An Heiress to Remember EPB Read online

  Dedication

  For all the ladies who do whatever they please

  Especially Seneca & Penelope

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  By Maya Rodale

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Prologue

  New York City, 1879

  One West Thirty-Fourth Street

  The duke was at the door. His Grace, the Duke of Montrose, had come calling at the Goodwin residence, all the way from Ye Olde England, on the hunt for an heiress to marry as dukes were wont to do these days.

  But young Beatrice Goodwin only had eyes for the young, handsome boy who had climbed into her bedroom window.

  By any definition, Wes Dalton was a nobody. He also happened to be the somebody she adored most in the world for many reasons, though one in particular claimed her attention now.

  Wes Dalton knew how to kiss a girl. He’d been in her room less than a minute before their arms were around each other, mouths colliding, young love seizing the moment.

  “You have to go,” she murmured.

  “I know,” he said. Mumbled, really. Talking and kissing were not tremendously compatible. Kissing won out.

  Arms and hearts entwined. Soft breaths. The sweetest taste.

  “I have to go,” he murmured.

  “I know,” she mumbled.

  Beatrice and Wes were no fools; they knew the rules and the way of the world. There was a duke at the front door and Wes was a nobody sneaking into her bedroom and Beatrice . . . well she was just a girl. One who was in danger of forgetting her purpose. Why did her father work night and day, eight days a week, to earn a fortune if not so her mother could realize her greatest social ambitions by making a duchess of their daughter?

  The duke was at the door . . .

  Barney and Estella Goodwin hadn’t done all that for Beatrice to marry Wes Dalton, a mere associate department manager at Goodwin’s, the department store her family owned. Even if Wes was an excellent kisser who, when he was not kissing her, wanted to hear whatever she had to say.

  Beatrice usually had lots to say, much to people’s chagrin.

  “We could run away,” he suggested.

  “We could,” she agreed, laughing. Because he couldn’t be serious. Then she lifted her gaze to his deep blue eyes and fell silent. He was serious.

  Him. Her. Run away.

  Her heart leapt at the prospect. Long nights with him, waking up beside him. The two of them taking on the world with nothing but their wits and love and fierce kisses.

  But the duke was at the door . . .

  It was a big risk. The biggest risk. Especially when the duke was downstairs, presumably now in the formal drawing room. It was not his first visit. But everyone understood that this was the visit. The one where he asked the same question Wes was asking her now. But with a guarantee of castles and parties and fancy dresses.

  She cared about these things as much as the next girl, which is to say somewhat.

  “I can promise you exactly nothing,” he said and they both already knew it. “Just undying love. Run away with me, Bea. Right now.”

  If there was one thing she knew about Wes it was that the man had an enormous appetite for risk. Exhibit A: climbing into the bedroom window of his employer’s daughter, who was an heiress about to receive a marriage proposal from a duke. Men ended up in the East River for less.

  “When? And where to? And how—?” she sputtered.

  Beatrice was not risk averse, but she did appreciate a plan. Her father’s business sense may have been lost on her brother, Edward, but not her. She needed some particulars more than just a promise. An idea. A kiss. Some facts and figures would be nice. A plan would not be remiss.

  “We’ll catch a train this afternoon,” Wes murmured as he kissed her neck and for a second she thought, Maybe.

  “Wes, you’re mad. Absolutely mad to suggest such a mad thing,” she said. Finishing school never did manage to tame her blunt, impulsive speech.

  “Madly in love.”

  “Is that what you call it?”

  He pulled her close so she could feel how madly in love he was with her. He flashed a grin that had her heart bursting like fireworks. If this was the start of forever . . . she could do worse.

  There was a knock at the door.

  They jumped apart.

  She opened the door a crack while Wes stayed out of sight, hiding behind the curtains.

  It was a housemaid.

  “I have been sent to inform you that His Grace is waiting. And your mother.”

  One was more fearsome than the other.

  “I’ll be there in a moment.”

  She closed the door. The curtains over her window fluttered in the breeze.

  They both knew why the duke was downstairs, in the formal drawing room. There was only one reason British Peers of The Realm traveled so far afield. There was only one reason dukes condescended to call repeatedly upon new-money debutantes.

  Fortune hunting was the sport of the day.

  She was the prize.

  “If not right now, then run away with me tonight,” Wes said urgently. Because the clock was ticking on forever. Their chances to be together were dwindling. He grasped her hand. “You, Beatrice, are my one and only.”

  Her lips still tingled from his kiss. She wanted to know how this could work. Because she was tempted. The duke was . . . fine. He was a few years older, staid and remote and just . . . fine.

  And Wes was divine. He only had to smile at her across the sales floor and she was floating on air. He had only to kiss her and she was thinking of throwing her whole future away for him.

  She was young yet. Just twenty years old. That was a lot of future to throw away.

  “And then what? Suppose I run away with you to Grand Central Depot right now. And then what?”

  “You. Me. The rest of our lives. Starting tonight.”

  Tonight! Beatrice felt the walls closing in on her. She knew what her mother and society expected of her: to marry, and marry well. Dress well, throw parties, associate with the right people. She knew the expectations so well that she scarcely even considered that there might be more. She adored Wes, but how was she supposed to give up family, friends, and a city she loved on some mad lark, with no plans?

  Beatrice gazed at him. The dark hair falling rakishly into his ocean blue eyes. The line of his jaw, the curve of his to
p lip, the hands around her waist. She gazed at this boy she loved to kiss, who made her heart sing, who never told her to be quiet, who always asked her opinion. She wanted to run away with him. But she also couldn’t help but wonder:

  Where would they even go?

  How would they eat?

  Her father would fire him in a heartbeat. She knew how the world worked; powerful men protected their own and doors all over town would be closed to Wes. He wouldn’t find decent work in this town. She would have to give up family, friends, and the city she loved to wander the world with a man who might not be able to support her at all.

  It felt tremendously, grievously unfair that she should have only these two wildly extreme all-or-nothing options to choose from. What she wouldn’t do to just . . . see how things went. To pursue both paths without impossibly high stakes, or devastating repercussions. If only she had a little more time or freedom to explore. If only it wasn’t a matter of either/or.

  But the duke was at the door.

  “I’ll think about it.” She pressed one more kiss on his lips. “But I have to go.”

  Chapter One

  New York City, 1895

  Sixteen years later

  The first thing Beatrice did after the demise of her marriage was to return to New York. After nearly sixteen years spent languishing in a crumbling old castle in a remote corner of the English countryside, the city seemed like the place to go. When one had burned their bridges, ruined their reputation, and still smoldered with possibilities, what else could one do but escape to Manhattan?

  The place was full of opportunities for second chances—as long as one was mad and daring enough to seize them. Beatrice was mad enough and daring enough. She didn’t have other options.

  Where else in the world was a divorced duchess to go?

  Despite the best efforts of the duke, he hadn’t been able to extinguish her spark. God knew he’d tried. She still shuddered thinking of his knock at the door. But all that was on the other side of the Atlantic. Good riddance.

  Finally, unencumbered, Beatrice stepped onto the dock and into the churning crush of humanity. She breathed in deeply.

  Some lumbering man beside her grumbled loudly, “It smells like—”

  She thought home just as he said “garbage.”

  To be clear, it did smell like garbage. Hot, stinking garbage that had been left in the sun. It was a noxious mix of manure, refuse, and the seething mass of humanity inhabiting the island. Oh, the city did stink. But it was also home. Where she’d been born and raised, a place where she had loved and lost and left.

  It felt good to be back. It felt right. Already she felt a shimmer of possibility that she hadn’t felt in a long time. It was the magic of the city, welcoming her home.

  Beatrice easily fell back into the brisk pace of a city person; the dowager duchess never managed to get her to move at the sedate pace of a duchess with nothing to do. Though Lord knew her ladyship had done everything in her power to slow Beatrice down, to silence her, to stifle her. The duke, too.

  But she did not want to think of them anymore.

  She didn’t want to think of anything in her past. Beatrice only had eyes for the future.

  She made her way along the dock, jostled by the crowds. Someone stepped on her boot and shoved her slightly to the side. People here were in such a hurry, all burning up with ambition and determined to get it done yesterday. All that energy urged one to go faster, try harder. It took extraordinary effort just to keep up. Some found it exhausting, Beatrice found it exhilarating.

  The duke should have known better than to try to cow an American girl. A Manhattan girl.

  She would have the last laugh because she was here and she had money and she was free.

  Beatrice flashed a grin.

  The dowager would say women of a certain age shouldn’t grin. A certain age being six and thirty. Anyone would say she was old news and unmarriageable but oh, if she didn’t feel like her life was only beginning.

  The dowager duchess had no command over Beatrice now.

  And what do you know if Beatrice didn’t give a whoop of joy. Right there in the middle of the crowded docks.

  No one batted an eye.

  Because this was New York City and if you wanted to whoop for joy on the street, apropos of nothing, it was the least interesting thing that happened on that particular spot of sidewalk.

  When Beatrice saw Henry, the family’s longtime driver, she shot her hand in the air for a wild, undignified wave unbefitting a duchess. “Henry! Hello!”

  He smiled when he saw her.

  “Welcome back, Duchess.”

  “Oh, Henry shush. I left her back in England. I feel like Miss Goodwin again.”

  They sorted out the bags, and there weren’t too many. She’d left most of her duchess dresses behind, as they were the sort of gowns one wore when languishing in a drafty old castle, trying to blend in with the woodwork.

  It went without saying she had Other Ideas for her time in New York City.

  “Henry, will you take us to the shop first?”

  “Before you kiss your mother?”

  “You know me, Henry.”

  “I do, Miss Goodwin. I do.”

  Henry expertly navigated the carriage through the mad crush on the docks and onto the avenue taking them uptown to her favorite place in the world. They moved slowly—traffic!—but there was so much to see.

  Buildings she remembered had been torn down and rebuilt taller than ever before, in the newest cast-iron architectural styles—next to churches and dwellings that had been standing since before she’d been born. It was just like she remembered and wildly different at the same time. The old crushed up against the new. This was a city for constant reinvention.

  For second chances.

  And there it was ahead, a particular building rising up on the corner of Broadway and Tenth Street. Goodwin’s, the greatest department store in all of New York. It was certainly her most favorite spot in the world.

  Her grandfather on her mother’s side had started a successful shop farther downtown, her father had taken over the business—and renamed it after himself—after marrying her mother. He’d built this magnificent department store on the Ladies’ Mile. It was five floors of everything a man, woman, or child could ever want or need.

  Her happiest childhood hours had been spent wandering through the shop, marveling at all the pretty fabrics, gloves, jewels, umbrellas, whatever. She tagged along after her father, as he discussed pricing strategies and merchandise displays and managed all the employees.

  Goodwin’s was where she experienced that magical rush of a girl’s first love. Shopping. And her other first love.

  Whatever happened to him?

  The carriage rolled to a stop and Beatrice didn’t waste a minute, leaping from the carriage and bursting in through the tall front doors.

  It was just like she remembered.

  The pink marble columns. The five-story open atrium. The old brass chandeliers.

  But it all felt smaller and it didn’t quite gleam as it did in her memories. All the energy out there on the streets came to a screeching halt in these once-hallowed halls.

  A few customers wandered around the counters and displays, rifling through the selection of goods. This was not the vibrant, bustling scene of her youth. This was not the magical place that inspired hope and dreams of brighter days and better things.

  Something had changed. Something had gone wrong.

  The magic was gone.

  What happened?

  Edward, probably. With her father gone and the store failing to capture her brother’s imagination, it had been left to plod along as it had always done, even as the city grew and transformed all around it.

  With a heavy heart, Beatrice turned, pushed open the heavy doors, and stepped onto the street.

  She was momentarily blinded by the sight of a tall, gleaming white building on the other side of Broadway. It was six stories high with a ma
ssive glass dome rising higher still. Massive sheet glass windows revealed colorful displays of hats and gowns. A crush of people were entering and exiting through a revolving door. The whole building was a hive of activity.

  “Henry, what is that? I don’t see a sign.”

  “That is Dalton’s. It’s so popular it doesn’t need a sign,” Henry explained.

  I used to know a Dalton once. Funny, she hadn’t thought of him in years and she’d already thought of him twice this morning. Ghosts of New York, she supposed. But never mind that, Beatrice had crawled through hellfire and agonies to be here, in the heart of New York City, and she wasn’t looking back.

  Chapter Two

  The Goodwin Residence

  One West Thirty-Fourth Street

  After thoroughly enjoying the modern conveniences of her family’s mansion—which she had been deprived of in the duke’s drafty old castle—Beatrice dressed and went down to dinner.

  “It’s good to be home,” Beatrice said and it was somehow the wrong thing to say because it reminded her mother of her daughter’s failure.

  A divorcée was bad. But to divorce a duke? It boggled the mind and was somehow a personal attack upon her mother, her values, and the sacrifices and plans she had made.

  Her mother, Estella, smiled tightly.

  “What is the news?”

  “You know most of it from our letters,” Estella said. Her mother’s long missives detailing the births, deaths, marriages, and scandals of Manhattan society had always been a delight to receive and savor. But then Beatrice had to write back—with so much time and very little to report—and it’d been rather depressing.

  Silence. Her mother sipped her wine. Edward, leaning against the mantel, sipped some spirits. What a homecoming.

  “I went to the shop today,” Beatrice said.

  “Already?”

  “I popped in on my way home from the ship. I had missed it desperately and couldn’t wait to see it. You know it is my favorite place in the world. But things have changed. Or rather . . . they had not changed at all.”

  Beatrice looked from her mother to her brother, hoping for an explanation as to why the crown jewel of the Ladies’ Mile was now a dispiriting building hosting last season’s leftover merchandise, like a party that had gone on too long.