Rogue Countess (14 page)

Though his mother had fought the earl on his behalf, Jude had known there was no escaping the monstrous machine that had been set in motion. And he’d started to go numb.

The numbness had persisted even when he’d met with Olivia for a final farewell. The tears had fallen unheeded from Olivia’s golden-brown eyes. But for some reason, the scene didn’t affect him as he knew it should. Jude could recall with vivid clarity how he had sat opposite Olivia and watched her sob inconsolably, but he had lost all connection to her sorrow and to his own sense of loss. All he could think was how amazing it was that her eyes didn’t get the slightest bit red even with the great tears tracking down her cheeks.

Oddly, when it came to the younger Locke girl, Jude was able to tap into a wealth of feeling—rage, revulsion, loathing. He hadn’t even been able to look at the girl as she stood beside him while they recited the necessary vows that bound them in marriage. All of his energy had been focused on getting through the evil proceedings and then getting as far away from her as possible. There was no reception planned to follow the ceremony, something he had refused that his father had agreed to. Jude was not about to parade about amongst a bunch of guests, accepting half-hearted congratulations for such a hideous event.

In the short carriage ride from the church to Silverly, Jude had struggled to imagine life with the silent bride across from him. By the time the carriage stopped in front of Silverly, his stomach had been twisted in knots of furious protest. The footman had helped his bride step down to the gravel drive, and when she’d turned around to peer into the carriage with large dark eyes, waiting for him to follow, Jude had stared back at her in solemn silence. All he’d seen when he looked at her pale thin face was a devilish witch and the end to the life he’d always thought to have.

In a split second of decision, Jude had leaned forward to pull the carriage door shut and then shouted for the driver to continue on. He hadn’t stopped until he reached the docks of London and found a ship to take him from England, his family and the wife he refused to acknowledge.

Jude had committed himself to a state of perpetual oblivion, not wanting to devote another second of thought or drop of energy to the circumstances that preceded his departure from England. His memories of those years were fuzzy at best with the effects of alcohol, the smoke of opium dens and the faces of many nameless women. He’d devoted himself to constant movement, a constant changing of scenery. He’d learned how to disconnect from the world around him and become only a superficial participant.

It wasn’t until much later that he had a chance to wonder at how easily he had shoved not only Anna from his mind, but also Olivia, the woman he had thought he loved. When news of her marriage to the Duke of Clavering finally reached him, he had only felt a certain relief to know she had managed to move on after the tragedy of their parting. Then he had barely thought of her again.

For years, he barely thought of anyone.

But after he had been in India for a time and began to gain new perspective, his thoughts had often turned to his father. Jude’s last words to him on the day of his tragic marriage had been filled with resentment and wrath for the very traits that made the earl a man to be admired. His father was fair in judgment beyond all things and never made a decision without weighing out all possible consequences. It took Jude a long time to acknowledge that his father’s position on the marriage had not been the great betrayal he had felt it to be at the time.

Jude had already decided to return to England when he had received news of his father’s death. His mother’s sad letter had taken several months to reach him, and although he’d rushed through his travel plans, it still took a few more months before he stepped off the ship in London.

When Jude had made the decision to return home, it had been with the full intention to resume the life he had rejected with one unmovable exception. His unwanted marriage would be dissolved as quickly as possible. He had learned much about himself and his place in the world. He knew that fleeing from the disaster his life had become eight years ago had been infinitely foolish and pointless. A young man’s reckless rebellion. But during his time away, he had also come to value the understanding that life was made up of an endless series of choices. How a man reacted to things he could not change was a matter of choice. It was Jude’s choice to go back to England and take his place as the son he had been raised to be. It was also his choice to annul a marriage that never should have taken place, a union based on deceit and manipulation.

He should have realized, however, that acquiring an annulment was not going to be without its challenges. If a girl of sixteen could feel no compunction against climbing naked into the bed of a drugged and unconscious man, as a grown woman, she would be even more dangerous. He just hadn’t considered she would be so strikingly beautiful or that he would have such an intense attraction for her.

It was a fact he couldn’t ignore no matter how much it disturbed him.

He would have to be clever to get what he wanted. But he would get it.

Jude nudged his mount with his heels, wanting more speed, more wind in his face. The park at this early hour was virtually empty, with only the most serious riders out on the lanes. The flood of stylish carriages carrying society ladies and debutantes desperate to be seen and admired would come later. As would the posturing dandies on horseback, intercepting the ladies to engage in a light flirtation or a more serious courtship.

Jude rode for more than half an hour before he came around the pond and spotted her up ahead, watching him from beneath the branches of a wide spreading oak. The countess.

He turned his mount in her direction. How long had she been watching him? He should have been paying more attention. He had wanted to come upon her by surprise. He had wanted to disarm her and catch her off-guard.

As he neared, he couldn’t help but admire the image she presented as she sat astride a stunning gray thoroughbred. She looked poised for battle. He could suddenly picture her with startling clarity as one of those mythical Amazon warriors as she surveyed the approach of a hated enemy.

Jude smiled. He couldn’t help it. He knew of enough husbands and wives of arranged marriages who discovered themselves to be incompatible. He knew of a few couples who very plainly disliked each other. But he had to believe he and Anna were likely the only pair in recent history to declare open war against each other.

Pulling back on the reins, he slowed his mount to a walk. He told himself that the sudden warmth through his limbs and loins was due to the sun and exercise, but he lied.

It was Anna. It was the sight of her long, shapely, buckskin-clad legs expertly hugging the sides of her horse. It was the tantalizing sight of the fitted jacket that she had opened to allow the slight breeze of the warming morning to cool her. As he grew closer, he couldn’t help but notice she wore no corset beneath her white shirt. The curves of her breasts were soft and full beneath the light linen material. His blood nearly boiled with the lust flooding his veins.

She sat still and confident even as her mount shifted at the nearing of Jude’s horse. A muttered word from between her enticing lips instantly calmed the well-trained beast.

He almost chuckled when he noted the swift pulse throbbing at the side of her throat and the fact that she managed to give him a look filled with irritation even though her eyes were wary.

“Lady Blackbourne,” he said with a formal nod, watching her closely in the hopes that something in her manner might disclose answers to the mystery she presented. She continued to sit stiffly in her saddle, revealing nothing but her animosity. “Lovely morning, isn’t it?”

“What are you doing here?” Anna asked, putting forth no attempt at an amicable attitude.

Jude lifted his brows in an expression that clearly indicated he thought the answer to her question was obvious.

“Riding,” he answered, gesturing toward the horse beneath him.

She took a deep breath as if to calm herself. She was obviously trying to hold her temper and that made him smile all the wider. Perfect, he thought. He was getting to her as much as she got to him.

“Would you join me for a turn about the park?” he asked, indicating in his tone that he was not about to be put off easily. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion.

“No,” she replied curtly.

One corner of his mouth curved upward. “I didn’t think so.”

“I was just about to head back to the house.”

“I’ll join you,” Jude insisted. “Where is your groom?”

“I don’t ride with a groom,” Anna answered as she turned her horse and nudged him to a walk.

“Of course you don’t.” Jude guided his mount alongside hers. “Do you do anything one would expect of a gently reared lady?”

“Almost never,” Anna retorted without turning to look at him.

“Why is that?” Jude pressed, knowing instinctively how his personal inquiries would annoy her.

Anna turned to look at him with a dark expression and a malicious smile. “For the sole pleasure it gives me to think it might irritate you.”

Jude shook his head, not accepting her response. “I might believe that except for the fact that you have been ignoring society’s rules long before I returned to England.”

“To annoy your mother, then,” Anna amended.

“That I can certainly believe.” He replied with a touch of amusement, thinking of his mother’s horror over her daughter-in-law’s activities. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised the two of you don’t get along.”

Anna’s response was a non-committal shrug. “We have an understanding. She gets to continue in the role of Countess of Blackbourne, reigning over her social inferiors, and I am free to do what I enjoy.”

Jude seized the verbal opening she had left unguarded. “But she is not the countess,” he noted with an abrupt change in his voice. He glanced sidelong at her. “You are.”

She kept her eyes trained forward, refusing to return his glance. He studied her regal profile with an admiring appreciation. Her features were exquisite, he admitted reluctantly. An intriguing mixture of refined beauty, stiff pride and a kind of quiet determination that resided just under the surface and shone through the dark depths of her eyes.

“Much as you would like to see that fact eradicated,” Anna replied finally.

“I never pretended to anything else, sweetheart.” Jude’s relaxed drawl was misleading. He watched very carefully for her reaction as he continued. “But it does surprise me to find you living as you are, and not at Silverly. I would have thought you would have been thrilled at getting your hands on the title, the social standing and, not least of all, the Blackbourne jewels that became yours upon the death of my father.”

Anna stopped her horse then. She was visibly seething as she returned his intent regard.

“You are a cold and callous human being to even suggest for one moment that I took any pleasure at all in the death of your father.”

Jude schooled his features to reveal none of his thoughts as he asked in an even tone, “Were you lovers?”

Anna’s brown gaze flared with deep burning flames of fury. Then she closed her eyes. Jude’s mouth twitched with involuntary humor when her lips moved as she silently counted. Reaching ten, she took a deep breath, opened her eyes and met his stare squarely with a look that spoke volumes as to what she thought of him in that moment.

“Your question is crude and more insulting than you could ever know. Not because your father wasn’t worthy of tender regard, but because you clearly didn’t know him at all if you can even entertain the notion that he would engage in anything so dishonorable. Though their relationship wasn't calm or harmonious even a small portion of the time, he and your mother loved and respected each other. And he never would have betrayed you in such a manner. You might have refused to accept me as your wife, but he treated me as a daughter-in-law from the moment I landed on his doorstep.”

As soon as she finished her lecture, Anna pressed her heels into her mount’s sides and urged him into an easy trot.

Jude was more pleased by her response than he had expected to be. He hadn’t realized that the idea of an illicit relationship between Anna and his father had been a sharp pricking thorn in the back of his consciousness until the irritating thing was pulled free. He felt much more at ease now that the subject had been addressed. He only wished she hadn’t been so accurate in her comment that he didn’t understand his own father. Her sharp words renewed the stinging ache of regret in his chest.

He gave himself an extra moment before he kicked his horse into a swift canter. She had already slowed to a walk and he reined in expertly as he came up beside her. She didn’t acknowledge his presence.

“So, who is your current protector?”

“Look,” Anna bit out from between clenched teeth as she focused on an invisible point between her horse’s ears. “I don’t know what maddening game you are playing with your incessant questions, but you have sufficiently ruined my morning. I am finished playing along, and if you intend to continue riding with me, then I must insist you shut up.”

Jude clicked his tongue. “Afraid I can’t do that. There is only one thing that will effectively expunge me from your life, dear wife. And you are determined to make that difficult. All you have to do is cooperate. No mess, no extra fuss. Just end this thing once and for all.”