Cheryl Holt (20 page)

“Maybe I’ve changed my mind. Maybe I don’t need all the folderol.”

He sighed. “Rebecca—”

“Kiss me.”

“What?” he gasped.

“You heard me, Alex. Don’t pretend you didn’t.”

“No.”

“Why won’t you?”

“It’s not fitting for us to be lingering in the dark and carrying on.”

“You do it with other women all the time.”

“I do not, and I’m offended that you would level such a despicable charge.”

“You have paramours crawling out of the woodwork—people delight in keeping me apprised—so if you can philander with every loose hussy in the kingdom, why not me?”

“You’ve gone stark raving mad, and I’m wondering if I shouldn’t have your sister call for a physician.”

“For God’s sake, Alex!” She stamped her foot like a toddler having a tantrum, so angry that she yearned to grab a chunk of his hair and yank it out by the roots. “I just want a simple kiss. Is that too much to ask? We’re not strangers; we haven’t stumbled into each other on the street; I’m not some sixteen-year-old child who can be ruined. We’ve been betrothed my entire life! So kiss me—this very second—or I swear I will cry off, and I will tell everyone it was because you . . . you . . . like men instead of women!”

She’d managed to rattle the appropriate cage. The slur to his manhood was more than he could abide. He bristled with temper, but she stood her ground as he hemmed and hawed.

Ultimately, he did as she’d demanded. He kissed her.

It was very sweet, it was very innocent, it was very dull, and it confirmed each and every one of her suspicions.

He pulled away and, discouraged and saddened, she evaluated him; then she murmured, “You don’t love me, do you? You never loved me.”

“Oh, Rebecca . . .”

“Do you?”

“We’ll develop deep feelings with the passage of time,” he maintained, “with association and familiarity.”

It’s been twenty-two years!
she longed to scream, but she didn’t. Resignation washed over her, and she was relieved to have the issue out in the open. If he didn’t love her, so be it, but she would enter into the union with no illusions, with her heart steeled against disappointment.

When the end result was so meaningless, she couldn’t
see any reason to go to all the trouble and expense of a fancy wedding.

“I want a Special License,” she said. “We’ll have a small ceremony, next week, in the downstairs parlor.”

He hesitated, trying to decide if he should talk her out of it, if he should flat-out decline, but what excuse could he give? What did it matter if they finished it tomorrow or next month or next year? The outcome would be the same.

He shrugged. “As you wish.”

Without another word, she turned and left.

  13  

Ellen heard Alex stomping down the hall, but she ignored him to fold her undergarments and tuck them into her portmanteau.

He tried the knob and, on finding the door locked, he let out a vicious curse and kicked it so hard that her window rattled.

“Let me in,” he hissed.

“No.”

“Dammit, Ellen! Let me in this minute.”

She didn’t respond but took a final look around, searching for any item she might have forgotten, though she shouldn’t have fretted. She had so few possessions that she scarcely needed a satchel in which to carry them.

Her deck of cards lay on the dresser, and she decided to leave them for the next occupant. They had given her comfort during many lonely hours, but now they simply and painfully reminded her of Alex.

“Ellen!” he barked, and he pounded on the wood.

He was growing more irritated, his voice much too
loud. As usual, it was the middle of the night, and if he kept on, he’d wake the whole house.

“Go! Away!” she quietly said.

With a sigh of resignation, she set her bag on the rug, then lay on the bed and gazed at the ceiling. She’d dispatched a note to James, begging him to come for her, and the moment he arrived on the morrow, she’d be ready.

If he didn’t appear, she wasn’t sure what she’d do. She had a bit of cash, but it wouldn’t support her for more than a few days on the streets of London.

The prospects for disaster were great, yet she couldn’t stay. News of Rebecca’s rapid nuptials had raced through the mansion like a wildfire, sending the staff into hysterics of preparation.

Ellen didn’t know why Rebecca had chosen to wed so fast, or why Alex had acquiesced, and she didn’t want to know. There was one reason a bridal couple had to hurry—that being a babe on the way—and if Ellen learned that pregnancy was the cause, she truly thought her heart might quit beating.

She felt as if she were the last person left on earth, a shipwrecked survivor on a deserted island. A candle burned on the dresser. It flickered with each strike of his fist, and she closed her eyes against his rage, eager just to sleep, to sleep forever.

Suddenly there was a thunderous crack, then another, and the door burst as he rent it open. He stormed in, a veritable wave of temper billowing out ahead of him.

She should have realized that she couldn’t keep him out. He was like a force of nature, a hurricane or blizzard that was relentless in its approach, that was impossible to halt or divert.

Silent and morose, she sat up as he assessed her packed bag, the emptied wardrobe. He rippled with fury.

“What in the hell are you doing?”

“If you’re determined to fight with me,” she said, “stop shouting. I won’t have your servants tromping down to listen.”

For once, he actually heeded her. He went to the ruined door and balanced a chair against it, bracing it as much as he could; then he whipped around. Hands on his hips, feet spread wide, he resembled an infantry captain about to question a prisoner, and she didn’t know whether to laugh or hit him.

What right had he to be angry? What right had he to barge in, to bellow and rant?

“I had to be informed by Lydia,” he snarled, “that you’ve resigned your post.”

“Yes, I have.”

“You told me you wouldn’t.”

She shrugged. “I guess I changed my mind.”

He marched across the floor and towered over her. “I won’t let you go.”

“It’s not up to you.”

“We’ll see about that!”

“You don’t own me. You can’t keep me here against my will.”

He was so irate that he yearned to lash out, and if she hadn’t known him better, she might have worried he’d strike her.

“How could you do this to me?” he demanded.

“To you!” Her own temper ignited, and she leapt to her feet. “You have an incredible amount of gall to ask.”

“You’re everything to me.” He grabbed her arms and shook her. “You’re my life, my soul, my . . . my . . .”

“I am not.” She shoved him away. “How dare you claim otherwise.”

At her assessment he was aghast. “You’re my entire world.”

“I’m a trifle for you!” She was shouting, too, having lost the ability of discretion. If they were overheard, she couldn’t help it. She’d never been so incensed. “I’m a dalliance. You sneak into my bed, because you’re bored, because you’re lonely, or I amuse you—I’m not certain why—but you insult me by pretending our relationship has any more significance than that to you.”

“Is that what you really think?”

“It’s what I know.”

“After all we’ve shared, how could you leave?” He gestured to her portmanteau. “You weren’t even planning to say good-bye.”

“You’re marrying next week!” she wailed. “I won’t watch it happen. You can’t make me. I swear I’d kill you first.”

“My marriage doesn’t have anything to do with us.”

“Are you insane? It has everything to do with us!”

“The situation is between Rebecca and me. It doesn’t involve you.”

“Only someone who was completely deranged would agree with you.”

“I won’t go through with it,” he impulsively stated. “I can’t. I’ll cry off, and you and I will run away together. I’ll marry you instead.”

Her breath hitched. “Marry me? Why would you?”

“Because I. . . I. . . love you.”

She chuckled, her voice cracking with indignation and mirth. “That’s the most preposterous comment ever
uttered in my presence. You don’t love me. You don’t love anyone but yourself.”

“I do love you!”

“Oh, shut up! Please! You’re embarrassing both of us.”

He’d had plenty of chances to profess elevated devotion, and she supposed he probably did like her more than some of his other lovers. But he was like a spoiled child, who always got his way. She was ready to walk out, before he was ready for her to go, and he couldn’t abide that she had the audacity to oppose him.

If he’d admitted a week earlier—even an hour earlier—how much he cared, she might have believed him. At this hideous juncture, he couldn’t convince her that he was sincere. His words were like leaves blowing in the wind.

At having his declaration discounted, his bluster faded, and he studied her as if he’d stumbled into the wrong room, as if he wasn’t sure who she was.

“Maybe I was mistaken,” he said, “but I was positive that there was a special bond between us.”

“There was,” she concurred. “You’re a handsome, tenacious man, who enjoys seducing women. I was a naïve, gullible female, who assumed she could romp without consequence. I did, even though it was terribly wicked of me, but it’s over. You’re moving on, and I am, too.”

“I meant nothing to you then?”

He gazed at her as if he truly wished to know. He seemed to be sad and distressed—or perhaps betrayed—by her lack of empathy, though she couldn’t figure out why.

His destiny was to marry Rebecca. There would be
no other outcome, and it was absurd for him to carry on as if they could forge a different ending. It wounded her to be taunted with dreams of what could never be.

What did he want from her? What did he expect? When he was finished, there’d be naught left.

“No,” she fibbed. “You didn’t mean anything to me. How could you have?”

As if she’d stabbed him with her remark, he sagged with despair, and she suffered from the strongest urge to reach out, to soothe and embrace, but she stopped herself. She refused to expend any energy pondering how much of his affection had been real and how much had been feigned.

Even if he’d been genuinely fond of her, he couldn’t act on it. The only role she could ever play was that of mistress, and she would jump off a cliff before she’d accept such a shameful position.

“Do you recollect when we first met?” she queried, wanting to hurt him, wanting him to depart and never come back. “I told you that I’d been acquainted with you previously.”

“Yes, but I didn’t recall the circumstances.”

“It was at a summer house party, a decade ago, when you were twenty and you were visiting friends in Surrey. Lady Barrington’s ring was stolen.”

“Yes, I remember it. She raised a huge ruckus.”

“There was a boy from the neighborhood who was accused and arrested.”

He nodded. “A local miscreant. He was hanged for the crime.”

“No, he wasn’t. He was transported to the penal colonies.”

“And you’re informing me because . . . ?”

“Because that
miscreant
, as you so blithely put it, was my brother, James.”

She had to give him credit. He appeared stricken, though whether from compassion or guilt she couldn’t decide.

“Oh, Ellen, I’m so sorry.”

“I’ve always detested you for not saving my brother.”

“How could I have helped him? I knew nothing about the incident. I was out riding when the theft occurred.”

“Did you steal that ring?”

“Me? My God, how could you level such a charge?”

“Did you?” she pressed. “I’ve often wondered if you were the man who destroyed my family.”

He was stunned. “I never could have.”

“So you see, Alex—excuse me, I should say
Lord
Stanton—there never was any actual amour between us. Over the years, I’ve speculated as to what kind of person you are deep down, and I let you close so that I could satisfy my curiosity, but that’s all it ever was for me.”

He evaluated her, and she kept her expression carefully blank, not wanting to furnish him with a hint of her agony. Short of making him hate her, she had no idea how else to force a split, how to create such a breach that it could never be healed. She had to push him away.