Unfortunately, the breakfast room was even dustier than the chandeliers above my head. Years ago, it had been papered in silk of light green and gold, a sparkling crystal chandelier above the table. Vaguely, I hoped Savannah could save the silk wallpaper. Breakfast in that room was one of my few good memories of this house.
Through the open doors of the dining room, the house bustled. Savannah calling out orders, Billy Bob’s slow easy drawls in response. I’d met Savannah’s cousins briefly on my way to the dining room, both of them giving me a firm handshake and an easy, “Good to have you back in town,” before they headed off to carry out their marching orders.
“Put the list away and eat your breakfast, Hope. We can figure out the day when you’ve had some food.”
Hope didn’t put the pen down. “I can’t relax and enjoy my breakfast when we have so much to do and I have no idea how we’re going to get it all done.”
Taking a sip of coffee, I went over the list I had in my head. “Fine. There’s that stack of mail on Prentice’s desk. Then I guess you should walk me through the most pressing issues you know about.”
“What about Ford?” she asked carefully. “And Cole? Don’t you need to talk to Cole, see what’s going on with Ford’s defense?”
My gut gave an immediate, No.
I needed to deal with Ford. I couldn’t ignore him. But not today. Not now.
“Later,” I said.
Hope shook her head but dropped it. “I don’t know everything about Prentice’s business. The best person for that is Ford, but—”
“We’ll work around him,” I said and bit into a biscuit. “Eat your breakfast.”
With a harrumph of a sigh, Hope shut her notebook and pushed it away, picking up her fork and taking a bite of eggs.
Watching her eat I had a new sensation in my stomach as it twisted and turned over, uneasy. Uncertain. Was this nerves? Was I… Nervous?
The box in my pocket dug into my leg. It shouldn’t be a big deal. We were already married.
Only an hour before while Hope had been doing something with her hair with a thing that looked like a giant clamp then fussing with bottles and tubes at the vanity, I’d gone to the safe hidden behind the shoe rack in the master closet.
Harvey had told me about it. New closet, new safe, same combination. Almost as tall as me, a small room unto itself, the safe held everything from decades-old stock certificates to passports to jewelry handed down from generation to generation. I knew exactly what I was looking for.
My great-great-grandmother’s ring. Lady Estelle Ophelia Sawyer. She’d traveled to North Carolina after a whirlwind romance with my great-great-grandfather, William Reginald Sawyer. He’d built Heartstone Manor for Lady Estelle, determined to give her a home worthy of her sacrifice in leaving England and her family for the wilds of America.
I remember my father showing me her ring decades ago, telling me that was the ring I’d give my wife one day. A ruby flanked by diamonds in aged yellow gold. I’d half expected to see it on Vanessa’s hand the day Prentice announced her marriage to Ford.
Vanessa had given me back the diamond I’d bought her, replacing it with Ford’s. Both rings had been ostentatious and obvious. But then, Ford and I had been young and stupid. Back then, it hadn’t occurred to me to ask Prentice for Lady Estelle’s ring.
Not just because I knew he’d never allow me to give it to Vanessa.
This ring was part of the Sawyer legacy. It was our history.
At twenty-two, I’d wanted to rebel against that legacy. I’d wanted to give Vanessa something that was just mine. As it was, I was glad the grasping viper never got her hands on any part of the Sawyers’ history.
It should have bothered me that Prentice intended for me to give this ring to Hope. My knee-jerk reaction was to deny my father anything he wanted. He’d taken enough, meddled enough.
It didn’t matter anymore. Prentice was dead. He’d trapped us with his will, but aside from compelling us to marry and spend a certain amount of time in Heartstone Manor, his influence was gone.
I wasn’t giving Lady Estelle Ophelia Sawyer’s ring to Hope because Prentice wanted me to. I was giving her the ring because she was my wife. She was Hope Sawyer. I needed to see it on her finger, needed to make this real.
Taking another sip of coffee, I set the box with the ring on the table in front of her.
“I know we did this in the wrong order, but I want you to have this.”
The greasy, cold twist in my stomach cranked up a notch. It only got worse when Hope didn’t move.
She eyed the ring box as if it held explosives and not jewelry.