Taming an Impossible Rogue (37 page)

“She’s clever; I’ll give her that. Is she dead?”

The fact that Adam had to ask that question spoke volumes about the man that Keating still was. Or everyone thought he was. The two seemed virtually the same. “No. Murder seemed counter to my best interests.”

“Thank Lucifer for that.”

Keating dropped the brush into a box and went to fetch a bucket of oats for Amble. “What the bloody hell does it matter, Adam? It’s changed nothing other than the fact that I’ll have ten thousand pounds for my own use. Perhaps I’ll be able to patch the holes in the roof at Havard’s Glen.”

“‘Instead they bade him live in shame, / With a bloody murder to his name. / So mind your manners, mend your ways, / Or you’ll join Blackwood in hellfire’s blaze,’” Greaves quoted. “Isn’t that how the poem ends? And the way you end as well, I suppose.”

“Tired as I am,” Keating said, his jaw clenching as he faced the duke full on, “I very much want to hit something. So thank you.”

For a heartbeat Greaves actually looked surprised. “I don’t want a fight, Keating,” he said, taking a step backward.

“You hit me earlier; it’s only fair. Aside from the fact that you’re a self-righteous bastard who pretends he’s never done anything nefarious in his life—which we both know is a lie.”

“Dammit, Keating, stop.”

“No.”

Greaves raised his hands, palms open. “Your ten thousand pounds isn’t coming from Fenton. It was part of the new wedding bargain he made with Montshire.”

Keating stopped his advance. “What?”

“Evidently your dear cousin barely has two coins to rub together. He made an agreement with Montshire that if he could return Camille to the altar and to her family’s good graces, they would pay him something over ten thousand pounds prize money. And a team of coach horses.” Greaves slowly lowered his hands again.

“Bays?”

“Yes.”

“And how the devil did you discover this?”

“She came by a few hours ago, looking for you. With her sister; evidently her family won’t take their eyes off her until the wedding.” He pulled out his pocket watch and flipped it open. “Which is in five hours.”

She.
Camille. She’d been here, and he’d been away, hunting Eleanor. He might have seen her once more, but Eleanor had ruined that as well. He took a breath. “It doesn’t change anything. She needs Fenton for his reputation; not for his blunt.”

Greaves looked at him for a moment. “Oh, well, now
I
want to hit
you.
” Shaking his head, he turned his back and walked toward the stable door. “I wash my hands of both of you,” he said over his shoulder. “I’ve never seen a pair so concerned with the other’s happiness that you just won’t see what’s directly in front of you. Good night.”

The duke didn’t understand. He didn’t see that Camille would be far better off with a proper life. Even if Fenton was a liar and a buffoon and a cold, cold fish, she’d manage. Certainly she’d have to learn to rein in her good humor, and she’d make good use of that caution she had about everyone and their opinions, but she would have a roof over her head, and her own household.

It was a rather shabby-looking household with decades-old curtains and furnishings, and those new gowns he’d imagined seeing her in would be cotton rather than rich silk, but on the positive side Fenton would never dance with her and would send her off with a maid for her daily walks through the park.

She would never see her friends—her odd new family—from The Tantalus Club again, because that would offend the sensibilities and thin layer of hide her husband possessed, but she would be able to have tea and biscuits with the chits who’d insulted her at every turn over the past year, the ones who’d turned her away from their homes when she’d been desperate and frightened.

He, on the other hand, would have a new roof, a solemn promise to himself and to her never to drink to excess or get into meaningless fights with people, and ten thousand pounds. And no need any longer to send every penny he earned off his land to someone else.

Keating sat down hard on one of the stable’s wooden benches. Perhaps it was the ache in his skull fooling him, but optimism nevertheless began to seep into his soul. Into his heart. Could he do this to his cousin? Would she do it to Fenton for the second time? Would she choose … him? A brawler and a drinker and a killer?

The thought made him giddy and light-headed. Could he have her? Worthy of her or not, he supposed it boiled down to one vital thing: Did he have the courage to ask her, and to face whatever her answer might be?

He pulled out his battered old pocket watch. Twenty after four o’clock in the morning. Standing again, he gave Amble a last pat and strode out of the stable for Baswich House. Hopefully Adam hadn’t yet gone to bed, because they had a few things to discuss.

And he needed to see whether he could rewrite the end of that damned poem, once and for all.

*   *   *

Lady Montshire pinched Camille’s cheeks. Hard.

“Ouch! Stop that,” Camille protested, leaning away and putting her cool palms over her face.

“You need some color.”

“Then use paint. There’s no need to maim me.”

Her mother frowned. “You aren’t maimed. And considering that this is the liveliest you’ve been all morning, I’m not going to apologize.”

“No, why would you apologize? Your daughter is marrying a man she dislikes, and who dislikes her, for a very large sum of money. And in return you get to tell your prissy friends that I’ve come back to my senses.”

“I only hope Lord Fenton realizes how poorly you govern your tongue,” Lady Montshire snapped back at her. “If you’d gone through this the first time as you promised, you and he might have learned by now to be friends. Now you have to begin with suspicion, which is your own fault. But you will be married today.”

“I gave my word.” What her mother didn’t realize was that the promise she was keeping wasn’t to her family or even to her almost-husband. It was to a man she would likely never set eyes on again. A man she loved and would never forget and whose happiness mattered more to her than her own. And for that the Pryce family should be very, very thankful.

Finally her mother stopped poking and pinching and stepped back. “You do look lovely,” she said.

“I look better in darker colors,” Camille countered, eyeing herself in the dressing mirror. With her fair skin and yellow hair, she felt far too pale and exposed in her white wedding gown.

And aside from the fact that this time she was not a wide-eyed virginal bride, seeing herself in that dress again brought back that flood of uncomfortable memories, her hopelessness and panic at being trapped into a marriage with a complete stranger, a man who’d remained aloof from her completely by choice. Nothing had changed since then. Well, nothing except for her.

“We need to leave for the church,” Lady Montshire said, turning to face her two younger daughters. “Stay here. I’ll be back in a moment.”

No one seemed to believe that she wasn’t going to flee. At least the company of her sisters kept her from dwelling too much on all the might-have-beens and should-have-beens that had kept her from sleep for the past week.

“What do you think?” Joanna asked, spinning a slow circle that made her light blue gown swirl around her legs. “I wore that green one last time, but everyone saw me in that.”

“You look pretty,” Marie supplied, sending Camille another sideways glance. She’d been doing that since their secret outing last night, but Camille wasn’t certain what she thought to see.

“Come downstairs, girls!” their mother’s voice came. “The coach is waiting!”

Camille took a breath. This was for Keating, she reminded herself for the thousandth time. She was the only way he would receive the money he needed. And that was the only path to him hopefully getting to see his son.

The trip to the church thankfully only took twenty minutes, because no one seemed to want to do anything but sit and stare at her as if they expected her to turn into a bird and fly out the coach’s window. At least Marie realized that if she’d wanted to run, she could have managed it last night. That was something, she supposed.

Once at the church, she and her sisters were bundled into the small dressing room at the rear. The door opened once to allow her mother in, and she wasn’t surprised to see her father standing directly on the far side, his arms crossed over his chest. Guarding her—or guarding against her, rather.

By now Keating had said he would be gone. She could imagine him on his pretty brown gelding, Amble, riding beside the hired coach that would carry his things and his valet. She wondered if he’d ridden by the church, or if he’d made an effort to avoid it.

Abruptly she heard a low-voiced argument just on the far side of the door. She couldn’t make out any words, but someone wasn’t happy. With a scowl her mother slipped out of the room again.

Marie came over and sat down beside Camille. “If you love Mr. Blackwood, how can you marry Lord Fenton?” she whispered. “I would die of heartache.”

“People don’t die of heartache. And I suppose marrying Fenton because of the money Keating gets is a better reason than marrying him because twenty-two years ago someone said I should.”

The door opened again. “Your ‘friends’ are here,” her mother snapped, her brows thunderously low. “Those light-skirts and tavern wenches, all sitting as nice as can be in the back pew. They told your father they would strip naked if he made a fuss, and promised to mind themselves only if we let them be.”

Camille grinned. “Good for them. I’m glad they’re here.”

“They’re ruining this ceremony. This is supposed to be about your return to propriety. Now the dregs of Society have dragged themselves in to make trouble.”

“The dregs of Society put a roof over my head and allowed me to avoid some very unsavory things,” Camille noted. “They stay.”

Her mother glared at her. “I am very glad that you will cease to be my responsibility in ten minutes. Because I know I didn’t raise you to be so defiant. I only wish Lord Fenton good luck.”

That seemed to signal the end of the discussion, and for the next ten minutes they sat in silence except for the sharp tick of the small clock in the corner. It seemed to echo her heart; steady, unaffected by events, merely concentrating on beating and not breaking.

Her father stuck his head into the room. “It’s time.”

Finally her heart shivered nervously. Time for a marriage. Time for her daydreams finally to die. Time to square her shoulders and do what needed to be done.

Lady Montshire and Joanna left, presumably to take their seats at the front of the church. Then Marie left, sending her a last glance that held more sympathy than she would previously have expected. Then her father offered his arm.

Taking a shallow breath, she wrapped her fingers around his sleeve and stepped into the church.

This was the moment, thirteen months earlier, that she’d fled. She looked up to see Fenton staring at her as though he was worried that if he blinked, she would vanish. Not this time. This time she at least had a reason for being there.

While what must have been a hundred pairs of eyes watched, she advanced until her father handed her off to Fenton and the priest began droning on about the sanctity of marriage. She wished he would finish with it already.

Finally the priest asked Fenton if he agreed to take her as his bride. He didn’t even glance at her, but kept his attention on the fellow officiating the ceremony. “I do,” he said.

Then it was her turn. Evidently she was supposed to love, honor, and obey the marquis. She wondered whether he would settle for one out of the three as she opened her mouth to marry him.

The rear doors of the church slammed open. Jumping, she whipped around—and froze.

Keating Blackwood strode up the aisle, his gaze on her. Only on her. Her heart broke free of its leash and began hammering crazily. What was he doing?

Amid the mutterings of “Bloody Blackwood” and loud speculation over his presence, she caught sight of her friends in the back pew. Sophia, Pansy, Sylvie, Lord and Lady Haybury, the Duke of Greaves—and to a one they were smiling.

He stopped directly in front of her. “Camille,” he said in a low voice that shook ever so slightly.

“Keating,” she returned. “What are you d—”

“I need to ask you a question,” he interrupted. “I’m a rogue, you know. A blackguard. The worst sort of man there is.”

She shook her head. “No, you aren—”

“People have lied to me, and used me, and I’ve lied to myself. You, however, have never lied to me.” Abruptly he sank down onto one knee.

For a moment, her heart simply stopped. Time stopped. She was twelve years old, imagining her charming hero storming castle walls and sweeping her off her feet into a world of kisses and chocolate sweets. That man finally had a face, and he was presently looking intently up at her.

“Camille, I love you with every ounce of my rotted soul. I worship you. I draw strength and courage from watching you. I never, ever, want to be without you.” He hesitated, the shaking of his deep voice touching her somewhere deep inside her soul. “Camille, will you marry me?”

“Just a damned minute, Blackwood!” Lord Fenton growled, stepping forward. “You can’t propose to her! I’m in the middle of marrying her. We have an agreement!”

“Shut up, Stephen,” Keating returned, not even sparing his cousin a glance.

Oh, she wanted to marry him. So badly. Hardly trusting herself to keep her balance, much less her wits, she put a hand on his shoulder and leaned down. “But what about the money? What about Michael?”

Light brown eyes held hers. “There is no Michael,” he murmured back. “She lied. And as for the money, it’s hardly a difficult choice, under the circumstances.” Reaching out, he took her free hand in his. “But it is your decision. Do you wish to spend the remainder of your life with a man like me?”

Camille shook her head. “No. I do not wish to spend the remainder of my life with a man like you.”

“You see?” Fenton broke in. “Leave, Keating. Now.”

Keating blinked. “I—”

“Hush. I don’t want a man
like
you. I want you. I want to marry you. I love you.”