School For Heiresses 2- Only a Duke Will Do (34 page)

“But the damage was done,” she said.

“If you want to call it that.” With unsteady motions, he picked up his shirt and pulled it on. “Infernal as his methods were, they did work. I did learn a valuable lesson.”

“That women are interchangeable?” she said tartly.

“No. I never did learn that.” Chucking her under the chin, he shot her a rueful smile. “If anything, going to the brothel taught me the reverse. One way I rebelled before Betsy came along was by trying to arouse my companions even when they were terrified of me. I tried everything, did everything. And that’s how I discovered that each woman has different preferences.” His smile faded. “And that paying for a woman muddies one’s enjoyment of the experience.”

“That’s why you were celibate in India.”

“Yes. That and the fact that I learned my grandfather’s other lesson very well.” He met her gaze steadily.

“He did succeed in teaching me to put my ambition above all else. In teaching me not to let…passion cloud my judgment.”

Passion. He used that word a great deal. She began to wonder if for him it meant something else. “What about love?” she whispered. “What is its place in your little hierarchy?”

He jerked away from her. “It has no place,” he said in a hollow voice. “That’s the one thing my ‘

depraved’ grandfather managed to beat out of me—the ability to love. If you haven’t realized it by now, you will. I am incapable of loving anyone.”

“You don’t believe that,” she said, heartsick to hear him put it in such bald terms. “And neither do I.”

“No?” Every muscle in his body went rigid. “Do you know who I was with at the club this evening, Louisa?”

A sudden premonition sent a chill down her spine. “Who?”

“Sidmouth and Castlereagh. We were discussing my future as prime minister.”

“You did say you might need them to gain that position,” she said warily.

“Unfortunately, I need them more than I anticipated,” he said, his voice as distant as she’d ever heard it, “

which is why I am…taking you to my estate in Shropshire in the morning.”

He couldn’t have astonished her more if he’d slapped her. “I don’t understand.”

His fingers curled into his palms, and he couldn’t seem to look at her. “They made it quite clear that they would prevent my ever becoming prime minister if I did not immediately ‘disassociate’ myself—and my wife—from the London Ladies.”

“What? How dare they!” She drew herself up, shaking from head to toe with anger. “They have no right to interfere if you choose to support my group!”

“I told them that. They did not agree. They left me no choice but to comply.”

She stared at him, her stomach roiling. “So you’re going to cut me off. Even though I upheld the terms of our bargain. Even though I changed my candidate—”

“They don’t care about our bloody bargain, damn it!” He whirled on her, eyes blazing. “And they don’t care who your candidate is, either. They simply want you and your ladies to stop interfering in politics.”

Even knowing why he was doing this didn’t assuage the hurt. “And since you told my father—and them

—from the beginning that you would manage that, you immediately agreed to pack me off to Shropshire?

”

“That was not their idea,” he admitted. “They undoubtedly expect me to demand that you resign.” A bitter edge tinged his voice. “Of course, they do not know how seldom my wife heeds my demands. So I am taking you away to make it easier for you.”

She struggled to contain her anger. “For me? Or for you?”

“Both.”

Panic seized her. “But you’re going with me.”

“Not to stay. Just to introduce you to the staff and—”

“Set up my prison.” Her anguish threatened to choke her. “That’s why you wanted to make love to me. Because you knew it would be our last time.”

Guilt suffused his face. “Just for a while, until Parliament adjourns and I can join you.” He dragged in a harsh breath. “You would have left the London Ladies soon anyway, once you conceived our child.”

“What are you talking about?”

“That was our agreement.”

“It was not! I agreed to stop going to the prison, that’s all. I said nothing about ending my other activities, like pushing for reform and trying to promote our candidate. And anyway, when you said you would support Fielden, I thought you had come to accept my participation in the group. That you might even approve.”

“I know what you thought. And it’s true that I—” He broke off, then cleared his throat. When he spoke again, his eyes looked utterly implacable. “It does not matter what I intended. I did not realize how determined they were to scuttle your organization. Now that I do, I have to take different measures.”

She couldn’t believe this. Everything she’d worked for, everything she’d thought she knew about her husband was crumbling in front of her. “You’re going to abandon Fielden.”

“We both are,” he said tightly.

A sharp pain lanced her chest. “But I already sent a letter by express to him to state that the London Ladies Society would be putting him up for office.”

“Then I will inform him otherwise.”

“He’s a member of your own party, for heaven’s sake,” she cried. “There is no reason—other than their idiocy—that you should abandon him.”

A shudder wracked him. “Things change.”

“No, you have changed.” Tears stinging her eyes, she hugged her arms about her waist. “You’re willing to sell your soul to those devils to become prime minister.”

Anger flared in his face. “When will you learn that politics requires compromise? I cannot do a bloody thing for reform if I do not have a position of power.”

She shook her head. “Do you really think they’re going to let you support reform once they put you in that position of power? You said you would unseat Sidmouth, but you won’t dare to do that to the man who makes you prime minister. At least with my father as your champion, you had a chance of choosing your own cabinet. But if you throw in your lot with his ministers—”

“Damn it, this is the way it has to be for now.”

“For now?” She strode up to seize his hands, desperate to reach him. “Sell your soul to them, and it’s sold for good. They won’t stop with this—Sidmouth isn’t the ‘compromising’ sort. They’ll drag you down into hell with them inch by inch until you forget every ideal you’re fighting for.”

He snatched his hands free. “I can build my own supporters. In time—”

“Sidmouth and Castlereagh aren’t going to give you time, don’t you see? They’re not even giving you time to make this decision. It’s either do as they demand now, or that’s it.”

His eyes blazed at her. “I have not been in England long enough to carry the Commons without them, damn it!”

“Perhaps not right now, but you still have your position in the Lords. Sidmouth can’t do anything about that. As for the Commons, you have the husbands of some of my ladies, not to mention Mrs. Fry’s brother-in-law. You’ll have Fielden, if he wins. You can gather your supporters without Sidmouth—”

“In how many years?” he snapped. “By then, God only knows where the country will be.”

She stared at his bleak face, forcing her anger back, swallowing the furious words that seared her throat. There was something more to this fierce ambition of Simon’s. In the past few weeks, she’d come to know her husband well. He wasn’t the sort of man to let men he despised force him into anything. Yet in this one matter he seemed to lose all sense of character and integrity. If she was to change that, she had to know why. She had to restrain her temper, be reasonable. “What made you decide to become prime minister anyway, Simon?”

The question brought him up short. “What do you mean?”

“You can work in the House of Lords to bring about change, and perhaps do almost as much good. Why did you seize upon the ambition of being prime minister? It’s a very unusual step for a man with your wealth and titles.”

“Someone has to do it,” he said flippantly.

She gritted her teeth against a hot retort. “That’s not an answer. Why must it be you?”

He drew himself up. “So that it’s done right. So that the country can move past its fear of the Reign of Terror and into a better place.”

“And only you can accomplish that?”

“I was bred for it. Loathsome as my grandfather’s tactics were, he taught me astounding things about politics. It would be foolish and irresponsible to waste that knowledge in a vain pursuit of my own pleasure—”

“Like your Uncle Tobias and your father, the duke, you mean.”

He eyed her warily. “Yes.”

“So you’re doing it to prove you’re a better man than them?” she asked, confused. “Because you don’t want to disappoint your grandfather, like his son and son-in-law did?”

“Certainly not!” He cast her a scornful glance. “Why should I care if I disappoint a dead man?” He snorted. “I disappointed him long ago. Grandfather never thought I could become prime minister. After my…error with you seven years ago, he said I was ‘too much a slave’ to my ‘passions’ to ever ‘run a country successfully.’”

She began to understand better now. And what she understood broke her heart. “So you set out to prove him wrong. First, you ran India without ever giving in to your passions. But that was only preparation for the real test—running England.” She caught her breath. “Except that I was still around when you returned, still inciting your ‘passions.’ And you can’t prove him wrong as long as I keep doing so, influencing you, meddling—”

“No,” he ground out. “This has nothing to do with him.”

“It has everything to do with him,” she said fiercely. “You need to prove to yourself that he was wrong about you, and to do that, you have to resist your passions. That’s the real reason you’re packing me off to Shropshire. Because you know you can’t resist your ‘passions’ as long as I’m near.”

He just stared at her with hollow eyes.

“But it’s not just your passions you’re trying to resist, is it?” she said, unshed tears clogging her throat. “

You’re fighting the impulse to care—not just about me, but about prison reform and all the issues Sidmouth and Castlereagh ignore. Because caring means feeling something, and nothing terrifies you more than that.”

“That’s enough,” he choked out.

“If you feel something,” she went on relentlessly, “you risk being hurt, the way your grandfather’s cruelty hurt you, the way your parents’ neglect hurt you, the way Betsy’s seeming betrayal hurt you—”

“Shut up, damn you!” he cried, seizing her by the shoulders. “You’re wrong! It’s not about that! It’s only politics—”

“Nothing is ever only politics,” she hissed. “Don’t you see? You think you’re proving him wrong, but all you’re doing is becoming him! You’re becoming the very man you detest. You’re trying to turn your heart to stone so you’ll have the strength to do what they ask.” She lifted her hands to cup his cheeks. “

And it’s killing you, my love. Compromise by compromise by compromise.”

For a moment, she thought she might have reached him. His eyes looked haunted, lost, and his fingers dug into her shoulders painfully.

Then with a heart-wrenching shudder, he thrust her away from him. “You do not understand how politics works, and you never will.”

His voice had become so icily remote that it was no longer the voice of her beloved Simon. It was the voice of the great Prime Minister Monteith. And she had no doubt that somewhere in hell, that man was cackling in triumph.

“I am sorry it pains you, Louisa,” he clipped out, “but this is the way it has to be. And we will be leaving for Shropshire in the morning.”

She caught her breath, then steadied herself. She knew what she had to do now. Even if he hated it. “Go to Shropshire if you wish. But I will not.”

Fury carved his features into coldest marble. “You are not going to destroy my chance at prime minister!”

“No, I wouldn’t do that. For one thing, defying my husband would harm my own reform efforts. For another, I love you, and that means I won’t ruin your hopes for the future, even if I think you’re wrong.”

When the mere word “love” made him flinch, her heart sank further. “So I’ll stay here in London and be the dutiful wife, if that’s what you require.”

Some of the tension left him.

But she wasn’t done. “That does not, however, mean that I’ll abandon my organization without a word. It’s only right that I prepare them for my resignation, that I meet with them and Mr. Fielden in person to explain, that I arrange for other members to take my place on the committees. Surely you won’t deny me that chance.”

“Louisa—” he began, his face clouding.

“I won’t do it publicly, don’t worry. And I won’t do it here.” She couldn’t prevent the curtness that crept into her tone. “I wouldn’t want it to get back to your ‘friends’ that you’re allowing my ladies to come and go in your house.” She glanced back to where dawn already lightened the window of his study. “So I’m going to Regina’s.”

That took him off guard. “For how long?”

“However long it takes.” Until she could figure out how to live with this Simon. The one who couldn’t seem to put his past behind him.

“There is no need for you to go to my sister’s,” he said hoarsely. “I am sure you will take care of your withdrawal from politics with discretion. As long as you are being reasonable, I would rather have you here.”

“You planned to send me to Shropshire for several weeks anyway, so I don’t see what difference it makes if I spend time at—” She broke off as the answer dawned on her. “Oh yes, I see. In Shropshire, you could have hidden from me the sort of man you’ve become. And if I stay here in our house, you think you can use our ‘passions’ to blind me to it.”

When anger flared in his face, she added softly, “But I love you too much to hide from the truth. If I am to spend the rest of my life watching you relinquish your principles to prove something to your devil of a grandfather, I need time apart from you to prepare myself.”

“To nurse your anger, you mean,” he bit out.

“Tell yourself that if it makes you feel better,” she whispered. “But the only person I am angry with right now is the Earl of Monteith. Because if not for him, I know without a doubt that my husband could become the greatest statesman England has ever known. Whether or not he ever became prime minister.