Gifts of Love Read online

Perry Whitton was a shy, middle-aged bachelor, a friend of some of the most influential women in Boston society. He had innumerable female acquaintances, but never showed a romantic interest in any of them. Whitton’s looks were pleasant but unthreatening, his manner engaging but not flirtatious. Any husband would feel completely secure in leaving his wife in Whitton’s company.

  “You know it was not like that,” Laura said in a low voice.

  Perry had been an acquaintance of the Prescotts for years—the kiss had been a gesture of sympathy not passion. As Laura had welcomed him to the party, Perry had seen the strain on her face and the unhappiness beneath her social pleasantries.

  “You are as lovely as always,” Perry had said kindly, “but I would presume to say that something is troubling you.”

  It was indeed. Laura had no intention of confiding in him about her problems with Jason, but to her horror she realized she was about to cry. She would rather have died than make an emotional scene. Understanding her dilemma, Perry had taken her to a private place. And before she could say a word, he had kissed her.

  “Jason, surely you can’t think there are romantic feelings between Perry and me,” she said in guarded tones.

  She quivered with unease as her husband approached her and seized her upper arms. “I own you,” he said hoarsely. “Every inch of you.” His eyes raked over the satin evening gown she wore. “Your face, your body, your every thought. The fact that I don’t choose to partake of your favors does not mean I’ll allow you to bestow them on any other man. You are mine, and mine alone.”

  Laura’s astonished green eyes met his. “You are hurting me. Jason, you know the kiss meant nothing.”

  “No, I don’t know that.” He glanced down at her body in that insulting way again, his cruel gaze seeming to strip off her garments. “You’re a beautiful woman, beautiful enough to make even Perry Whitton want you. He may have made the mistake of thinking he could find some warmth in that slender little body. Perhaps he isn’t aware that you’re as lovely and cold as a marble statue.”

  Laura flinched and turned her face away. Jason could see a moist patch on her cheek where her tears had not yet dried. He had never seen her cry, not in all the time they had known each other. “What were you crying about?” he demanded, his voice as rough as the blade of a saw.

  Laura was silent, staring at him uncomprehendingly. In her family there had never been displays of anger or violence. Hale’s boyish antics had provided the only excitement in the Prescotts’ placid world. During the last years when her brother had been away at school, her life had been as quiet as a nun’s. As Jason glared at her, demanding that she explain herself, she was too overwhelmed to speak.

  Cursing savagely, Jason yanked her against him. Her racing heartbeat pounded against his, and her skirts flowed around his feet. His dark head bent, and his mouth crushed hers. She whimpered and tried to pull her head back, but he caught her jaw in his fingers and held her still. His lips were hard and bruising, his kiss infused with raw anger. She gasped and went rigid, enduring the brutal onslaught.

  Jason let go of her so swiftly that she stumbled back a few steps. “I can feel how my touch disgusts you,” he jeered. “It must be humiliating for the daughter of Cyril Prescott to be fondled by a grocer’s son. You were meant to marry a Boston Brahmin, but instead you became the wife of a workingman, a shanty mick. I bought you, paid for you with money so new the ink was barely dry. I know how your friends pity you. God knows you have reason to pity yourself.”

  Laura’s face turned white, the marks of his fingers showing on her jaw. They stared at each other in the brittle silence. When it became clear he was going to say no more, she turned and fled the room as if the devil were at her heels.

  Jason dropped his black head and rubbed the back of his neck wearily. He was filled with self-hatred. He had promised himself he would never hurt her, and once again he had broken that vow. He had spent his entire life trying to overcome his heritage and hide his rough edges. Most of all he had devoted himself to making money, for he had realized in his youth that being rich was the only way to compensate for the lack of a proper name and bloodlines.

  In the past two months of marriage, Laura had organized his life and provided for his comforts with an efficiency he would never take for granted. Managing the household, entertaining their friends and guests, and accompanying him to social events were things she did with ease. Her taste was flawless, and he didn’t question her opinions even when it came to his own clothes. Subtly she influenced him in matters of style and discrimination, and he valued her advice.

  Jason knew how other men envied him for his wife, and he took pride in her accomplishments. Laura co-sponsored charitable functions for the benefit of the poor and was a member of the Ladies’ Christian Association. Her leisure pursuits were all proper and respectable: attending lectures, going to the theater, and encouraging the arts in Boston. Everyone agreed she was a quiet but charming woman, a model of self-restraint. Not for a minute did Jason regret marrying her. But that did not make her contempt for him any easier to bear.

  He remembered the day he had approached Cyril Prescott for Laura’s hand in marriage. In spite of their distinguished name, the Prescotts’ fortune was dwindling. Such “first families” sometimes found it necessary to sacrifice one of their daughters to the vulgar newly monied class. Marrying Laura had not been as difficult as Jason had expected. It had boiled down to a matter of money, and he had been easily able to meet Cyril Prescott’s asking price. “I would not consent to this,” Cyril had said, looking both indignant and shamefaced, “if I thought you would prove to be an unworthy husband to my daughter. But you appear to hold her in high regard. And there is obviously no question that you will provide well for her.”

  “She’ll have everything she wants,” Jason replied smoothly, concealing his triumph at finally obtaining the woman he had wanted for so many years. Afterward he had proposed to Laura in a businesslike manner, informing her of the decision that had already been made between him and her father. They never had a courtship—Jason had felt it would be unwise to give her an opportunity to spurn him, which she most certainly would have done. Instead he had maneuvered the situation so that she had no choice but to accept him as her husband. He knew there was no other way he could have had her. She was desired by every eligible man in Boston. Had it not been for him, she would have become the wife of a gentleman with blood as blue as her own.

  In time, Jason had thought, she would learn to accept him…and then perhaps he could begin to reveal his feelings for her. Unfortunately he had not anticipated how repelled she would be by his touch. She had such obvious disgust for her socially inferior husband that, God help him, he—who had always been so self-contained—couldn’t seem to stop himself from losing his temper around her.

  Keeping her head down, Laura strode rapidly along the hallway, her only thought being to escape. A short distance away was the large music room, which also doubled as a ballroom. The crowd of guests indulged in light conversation and danced to the buoyant waltz being played by the orchestra. Oblivious to the music and laughter, Laura made her way through the entrance hall to the front door and slipped outside. The November air was damp as it bit through her brocaded satin gown. She shuddered in misery and wrapped her arms around her middle, staring out at the dimly lit street where lacquered broughams and liveried drivers waited for the guests to depart.

  Drawing herself into the porch shadows of the fashionable six-story Beacon Street home, Laura wondered what she was going to do. It was obvious that Jason hated her. She could not face him anymore. She was a failure as a wife, as a woman. Tears welled up in her eyes, and she willed herself not to cry. Good Lord, what if someone saw her out here, weeping on the steps of her own home?

  Suddenly she heard a cheerful whistle on the street. Anxiously she stared into the darkness. “H-hale?” she cried. “Hale, is that you?”

  Her brother’s gentle laugh drifted to her. “Hmmm…why,
yes, I believe it is. Have I crossed the line between fashionably late and too, too late?”

  Laura gave a watery chuckle. “As always.”

  “Ah, you’ll forgive me,” Hale said, and leaped up the stairs with his customary vigor. “Have you been waiting for me? Damn, you’re out here in that thin dress! How long—” He broke off as he took her face in his gloved hands and tilted it up.

  Tears spilled from Laura’s eyes, and she gripped his wrists tightly. “I’m glad you’re here, Hale,” she choked out.

  “Laura, sweetheart.” Alarmed, Hale pulled her head against the front of his wool coat. “My God, what’s the matter?”

  “I can’t tell you.”

  “Oh, you can and you will. But not here.” He ruffled her hair, carelessly disarranging her coiled chignon. “We’ll go inside and have a talk.”

  Laura shook her head. “People…people will see—”

  “We’ll walk around the house and come in through the kitchen.” Hale shrugged out of his coat and draped it over her narrow shoulders. “It has something to do with Jason, doesn’t it?”

  Her throat closed painfully, and she nodded. Without another word Hale put his arm around her waist and guided her down the steps, shielding her from the view of the drivers and passersby. By the time they reached the kitchen, which opened onto the backyard, Laura was shivering violently. The heat and light of the kitchen engulfed her, but they did not take away her numbness.

  “Why, Mrs. Moran,” she heard the housekeeper’s voice exclaim.

  Hale favored the older woman with an appealing smile. He had matured into a handsome and solidly built man with green eyes, rich brown hair, and a thick slash of a mustache. His openhearted manner charmed all women. “Mrs. Ramsey, I’m afraid my sister has the vapors,” he said. “Could you find a way to inform Mr. Moran—discreetly, mind you—that she has retired for the evening?”

  “Certainly, Mr. Prescott.”

  The vapors, Laura thought wryly. Well, it would work. The excuse was always accepted with quiet understanding. Because of the spoonbill corsets and heavy haircloth bustles worn under their gowns, women often experienced dizziness and fainting spells. In fact, such episodes were considered proof of a lady’s refinement.

  “Oh,” Hale added as he guided Laura out of the kitchen toward the stairs, “and would you have two toddies brought to the upstairs sitting room, Mrs. Ramsey?”

  “Yes, Mr. Prescott.”

  Laura handed the coat back to Hale, and they began to climb the three flights of stairs to the sitting room. “You probably don’t even know what the vapors are,” she said with a sniffle.

  He laughed. “No, and I really have no desire to find out.”

  They reached the sitting room. It was Laura’s private place. No one intruded, not even Jason, unless she invited them. Like the other rooms in the house, it was comfortable and elegant, with a flowered Persian rug, velvet drapes, plush chairs, tiny polished tables covered with lace and ornaments, and a marble fireplace. Laura had chosen the carefully blended styles of furnishings for the entire house, all matters of taste being left to her discretion. Jason preferred it that way.

  “Now,” Hale said, sinking to his haunches in front of the fireplace, “tell me everything while I stir up the fire.”

  Laura gathered up the fringed train of her evening dress and sat in a nearby chair. Morosely she kicked off her damp satin slippers with their two-inch heels and tiny diamond buckles. It pleased Jason for his wife to be dressed in the finest of garments. “I don’t know what to tell you,” she said. “Jason would be furious if he knew—”

  “Tell me everything,” Hale repeated patiently, glancing at her over his shoulder. “Remember, I was Jason’s closest friend until you married.”

  “Yes, I remember.” Laura’s mind turned back to all the holidays Jason had spent with her family. Although he and Hale had been in the same class at Harvard, Jason was two years older. He had never made pretensions about his background. His father had been a grocer, and his mother had peddled a fish cart.

  It was highly unusual for someone of Jason’s humble beginnings to have climbed as high as he already had. But Jason was intelligent, hardworking, and ruthlessly charming when he wished to be. Something in his voice and the way he moved proclaimed he was a man who knew exactly what he wanted—and what he wanted, he would get. And when he smiled, he was the most handsome man on earth.

  “Laura, what’s wrong?” Hale asked.

  “Everything. It’s been wrong since the beginning.” She peeled her gloves off and wiped her stinging eyes. “Jason has no idea how overwhelming he is. I don’t know how to please him, and when I try I fail miserably. I—I think something is wrong with me. Whenever we try to…be intimate, I don’t do whatever it is he expects me to do, and—”

  “Laura, wait.” Hale cleared his throat uncomfortably, his cheekbones tinged with red. “If you’re referring to the sort of thing that goes on in the bedroom, I think you had better discuss it with a woman.”

  Laura thought of her prudish mother and her straight-laced sisters. “Who do you suggest?” she asked.

  Hale groaned and clutched his head in his hands, looking down at the flowered carpet. “All right,” he said in a muffled voice. “Tell me. But keep in mind that a fellow doesn’t like to hear about his sister and…that.”

  She shook her head. “There is nothing to tell you.” After a brief pause, she repeated meaningfully, “Nothing.”

  Hale’s astonished green eyes met hers. “Are you trying to tell me…my God…that you and Jason have never…never?”

  “No,” Laura said, embarrassed but strangely relieved to be telling someone.

  Hale opened and closed his mouth several times before he could form another word. “Why not?” he finally managed to ask.

  She held her head in her hands much as he had a moment before, while her words burst out in a swift torrent. “Jason has approached me a few times, but I—I make him so angry. The last time we argued he accused me of being cold, a-and I suppose I must be, but I can’t seem to help myself! I thought that as time passed we might come to some kind of understanding, but things only worsened. He spends his days at his business offices, and he dines at his club, and whenever he is in the house we avoid meeting in the same room! There’s not the least bit of trust or friendliness between us. The best we’ve been able to manage is politeness, but now even that seems to be beyond us.”

  “I see,” Hale said, sounding strange. He stroked his mustache and shook his head.

  “And tonight,” Laura continued, “I was in the library with Perry Whitton, who kissed me—”

  “He what?” Hale gave her a disapproving glance.

  “Perry and I are friends, nothing more.”

  “All the same, Laura, you shouldn’t have allowed it.”

  “It happened too quickly for me to say or do anything! And of course Jason walked in and misinterpreted the situation, and said that I must be ashamed of being the wife of a shanty mick…and I don’t even know what that is!”

  “That’s what they call an Irishman, one from a peasant family so poor that even the women have to work.” Hale sighed heavily. “A mick, a blackleg, a greenhorn. A few of the fellows at Harvard didn’t give a damn about his being Irish, but most of them did. Jason was excluded and subtly insulted at almost every turn. After all, his background was the same as that of their servants. You know how they can be.” He made a face. “Frankly, I can’t blame Jason for being upset if he saw you with Perry Whitton. He is the epitome of all Jason could never be, a gentleman with the right name, the right family, the right upbringing.”

  Laura nodded in understanding. Boston society was fastidious about every entry in a family’s genealogy. Change was regarded with suspicion, and everything depended upon who one’s grandfather had happened to be. It was considered vulgar to work hard or make much money. The ideal Bostonian man was genteel, dignified, and intellectual. Someone like Jason, ambitious and driven, a self-ma
de man, was a shock to the more refined Bostonians such as the Whittons.

  “Hale,” she said fervently, “if I had wanted a man of Perry’s ilk, I wouldn’t have married Jason. How can I make him understand that?”

  “I don’t know.” Her brother looked guilty. “It won’t be easy to convince him. Your entire family disapproves of his heritage. We all know that Father only consented to the betrothal because of the extraordinary amount of money Jason’s made in real estate. And I…well, I told Jason at the beginning that I was against the marriage because he’s Irish.”

  “Y-you couldn’t have!” Laura exclaimed, horrified. “Hale, you don’t really feel that way!”

  “Oh, yes.” He nodded stubbornly. “I explained to Jason that I valued him as a friend, but I couldn’t approve of him marrying one of my sisters. Especially not you. I knew how difficult it would be for you, never quite belonging in one world or the other. I had known for a long time that Jason wanted to marry someone with a name, someone who could gain him entry into our circles. And—hell, I’ll be frank—he comes from crude beginnings, Laura.”

  “That doesn’t matter to me,” Laura said, and cleared her throat awkwardly. “It has never mattered to me that Jason is Irish.”

  The maid knocked at the door and brought in their toddies on a small silver tray. Laura took the tray from her and dismissed her with a wan smile of thanks. She gave Hale his drink and sipped slowly on hers, welcoming its bracing effects.

  “Well,” Hale said, “let’s address this business about this ‘coldness’ of yours. I’ll wager some of this is Mother’s influence.”

  “Hale, I can’t blame her for—”

  “Don’t defend her, sweetheart. She raised all three of her daughters to believe that it is natural for a husband and wife to live as strangers. For years I knew about the ridiculous things she told you and Anne and Sophia, but it wasn’t my place to contradict her.” He sighed and regarded her sympathetically. “These matters are not complicated, Laura. It’s very simple. All you have to do is show Jason that you’re willing to accept his attentions, and he will take care of the rest of it. He is an experienced man. Just allow him to…” He stopped and began fiddling uneasily with the silk fringe of the brocaded chair. “He wouldn’t be cruel to you, Laura, not in that way.”