded pedigree, he is nearly destitute. He has the name. You have the fortune. Together the two of you have everything you want. I can’t imagine why you even need me. Just make him your son and be done with it.” The words burst from her, and the moment they were out, she wished she could catch them from the air and somehow make them disappear. But it was too late.

      Her father stood staring at her, and his face bore the shocked expression of a man who had just been stabbed in the back.

      Although he would never admit it, Arthur Sinclair had always felt inferior because his money was considered “new” by the upper crust. And to her father, the opinions of the socially prominent mattered greatly. He yearned for the one thing his money could not buy—the patina of generations-old gentility. In his mind—and in the minds of those he strove to impress—there was a particular quality to inherited wealth that was lacking in the fortunes of a self-made man. He would never be able to achieve that quality, but he could take a step closer by marrying his only daughter and heir to the flawlessly aristocratic Philip Widener Ascot IV.

      They had never spoken of this, of course, and the fact that Deborah had brought it up was a measure of her desperation. Remorseful for having hurt him, she said, “You’re a good man, Father. The best there is. Whether or not I marry Philip will not change that.”

      Slowly his coloring returned to normal. He no longer looked harsh or angry, just immeasurably disappointed.

      “Father, I didn’t come here to quarrel with you,” she said quietly.

      Moving as if his bones hurt, he lowered himself to his chair. When Deborah looked at him, she always saw a titan of industry, a man who was larger than life, larger than legend, even. Yet tonight, something was different. He simply looked like a man worn down by weariness. She couldn’t tell if the change was in her, or in him.

      “Did I ever tell you what your mother said to me the day she died?” he asked after a long pause.

      Deborah didn’t follow the sudden switch in topic, but he seemed calmer now. She owed it to him to let him make his point. “You’ve said so little of that day,” she said. “I know it must have been painful for you.”

      She had been just three when her mother died giving birth to a stillborn son. Deborah had exactly one memory of her mother. It was just a flash of awareness, not really a full-blown memory. She had been too young for that. But that made the faint, flickering awareness all the more important to her.

      Sometimes, when Deborah closed her eyes and emptied her mind, she could call up that memory, achingly vivid and scented with violets. She could feel the gentle touch of her mother’s cool hand on her brow, could recall being awash in her mother’s love. Even now, so many years later, she remembered the sweet whisper of a soft voice, saying, “Go to sleep, my precious girl. Go to sleep.”

      And there it ended. Perhaps the moment had never really happened, perhaps Deborah had fabricated it out of her own yearning for just one tender memory of the mother she had never known. But no matter. She believed the moment had happened, and would never let the memory go. She held it clasped to her heart, stubbornly and tightly, like a pearl in a closed fist.

      Her father had not remarried because, by then, pride and ambition held him in their grip. He would only accept a wife of the highest social distinction…yet such a woman would never have him, a vulgar upstart. Frustrated, he put all his energy into raising Deborah to achieve the one thing he never could—class. He never asked her if she wanted it; he just assumed she craved social prominence as intensely as he did.

      He and Deborah only had each other. He regarded her as his most priceless ornament, and would settle for no less than a fourth-generation Ascot for her husband.

      “What