A Rake's Midnight Kiss (45 page)

She turned back, blinking away tears. “You have my respect. You know that.”

In his pale face, his mouth was stern. “I can’t let you do this, Genevieve.”

“You have no right to
let
me do anything,” she snapped. Antagonism was easier to handle than devastation. Right now, perhaps it was true that all he cared about was her love. But that wouldn’t last. Not when he returned to his glittering ballrooms and society friends. Then he’d hate that she’d exposed him to fresh mockery.

Perhaps, God forbid, he’d even come to hate her. She couldn’t endure that.

His eyes narrowed. “Do you want to fight about this?”

“There’s nothing to fight about.” She glared at him and raised her chin defiantly. “My mind’s made up.”

She waited for more arguments, but he stared at her as if she was a stranger. His closed expression cut sharper than a knife.

“Well, that’s it, then,” he said in a clipped tone. “Of course, your decision is the only one that counts. Yet again, the independent, self-sufficient Miss Barrett goes her own way.”

She recoiled at the bite in his tone, but couldn’t back down. “I’m a woman alone. I have to make my own decisions.”

How in heaven’s name had everything come to this? Only a few moments ago, he’d held her in his arms.

“If you’re alone, it’s because you want it that way.” The muscle flickered in his cheek, always sign of strong emotion, and she realized that in trying to save him from hurt, she’d hurt him.

She stood silent, unable to summon words insisting that she didn’t want to be alone, she wanted to be with him. Yesterday Richard had told her that he loved her and she thought she’d never feel lonely again. Today she stared at him across an impassable gulf and felt lonelier than she ever had in her life.

“I have to go to London with Cam.” He stalked toward the table. His voice was unemotional, as if he’d never called her his darling. The knife stabbed deeper. “He’s in this mess because of my dashed stupidity. There will be questions about Fairbrother, legal issues.”

He paused and she wondered if he meant to make some conciliatory gesture. Her hands curled at her sides as she fought the urge to reach after him and tell him she’d do whatever he asked. In this case, what he asked would injure him. She couldn’t countenance that.

Genevieve turned away and stared out the window at Leighton Court’s elaborate gardens. Although tears
prevented her from seeing them. Was this how everything ended? A few sharp words and Richard retreating to London, and with that, the joy was done?

He continued, still in that same neutral tone. “Promise that you won’t do anything until you hear from me.”

“I can’t wait. Dr. Partridge is preparing to publish.” She struggled to match Richard’s uninvolved manner, but her voice emerged raw with misery. “I won’t change my mind. As I said, this is purely up to me.”

After a weighty pause, he answered. This time even his well-practiced nonchalance couldn’t hide the anger vibrating under his words. “As you wish.”

Dear Lord, it wasn’t as she wished. She turned to ask Richard to wait, to beg him to let her explain, although surely he must know the reasons for what she did.

He was gone. Her gaze fell upon the library table. He’d taken the Harmsworth Jewel.

Richard was halfway to London before his temper eased enough for his mind to make sense of this morning’s disaster. He didn’t see Genevieve before leaving. He’d dashed off a note to Cam saying he’d be in London, then he’d returned to the vicarage for his carriage and a change of clothes. The phaeton now hurtled east at a pace that sent the mud flying.

How dare Genevieve sacrifice her dreams for him? He wanted to give her a good shake and tell her to wake up to herself. He wanted to kiss her into a stupor until questions of right and wrong no longer mattered.

But after several hours of furious driving, he began to see that she’d made the offer out of love, foolish girl. It was an act of such wholehearted generosity, he could hardly comprehend it.

Gratitude made him no more likely to accept her
self-denial. Genevieve underestimated how she’d changed him. His old misguided self had crouched behind an imperturbable façade. Now that Genevieve loved him for the man he was, the world’s derision had lost its sting.

He’d damn well show her that in loving Richard Harmsworth, she gave up nothing. One hand slid into his pocket to touch the Harmsworth Jewel. He no longer needed it to shore up his pride, but the trinket would yet prove its value.

F
irst Genevieve noticed the dog.

From the parlor window, she saw Sirius trot past in the late afternoon light. Nerves set her pulse racing. If Sirius appeared, Richard couldn’t be far behind.

She’d picked up her embroidery, but the sight of her elephant peony made her want to cry, so instead she stared moodily outside. Hecuba curled beside her, as out of sorts as her mistress. Autumn drew to a close. Since her last meeting with Richard, Genevieve had felt cold to the bone. Although that wasn’t altogether the season’s fault.

As if summoned by her thoughts, the stylish phaeton turned into the back lane. When she saw Richard, bundled into a caped coat, his hat at a jaunty angle, her heart hiccupped. As he passed, she caught a flash of his face. His features were set and determined. He looked more like the man who had rescued her from Lord Neville than the man who had mocked her inept stitchery.

“Who is that, dear?” her aunt asked from her chair near the fire.

“Sir Richard,” she said without turning. The carriage disappeared in a cloud of dust.

“That’s nice.”

Curious, Genevieve glanced at Aunt Lucy. She sounded remarkably calm about the famous beau’s visit. A distinct contrast to her excitement when Genevieve had told her that Christopher Evans was really the fabulously wealthy baronet Richard Harmsworth. Genevieve had taken her cue from Sedgemoor and repeated the story about Richard guarding the Harmsworth Jewel from Lord Neville. Lord Neville who had killed himself a fortnight ago to escape prosecution for theft.

“You don’t seem surprised,” she said flatly.

Her aunt laid aside her knitting and shot her a withering look. “Of course he’s come back, Genevieve. Don’t be a henwit.”

Well, that put her in her place, she thought, flopping back against the window embrasure. She hadn’t been nearly so certain she’d see him again. After all, she hadn’t heard from Richard since their quarrel.

Unexpectedly it was Sedgemoor who had sent her a couple of notes informing her of developments. The inquest into Lord Neville’s death had brought in a verdict of suicide. No alternate theories had arisen. Greengrass, named as a person of interest, had vanished without trace.

Thanks to Lord Hillbrook, the world now knew the scope of Lord Neville’s criminal activities. No wonder the man had lived in the country where he could display his ill-gotten gains without questions. No suspicion in Lord Neville’s suicide had fallen on either Richard Harmsworth or Camden Rothermere. As far as Genevieve knew, her name was never mentioned.

She’d pored over the London papers, seeking details of
the brouhaha that engulfed the Fairbrothers, reaching as high as Lord Neville’s top-lofty nephew, the Marquess of Leath. Actually if truth were told, she’d searched like a love-struck adolescent for the merest mention of Richard Harmsworth. Every time she saw his name, in connection with the Fairbrother scandal or detailing his appearance at some glamorous event, their hours together receded further into the realm of fantasy.

She couldn’t imagine a man who hobnobbed with the king telling her that he loved her. She couldn’t imagine such a man returning to wrench her from the melancholy limbo that had gripped her since his departure.

If she’d ever felt herself above the common run of her sex, she felt that no longer. She was as capable of making a fool of herself over a man as any naïve dairymaid or giggly miss at Almack’s. She couldn’t even find comfort anymore in her dreams of scholarly acclaim.

Richard had made no promises, no plans for the future. She couldn’t accuse him of raising false hopes. But she loved him. Hope, false or real, had become the breath of life. With every day of her lover’s absence, that breath became fainter. Until she’d convinced herself that everything was over between them. Even worse, they’d parted in rancor.

Yet here he was, rolling along in his carriage as though he hadn’t left her to lonely torment for fourteen whole days. Was he here to convince her to publish her article? Or out of politeness? After all, he’d deceived everyone in Little Derrick. His scruples must insist upon apologizing to the Barretts for his falsehoods.

If he apologized to her, she honestly thought she’d brain him with her sewing box.

Dorcas appeared. She looked like someone had struck her with a cricket bat. “Sir Richard Harmsworth, missus.”

“Please send him in,” Aunt Lucy said before Genevieve could respond.

Dorcas performed a shaky curtsy and held the door open. Richard strolled into the tiny parlor and Genevieve understood why Dorcas acted like she’d witnessed a heavenly apparition. For all her turmoil, Genevieve felt rather that way herself.

“Mrs. Warren, your servant.” He swept off his hat and bowed to Aunt Lucy with an elegance that contrasted sharply with this rundown room. He turned to Genevieve. “Miss Barrett, a pleasure to meet you again.”

“Yes,” she said faintly, standing and feeling completely inadequate to handling this resplendent creature.

He wore a royal blue coat, and a gray-and-white-striped waistcoat that fitted him within an inch. His faun breeches displayed not a wrinkle and his boots were so shiny that she’d see her face more clearly in their black leather than in her mirror upstairs. A gold fob glinted in his pocket and a sapphire pin the color of his eyes adorned his impossibly complex neck cloth.

If this was what he usually looked like, she could understand his shock when she’d accused him of overdressing as Christopher Evans. The man who stared at her with a quizzical light in his beautiful eyes belonged in a painting by Raeburn or Lawrence. Hecuba sprang down with more spirit than she’d displayed in a fortnight and twined around his long legs.

“Sir Richard, how good of you to call.” Her aunt rose to lift the purring cat and shot Genevieve an annoyed glance, wordlessly insisting that she gather herself. “Would you like tea?”

“How kind,” he responded smoothly.

Genevieve supposed he’d always possessed this effortless
assurance. When he’d first arrived at the vicarage, she remembered wanting to puncture his conceit. Today he looked as out of place in their untidy parlor as she would dancing on-stage at the Theatre Royal.

A silence descended and he sent Genevieve a questioning look. Her aunt struggled to restrain a wriggling Hecuba.

“I’ll see about a fresh pot. Genevieve, will you entertain our guest?” Aunt Lucy’s voice developed an edge. “Perhaps he’d like to sit down after his journey from London.”

Genevieve continued to gape at Richard like a rag-mannered hoyden. Or even more mortifying, like a starving urchin outside a pie stall. This gorgeous man couldn’t have told her he loved her or kissed her or dragged her to safety through stinking mud. Somewhere there must be another Richard Harmsworth. The man she knew well enough to tease and scold and love.

“I can’t claim to have come so far, Mrs. Warren. I’m at Leighton Court for the next few nights.”

“Is His Grace in residence? I hadn’t heard.”

“No. But he’s given me the run of the place.”

“Please sit down,” her aunt said. “I won’t be long and you and Genevieve know each other so well.”

As she retreated to her window seat, heat tinged Genevieve’s cheeks at her aunt’s unintentional double entendre. She and Richard did indeed know each other, in ways a vicar’s daughter should never know a man to whom she wasn’t married.

Genevieve stared into her lap, feeling awkward. She’d never been tongue-tied with Richard, even when she believed he was a lying thief. Especially not then. But this man was a stranger.

She heard the parlor door close.

“Alone at last.”

She jerked her head up. He’d chosen a chair to her right. His eyes brimmed with laughter and she didn’t trust that note of fond exasperation, just because she so desperately wanted to hear it. “Don’t mock me.”