A Bride's Tangled Vows

Aiden frowned as his grandfather’s head eased back against the pillows, as if he simply didn’t have the energy to keep up his diabolical power-monger role anymore.

“As your grandfather told you, I’m his lawyer,” Canton said as he reached out to shake Aiden’s hand, his grip forceful, perhaps overcompensating for his thin frame. “I’ve been handling your grandfather’s affairs for about five years now.”

“You have my condolences,” Aiden said.

Canton paused, blinking behind his glasses at Aiden’s droll tone.

James lifted his head, irritation adding to the strain on his lined face. “There are things that need to be taken care of, Aiden. Soon.”

His own anger rushed to replace numb curiosity. “You mean, you’re going to arrange everything so it will continue just the way you want it.”

This time James managed to jerk forward in a shadow of his favorite stance: that of looming over the unsuspecting victim. “I’ve run this family for over fifty years. I know what’s best. Not some slacker who runs away at the first hint of responsibility. Your mother—”

He fell back with a gasp, shaking as his eyes closed.

“Christina,” Canton said, his sharp tone echoing in the room.

Christina crossed to the bed and checked James’s pulse on the underside of his fragile wrist. Aiden noticed the tremble of her fingers with their blunt-cut nails. So she wasn’t indifferent. Did she actually care for the old buzzard? Somehow he couldn’t imagine it. Then she held James’s head while he swallowed some more water. Her abundant hair swung forward to hide her features, but her movements were efficient and sure.

Despite wanting to remain unmoved, Aiden’s heart sped up. “You should be in a hospital,” he said.

“They couldn’t make him stay once your grandfather refused further treatments. He said if he was going to die, he would die at Blackstone Manor,” Canton said. “Christina was already in residence and could follow the doctor’s orders....”

His grandfather breathed deeply, then rested back against the pillows, his mouth drawn, eyes closed.

“Can you?” Aiden asked her.

She glanced up, treating him to another glimpse of creamy, flawless skin and chocolate eyes flickering with worry.

“Of course,” she said, her tone matter-of-fact. “Mr. Blackstone isn’t going to die. But he will need significant recovery time. I’d prefer him to stay in the hospital for a bit longer, but...” Her shrug said what can you do when a person’s crazy?

Something about her rubbed Aiden wrong. She didn’t belong in this room or with these people. Her beauty and grace shouldn’t be sullied by his grandfather’s villainous legacy. But that calm, professional facade masked her feelings in this situation. Was she just here for the job? Or another reason? Once more, Aiden felt jealous of her, wishing he could master his own emotions so completely.

But he was out of practice in dealing with the old man.

This time, Christina retreated to the shadows beyond the abundant purple bed curtains. Close, but not hovering. Though keenly aware of her presence, Aiden could barely make out her form as she leaned against the wall with her arms wrapped around her waist. It unsettled him, distracted him. Right now, he needed all his focus on the battle he sensed was coming.

“Your grandfather is concerned for the mill—” Canton said.

“I don’t give a damn what happens to that place. Tear it down. Burn it, for all I care.”

His grandfather’s jaw tightened, but he made no attempt to defend the business where he’d poured what little humanity he possessed, completely ignoring the needs of his family. The emotional needs, at least.

“And the town?” Canton asked. “You don’t care what happens to the people working in Blackstone Mills? Generations of townspeople, your mother’s friends, kids you went to school with, Marie’s nieces and nephews?”

Aiden clamped his jaw tight. He didn’t want to get involved, but as the lawyer spoke, faces flashed through his mind’s eye. The mill had stood for centuries, starting out as a simple cotton gin. Last Aiden had heard, it was a leading manufacturer in cotton products, specializing in high-end linens. James might be a bastard, but his insistence on quality had kept the company viable in a shaky economy. Aiden jammed a rough hand through his damp hair, probably making the spiky top stand on end.

Without warning, he felt a familiar surge of rebellion. “I don’t want to take over. I’ve never wanted to.” He strode across the plush carpet to stare out the window into the storm-shadowed distance. Tension tightened the muscles along the back of his neck and skull. Familial responsibility wasn’t his thing—anymore. He’d handed that job over to his brothers a long time ago.

Aiden realized he was shifting minutely from one foot to the other. Creeping in underneath the turbulence was a constant awareness of Christina’s presence, like a sizzle under his skin, loosening his control over his other emotions inch by inch. She drew him, kept part of his attention even when he was talking to the others. How had she come to be here? How long had she been here? Had she ever found a place to belong? The heightened emotion increased the tension in his neck. A dull headache started to form.

“You knew something like this was coming, considering your age—” Aiden gestured back toward the bed “—you should have sold. Or turned the business over to someone else. One of my brothers.”

“It isn’t their duty,” James insisted. “As firstborn, it’s yours—and way past time you learned your place.”

As if he could sense the rage starting to boil deep inside Aiden, Canton stepped in. “Mr. Blackstone wants the mill to remain a family institution that will continue to provide jobs and a center for the town. The only potential buyers we have want to tear it down and sell off the land.”

Aiden latched on to the family institution part. “Ah, the lasting name of Blackstone. Planned a monument yet?”

A weary yet insistent voice drifted from the bed. “I will do what needs to be done. And so will you.”

“How will you manage that? I walked out that door once. I’m more than happy to do it again.”

“Really? Do you think that’s the best thing for your mother?” James went on as if Aiden hadn’t spoken. “I’ve worked my entire life to build on the hard work of my own father. I will not let my life’s work disappear because you won’t do your duty. You will return where you belong. I’ll see to that.”

Aiden used his hand to squeeze away the tightness in his neck. “Oh, no. I’m not buying into that song and dance. As far as I’m concerned, this family line should die out. If the Blackstone name disappears, all the better.”

“I knew you’d feel that way,” his grandfather said with a long-suffering sigh. “That’s why I’m prepared to make it worth your while.”

* * *

Christina listened to the men spar with one another as if from a distance. Shock cocooned her inside her own bubble of fear.

Aiden’s gaze tracked the lawyer’s movements as he spoke, but Christina’s remained focused on Aiden. The impenetrable mask of rebellion and pride that shielded any softer emotions. The breadth of his shoulders. The ripple of muscles in his chest and forearms, reminding her of his strength, his dominance.

Could a man that strong prevail over someone with James’s history of cunning maneuvers, both business and personal?

“Why don’t you just lay it out for me,” Aiden said, his voice curt, commanding the immense space of the master suite. A shiver worked its way down Christina’s spine. “The condensed version.”

This time, Canton didn’t look to James for permission. Proving he learned quickly, he cleared his throat and continued.

“Your grandfather set up legal documents covering all the angles,” he said, pulling a fat pack of papers from his briefcase. “It essentially hands you the rights to the mill and Blackstone Manor.”

“I told you,” Aiden said. “I don’t want it. Sell it.”

Christina’s throat closed in sympathy and fear.

“We can,” Canton said. “The interested buyer is a major competitor, who will shut it down and sell it piece by piece. Including the land Mill Row is built on. And every last one of the people living in those fifty houses will be turned out so their homes can be torn down.”

James joined in with relish. “The money from the sale will make a splendid law library at the university. Not the legacy I’d planned,” he said with a shrug. “But it’ll do.”

Canton paused, but James wasn’t one for niceties. “Go on,” he insisted.

Canton hesitated a moment more, which surprised Christina. She hadn’t cared for the weaselly man from the moment she’d first laid eyes on him, and his kowtowing to James had only reinforced her first impressions. For him to resist the old man—even in a small way—was new. Maybe having to face the person whose life he was ruining awakened a small bit of conscience.

“If you choose not to take over, Mr. Blackstone will exercise his power of attorney over his daughter to place her in the county care facility. Immediately.”

A cry lodged in Christina’s throat before it escaped as she envisioned the chaos this would unleash, the disruption and danger to Lily, Aiden’s mother. She’d cared for Lily for five years, from the moment Christina had received her nursing degree. But Lily had been a second mother to her long before that, the type of mother she’d never had. The last thing she’d allow to happen would be handing Lily over for substandard care.