All for One Read online

  ALSO BY MELISSA DE LA CRUZ

  The Alex & Eliza Trilogy

  Book One: Alex & Eliza

  Book Two: Love & War

  Heart of Dread Series (with Michael Johnston)

  Book One: Frozen

  Book Two: Stolen

  Book Three: Golden

  Witches of East End Series

  Blue Bloods Series

  Beach Lane Series

  The Ashley Project Series

  The Ring and the Crown

  The Descendants Series

  Surviving High School (with Lele Pons)

  Something in Between

  Someone to Love

  29 Dates

  Because I Was a Girl: True Stories for Girls of All Ages

  (edited by Melissa de la Cruz)

  Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe

  G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS

  an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, New York

  Copyright © 2019 by Melissa de la Cruz.

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  G. P. Putnam’s Sons is a registered trademark of Penguin Random House LLC.

  “Answer to the Inquiry Why I Sighed,” from The Intimate Life of Alexander Hamilton by Allan McLane Hamilton (New York: Scribner, 1910), p. 126.

  Visit us online at penguinrandomhouse.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: De la Cruz, Melissa, 1971– author.

  Title: All for one / Melissa de la Cruz.

  Description: New York, NY: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, [2019] | Series: The Alex & Eliza trilogy; book three

  Summary: “Alex & Eliza’s household continues to expand as they prepare for an arrival of their own, but new developments in their lives bring unforeseen consequences”—Provided by publisher.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2018035473 | ISBN 9780525515883 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780525515890 (ebook)

  Subjects: LCSH: Hamilton, Alexander, 1757–1804—Juvenile fiction. | Hamilton, Elizabeth Schuyler, 1757–1854—Juvenile fiction. | United States—History—1783–1815—Juvenile fiction. | CYAC: Hamilton, Alexander, 1757–1804—Fiction. | Hamilton, Elizabeth Schuyler, 1757–1854—Fiction. | United States—History—1783–1815—Fiction. | Marriage—Fiction. | Family life—New York (State)—New York—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.D36967 Am 2019 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018035473

  Cover art © 2019 by Teguh Mugiono and Julia Urchenko

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  For Mike and Mattie, always

  And for Jen Besser, who believed from the beginning

  CONTENTS

  Also by Melissa de la Cruz

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Part One: Sybarites and NeophytesChapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Part Two: Footmen and GentlewomenChapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Part Three: Vows and VicesChapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Epilogue: Final Midnight Rendezvous

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Answer to the Inquiry Why I Sighed

  Before no mortal ever knew

  A love like mine so tender, true,

  Completely wretched—you away,

  And but half blessed e’en while you stay.

  If present love . . . face

  Deny you to my fond embrace

  No joy unmixed my bosom warms

  But when my angel’s in my arms.

  —Poem from Alexander Hamilton to Elizabeth Schuyler, found in a locket she wore around her neck until she died

  Part One

  Sybarites and Neophytes

  1

  Her Brother’s Keeper

  New York Harbor

  New York, New York

  June 1785

  To passersby, they must have looked like any other young couple enjoying the bright sun and cool breezes of a June day in New York City. Broadway was crowded with similarly affectionate pairs, arm in arm, or holding hands, or even giving in to the urge to steal a kiss, regardless of who was watching. City Hall Park was in full bloom, and the only odor that could push through the heavenly fragrance of lilac was the salt of New York Harbor, less than a quarter mile away. But unbeknownst to their fellow flâneurs, Alexander and Eliza Hamilton were engaged in that most high-stakes of marital negotiations: their social calendar.

  “No, no,” Eliza admonished Alex as gently she could. “We dine with the Van Cortlandts on the morrow. They are in town for just four days. We are seeing the Van Wycks on Thursday.”

  From the corner of her eye, Eliza saw Alex’s brow furrow beneath his hat, a narrow-brimmed midnight-blue tricorne that brought out the red in his hair and the twinkle in his pale blue eyes. “But I thought we were dining with John and Sarah on Thursday.”

  “No, the Jays are Friday,” Eliza said as soothingly as possible, regarding him from beneath the brim of her own bonnet, which was a handsome chocolate brown trimmed with pink ribbon that accentuated the apples in her cheeks. She patted her husband’s arm as though he were a little boy. For a man who had supervised the schedule of the commander in chief of the Continental army for five years, he had a notoriously hard time remembering whom he was going to have dinner with three days out.

  “Friday?” Alex repeated, as though she’d just told him Congress had voted to return the United States to British rule. “Then when are we seeing the Morrises?”

  “Do you mean Gouverneur, or Helena Morris that is now Rutherford?” Eliza responded. “We’re having Gouverneur and his latest belle du jour, Miss Du Pont, to tea a week Saturday,” she continued without waiting for her husband to answer, “and taking luncheon with John and Helena at their city residence after services on the Sabbath. Or, no,” she corrected herself. “We are joining James Beekman at Mount Pleasant after church. The Rutherfords have had to push back their arrival until Monday, but we have tentative plans to join them for supper.”

  “‘Tentative plans’?” Alex laughed. �
��How on earth can such a schedule accommodate a tentative plan? My good wife, you manage our social calendar with more precision than General Washington arranged his parlays! If you were foreign minister to King George or King Louis, there would never be another war in Europe again!”

  “As I recall,” Eliza said, chuckling, “it was you who arranged General Washington’s social calendar, which makes it that much more surprising that you cannot keep track of your own.” She held up a string purse whose pink ribbon matched her bonnet. “If it makes you feel better, I have everything written down in a little diary I keep with me at all times.”

  “When I was General Washington’s aide, I didn’t have a social calendar,” Alex said, laughing. “All my time was spent racing after him. It is your own fault, my darling,” he continued, squeezing Eliza’s silk-clad arm with a kid-gloved hand. “You are as impressive a hostess as you are a guest. Everyone wants you in their salon, and if they’re not soliciting your presence at their table, then they’re begging for a spot at ours.”

  Eliza blushed prettily at the compliment and allowed a few steps to pass before she answered. Catching a glimpse of herself in a shop window, however, she couldn’t help but think that Alex might be right. He in Prussian-blue wool, she in dark rose silk with pink and chocolate accents—they were the picture of urbane, young New York society, and she noticed more than one set of eyes glancing at them both approvingly and enviously.

  “Oh, pshaw!” she said at length. “I am naught but the wife of a war hero, who just happens to be the most capable attorney in New York City. If people court my presence, it is only so they can be closer to you.” At that, she squeezed his arm to let him know that none could come closer than her.

  “Did you just ‘pshaw’ me, Mrs. Hamilton?”

  “I believe I did, Mr. Hamilton.”

  “That’s Colonel Hamilton to you.”

  Eliza pretended to be shocked. “Of all the cheek—”

  Alex soothed her with a kiss. “The only cheek that I’m interested in is the one my lips are pressed against,” he murmured.

  “Just be sure you don’t neglect the other one,” Eliza said, touching the opposite side of her face. “It will get jealous.”

  Alex dutifully leaned across his wife to give her a second kiss, then threw in one on the lips for good measure, and they continued on their way down Broadway. Eliza went on informing him of their social schedule, as Alex shook his head in disbelief at the number of bowls of creamed spinach he would be expected to consume in the next three weeks.

  Such was the price of being the most popular couple in town.

  Since the smashing going-away party Eliza had thrown for Angelica and John Church last winter, where everyone who was anyone in New York and New Jersey society had been present, the Hamiltons’ hall table had been littered with calling cards. To accommodate all the requests, Eliza began hosting Thursday night dinners and Friday night salons, which quickly became the most coveted invitation in town. She was adept at mixing lawyers with painters, businessmen with artists, so the conversation was always knowledgeable and varied, and everyone left feeling like they’d learned a little bit more about how the world functioned, from the workaday business of brewing one’s own ale to the exalted labor of forming a new country from the ground up.

  For if Eliza provided the culture, Alex provided the politics. His brilliant and compassionate legal defense of Caroline Childress, the widow of a British soldier who’d fought against Continental troops in the War for Independence, not only had made him the most sought-after lawyer in town—the man who could win the unwinnable case—but also led to repeated calls for him to enter politics at the highest level. Several people approached him to run against New York’s corpulent, corrupt governor, George Clinton, while others suggested something at the national level—senator, or perhaps foreign minister, should Congress decide to create an executive office. He might even be prime minister or president or whatever title they would bestow on the new leader of the country.

  The Hamiltons’ combined success had made them the It Couple in New York City. With Eliza’s family relations to the Van Rensselaers, Livingstons, Schuylers, and the rest of the New World gentry, and Alex’s military and legal connections to General Washington and other heroes of the revolution, there wasn’t a soul in New York who didn’t want to meet them, whether to bask in their glory or ride on their coattails. But right now the Hamiltons were on their way to meet someone who meant more to them then all the tow-headed Dutchmen and high-collared Anglicans you could stuff in a parlor.

  * * *

  • • •

  AS THEY TURNED a corner, the vista opened before them, revealing the clear southern sky over New York Harbor, whose sparkling waters were dotted with masts and brightly colored flags waving in the soft breeze.

  “Papa’s letter said that Johnny was nervous about the journey down,” Eliza said, sounding a bit anxious herself. “It’s been such a stormy spring, and apparently he gets seasick, even on a riverboat. Although,” she continued, “I must say, my stomach feels rather restless this morning. I think Rowena’s eggs were a bit underdone at breakfast.”

  “I found them delicious as always. I think you are just missing your Jenny or Martha, or whatever you called her.”

  “We just called her Cook,” Eliza said.

  “No doubt. To a child, she must have seemed the source of all food, and no eggs, regardless of how well they are scrambled, can possibly taste as good as the ones your Cook made you for the first eighteen years of your life.”

  Eliza knew Alex had a point, but still, Rowena’s omelet had seemed a little runny to her. Rather than linger on breakfast, she tried to focus on her excitement at being reunited with her brother, who was to start at Columbia in a few weeks. Everyone in her family was proud of the university’s new name, no longer saddled with the British monarch’s title as King’s College. Since he was the eldest son, great things were expected of Johnny, and as her parents’ representatives here in New York, Eliza understood it was her job to see that he was kept in line. Johnny was also the first child after the sisterly triumvirate of Angelica, Eliza, and Peggy—the first to survive, at any rate—some nine years her junior. Though she was grown now, and he nearly so, she still couldn’t help but think of him as the baby she and Angelica and Peggy had fussed over for the first three years of his life, until Philip Jr. came along. They had coddled their brother and made a pet of him, and she knew that he wouldn’t stand for runny eggs.

  “You will admit that Rowena has been very distracted since Simon went away,” she said now. “I do wonder if it was the right decision.”

  Rowena’s son, Simon, had been in training as their footman, but from the start the energetic eleven-year-old showed no aptitude for it. He was an outdoorsy child, preferring bare feet to shod and loose cotton or linen to fitted wool. When, on an errand to the Beekman estate, Mount Pleasant, five miles north of the city, he had gamely assisted the chauffeur in delivering a mare whose foal was breach, Jonas Beekman was so impressed with his performance—both mare and foal pulled through swimmingly—that he offered Simon a job as a groom at a grown man’s wages. Rowena had reluctantly agreed to let him go, but took it hard. Simon would have to go live at Mount Pleasant, and, since the death of her husband in the war, she would be all alone.

  “The right decision for Rowena?” Alex now asked pointedly. “Or for you?”

  “Oh, don’t tease me when my stomach is upset,” Eliza said, but she had to admit that, like her mother, she firmly believed that happy servants made for a happy house, or, at any rate, that a house in which the staff was miserable would share in their pain. Fires would go out, dust would accumulate, the eggs would separate on the plate. And as the thought of them returned, her insides churned anew.

  “Well, the nephew should be here next week,” Alex said. “What’s his name again?”

  “Drayton,�
� Eliza said. Drayton Pennington was the eldest child of one of Rowena’s sisters. He was said to be a hale lad of seventeen, though Rowena had not seen him in nearly a decade: The Penningtons had moved to the Ohio Territory to avoid the war. They transformed a considerable bit of land into a farmstead, but it was still essentially wilderness, and Nigella, Rowena’s sister, had written that Drayton seemed somehow “cut of an urban cloth.” He knew his letters and read every book he could get his hands on, was even better at math, and, owing to a dearth of sisters, was remarkably spry with needle and thread.

  “Drayton and Johnny, both arriving within a week. Our household will be incredibly full.”

  “Not too full,” Eliza said, patting her all too flat stomach.

  “There, there, my dear,” Alex said, squeezing his wife’s arm tenderly. “It will come.”

  After Alex’s momentous victory in court last year—and the settlement fee—the Hamiltons had at last felt ready to start a family of their own. But eight months of “carefully coordinated activity,” as Eliza had referred to it in a recent letter to her mother, produced nothing in the way of nascent Hamiltons. In an earlier letter, Mrs. Schuyler asked why Eliza had not joined her two sisters in giving her a grandchild to spoil, and, in a rare moment of candor, pointed out that the activity in question was not without its own charms: “You and Alex should persevere, and take pleasure in the perseverance,” she concluded. Eliza had thought the page in her hands would spontaneously combust when she read those words, but it was just her cheeks burning. And yet, her mother’s disappointment did not compare to Eliza’s greater one. Her wish for a child was much too painful at this point.

  “Having Johnny here will be almost like having a child I suppose. Though he is nearly grown, Mama says that he is as headstrong as Cornelia, who is not even five,” she told her husband.