Her Enemy At The Altar. Virginia Heath

Connie pulled open the doors. A pristine line of snowy white shirts sat on one side. Stark black and navy coats on the other. He was always immaculately turned out and his austere clothing tended to make the more adventurous outfits of other gentlemen look a tad foppish. She might dislike a great many things about Aaron, but she could not fault his dress sense or the way he filled out his clothes.

      Connie wandered towards the stack of books and read the title of the one he had been reading: The Complete Farmer or General Dictionary of Agriculture and Husbandry: Comprehending the Most Improved Methods of Cultivation... It hardly promised to be a riveting read. She picked it up and scanned the open page. As the title suggested it was indeed a dictionary, although the definitions of each term covered several pages and were accompanied with diagrams. The open pages were explaining, in great and laborious detail, the concept of ploughing. The spectacles were a surprise and she could not help wondering what he looked like in them. Knowing Aaron Wincanton, he no doubt looked quite splendid in them. He had a tendency to look splendid in everything. The wretch.

      As she went to put the book down she noticed the name of the book beneath. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. There was a bookmark slotted between some pages so Connie opened them. Then her eyes narrowed. The words ‘For I am born to tame you, Kate!’ stared mockingly up at her from the top of the page. The rogue was reading The Taming of the Shrew!

      * * *

      Aaron ignored the light rain and slowly rode around the furthest perimeter of the estate. Feeling cold and damp was preferable to marching back into battle with his new wife. His father often accused him of avoiding confrontation or adversity—and perhaps that was true—but in this case it seemed the prudent thing to do. Besides, Connie was only one of his mounting problems.

      The estate was another one. The fields were all empty of crops, something that did not really surprise him seeing as it was the middle of November, but they were also choked with weeds and something about that really did not seem right. Surely they should be ploughed like the tenant farms already were?

      Not for the first time, he wished he had paid more attention when his grandfather had tried to teach him about estate management. The old man might well have been a vindictive and tyrannical man, but he had known everything there was to know about farming—especially how to turn a profit from the land. His father had always preferred to delegate the task and Aaron had been so determined to leave and join the army that he had never shown any sort of interest. Now he was back, and would soon be in charge of the estate and wholly responsible for the many people who depended on it, his lack of knowledge bothered him.

      What Aaron could not quite get to grips with was the fact that the price of wheat was fixed, yet they were falling deeper and deeper into debt every year. Obviously, he had asked his father. Unfortunately, Viscount Ardleigh was so arrogant and so absorbed with besting the Stuarts next door that he failed to acknowledge there was even a problem. He was happy to leave all responsibility for the farming to his estate manager while he plotted and planned and schemed against the Stuarts in his study. Mr Thomas, the estate manager, was as elusive as fox and probably just as wily. Aaron did not warm to the man at all. Unfortunately, his father would not have a bad word said about him.

      Mr Thomas was responsible for the enormous parcel of land his father had bought while Aaron was fighting in the Peninsula. The viscount refused to allow Aaron full access to the estate accounts—not that it had stopped Aaron from snooping in the ledgers when his father was not around—and as far as he could make out, things were now very dire indeed. The unnecessary purchase had created a massive void in the coffers that they had not recovered from. The land in question did not even border the Wincanton estate. It sat to the south of the Stuart estate, which probably explained why his father had paid ten times what the plot was worth just to get it. That the Earl of Redbridge had also desperately wanted the land had made his father even more reckless with his money. He was so pleased to have snatched it away from the Stuarts that he had apparently failed to notice that all those additional, ridiculously expensive acres were good for nothing. The soil was so thin it was barely a film upon the hilly rock beneath, so nothing would grow upon it. It had been a total waste of good money that had set them on the road to ruin. Each year since, they had failed to turn a healthy profit. Or, for that matter, any profit at all.

      Aaron turned his horse towards the small hill. From the top he got a good view of the Earl of Redbridge’s estate and there all the fields were dark brown from ploughing. A fortnight ago he had seen men sowing seed in the land ready for next year. Why were his fields still idle? Perhaps the fact that they did this task so much later was the reason why their wheat crop had been so sparse last season?

      It irritated Aaron that he did not know the answer to these questions. It irritated him more that he had no control over any of it either way. Not yet at least. Until his father died, he would not relinquish his control and Aaron could do nothing but watch the decline and wait. Except now, when his father did die, Aaron would not have the funds to fix things or to branch out into more modern investments. Thanks to his disadvantageous marriage.

      Just thinking about Constance Stuart put him in a bad mood and he had no idea what to do about her. He had tried to be pleasant yesterday and had hoped that she would realise that they were both now stuck in the same boat and that she might come to appreciate his noble gesture. He had hoped that they might, in time, find a way to be able to co-exist without wanting to kill each other. After last night, he found that prospect less likely. The woman had no intention of making any form of compromise and trying to get her to see reason was exhausting. After hours of soul searching he had come to the conclusion that the best thing that they could do for the time being was avoid each other. At least until the dust had settled.

      To that end, Aaron had been actively avoiding her all morning. He had ridden over every inch of the estate, was cold, soaking wet and the beginnings of hunger was gnawing at his belly. He wished he had had the foresight to bring some food and a blanket out with him, so he could have camped outside all night. He had slept quite soundly under the stars in worse conditions than this. Unfortunately, Connie would see such behaviour as cowardice rather than a tactical retreat and he was not prepared to give her that satisfaction. Clearly too many people had kow-towed to Constance Stuart for far too long and he was not going to be one of them. He had never run away from a battle in his life. Reluctantly, he turned his horse towards home and hoped for the best.