The Rusticated Duchess (22 page)

“You don’t deserve to be brought into this drama,” she finally said. “Sacrificing your future to protect me? I’m amazed that you offered—grateful, even—but it’s hardly fair to you.”

“What?” Clare lifted a hand and tipped her chin to look at her face, and Gloria met his eyes honestly. After a moment, his face crinkled, and he chuckled. “Marriage to you is hardly a sacrifice, Glory. The match is clearly to my favour. You are beautiful and passionate. You are clearly capable of dealing with the demands of the estates and servants and all the associated responsibilities. You are clearly well-versed with society and whatever obligations will confound me when I am forced to take my place in it. You inspire loyalty in others, you are educated and intelligent and conversant. What could you possibly think is a sacrifice?”

Gloria blinked, biting her lip even as pleasure spread through her at his list of unrehearsed points, then shrugged. He seemed indignant. She hadn’t meant to insult him, only to point out that he couldn’t like being
forced
to marry.

She had been forced to marry once.

“I would never trap someone into marriage. I know what it feels like,” Gloria explained, seizing on the reality. “Marrying me to protect me, because your honour demands you to protect me, is no different than forcing me to marry
him
to protect the reputation of my family. I won’t put you in that position.”

Clare’s expression turned to a scowl. “And if I said I wanted to marry you?” he asked. “Do you consider me ineligible because of my advanced age and the likelihood of being made a widow?”

She frowned at him. “Ineligible?” The strangeness of the idea made her laugh. “You are hardly ineligible and if you’d spent any time in London society you’d know it, because females would be accosting you in the street and twisting their ankles on your front stoop. You can’t want to marry me. Ducal heirs do not marry widows. They marry diamonds of the first water, in their first season—”

“I’ve done that,” Clare interrupted. “And so have you. Mine was wonderful, yours much less successful, which just proves that the expectation doesn’t guarantee happiness. But I am not looking for an heir. I have one. God knows I would treasure more children, Gloria, and I’m well able to father them, and support as many as you like. The future of my title is not of primary consideration here.” His face softened as his eyes swept her. “A little girl in our household would be treasured beyond wealth, and certainly never auctioned off like livestock.”

Gloria’s entire body tightened and froze. Her breath caught. She paled as realisation struck her.

In sharing his bed, she hadn’t once considered the risks. Another child?

“No,” she blurted out, then shook her head to reinforce it.

Clare’s eyes narrowed, as if he could interpret her shock, and he bit out an answer, his words sharp. “If you turn up with child, we are marrying, Gloria Jane, even if you never speak to me again. I will not have you bear my child out of wedlock.”

Still sick and nauseous at the notion, Gloria remained frozen, until Clare put his hands to her shoulders and nearly shook her. “Do you understand me, Gloria?”

She did. If she was with child, she thought desperately, she’d have no choice. None. Clare would never let her go. Society wouldn’t let her go unless she went to Europe or America. Gloria shuddered. Clare would probably follow even there to claim his paternity.

Speaking was out of the question. She nodded her head, then pushed against him and ran for the salon, determined to avoid any further discussion, her head aching and her body trembling with fear.

She was a fool.

In the salon, the little household was quiet. Eynon slept. Mrs Pitcher knitted, as endlessly as always. Brody and Colman played cards, their eyes narrowed in concentration. Mrs Sinclair, exhausted from the last two days, slept sitting up and Astrid was sewing. Gloria was able to sit apart from them, in a high-backed armchair at the end of the room opposite the coal warming stove, and stare out at the deck and the water.

Gloria should never have been seduced, not by Clare or by her own desires. She wanted to blame him, to lay her panic and fear at his doorstep, but honesty forced her to admit that she had simply forgotten. In the amazement of learning how pleasurable and uplifting their private moments could be, Gloria had forgotten the true purpose of such coupling. Couples wed and shared a bed not to enjoy themselves together, but to produce children.

Gloria had no desire to re-enact that part of her first marriage, either.

She loved Eynon. She would fight for him, defend him, even against Lennox. Gloria wanted to see him grow, to watch him toddle across a room, to teach him all that she had been taught. She wanted him to be an honourable man, as Lennox was—as Clare was—and would teach him that women were valued and capable, and not simply ciphers on a shelf or warm bodies to absorb a man’s aggression and anger.

But another child?

No
.

Gloria’s mind blanked at the very idea.

She could not marry Clare. She could not again share his bed. Never again would she feel his lips against her navel or his hands in her hair, clenching her scalp. She would never again thread her hands into his hair and hold his head to her breast.

She hugged herself, tightly, and shook her head, though no one was watching.

No.

* * * *

No.

She hadn’t just said no. Gloria’s entire body had seized on some realisation and shut him out completely. She hadn’t just refused him because of some concern he hadn’t been able to foresee. She’d panicked, and over the discussion of children. Of daughters.

Clare stood silently on the deck, staring at the brilliant view of sea and horizon that spread out before him. The Isle of Man was approaching, and soon the yacht would change course and make for the dock at Douglas. But before then it would skirt the island and pass under the magnificent sight of Peel Castle, guarding Peel Bay.

Gloria would appreciate the panorama. He’d recognised her appreciation for Killard Castle, though she’d not been cloyingly effusive as so many admirers were. Clare knew from the attention she’d paid to the details and the observant questions she’d asked about the architecture and history, not to mention how she’d refrained from complaining about the less stellar aspects of castle living, despite her regrettably short stay. Making modern space within a structure of old stone required constant maintenance and a tolerance for draughts.

Impulsively he turned to the low room that served as a salon and slipped through the doorway. At once, every eye turned to him, and Gloria gasped, then covered it with a rushed, “Is there a problem?”

The only problem Clare could see was that she was huddled in a chair by the fire, apparently sorting embroidery thread. He frowned. She belonged in the sunshine, with the rays gleaming in her wheat-gold hair. He had a brief flashback to a dream he’d had before bedding Gloria, in which she was tied naked to the mast, her hair in wild disarray.

He snorted inwardly at the fantasy.

Instead, he bowed and held out his hand, turning to ignore the interested observers. “I would be honoured if the lady would accompany me for a brief stroll in the sunshine.” He cleared his throat and added, “There is a sight which is not to be missed coming.”

Gloria looked uncertain but the stiff weariness of her muscles was evident when she stood. Maintaining a polite façade, he assured her she would not need a cloak to cover her seaworthy high-necked and long-sleeved gown, and guided her into the sun.

The light caught her face and glinted in her eyes. Clare’s heart warmed when she breathed in the breeze, openly savouring the salt tang. Her lips pursed and parted, making Clare’s abdominal muscles tighten.

He tugged her two inches closer beside him and strolled with her to the rail near the bow of the ship. They were running with the wind, so the yacht rushed onward with a dizzying display of speed.

Then they were upon it. Below them, the deck tilted as the vessel turned and Clare laughed aloud at the sensation, even as he steadied Gloria beside him.

Before them, Peel Castle rose in sudden relief. The old stone glowed in the sunlight, and Clare watched Gloria’s eyes widen with delight. The ancient site on St Patrick’s Isle was a vision to behold, so Clare drew the fascinated woman beside him into his arms and began relating the legend of the black dog that was said to haunt it.

She shivered, but stayed where his hands demanded. Whether she wished to be close or she simply wished to hear him tell about the Viking wooden fort that had preceded the castle, or about the legendary possibility of Avalon, Clare couldn’t say. In truth, he wasn’t sure he cared. Gloria was in his arms.

Determinedly, he kept her before him as the yacht slipped past Peel and headed south. They had to round the southern tip of the island before facing the headwind into Douglas.

Clare felt a sliver of doubt assail him. He could have had the crew put into dock at Peel instead of Douglas. It would have shortened the trip. But Douglas, on the eastern side, drew increasing numbers of English travellers and vessels, despite its unattractive array of dockside taverns and inns.

As much as he could, Clare continued to tell Gloria the history of the Manx, determined to keep her close. They remained in sight of the rocky coast, with its already greening pastures and farmland that descended almost to the cliffs themselves. The winter snow was gone, and the first hints of what would be a glorious verdant green were beginning to appear. But the coastline was desolate and rocky here, with few visible and memorable points of interest.

Eventually, Clare halted his monologue, still with Gloria in his arms. Her supple body was deliciously without a corset beneath the practical and warm dress, and Clare had to struggle to remind himself that she’d probably gone without the stiff garment to make moving about on board the yacht easier.

Temptation whispered, anyway. The stairwell to the cabins below deck was only steps away, and they had no duties beyond enjoying the voyage. The smell of sweet pea drifted into his nostrils. Clare groaned aloud and rested his lips in Gloria’s hair as his body hardened, only to feel her stiffen. Resistant.

Clare drew back, surprised.

“Talk to me, Glory,” he murmured against her ear. “Why? What’s changed your mind?”

He didn’t have to see her to know that she understood his abrupt change in subject. Her shoulders stiffened. She even stood straighter in an attempt to separate their bodies.

“The word
marriage
,” she claimed bitterly, then stopped. Clare could see down at her cheek, knew she had bitten her lip to keep from spilling anything more detailed.

“Ah, that’s not precisely true,” he ground out. “It can’t be. First of all, while I never mentioned the word prior to your uncle’s arrival, I was very well aware that you were a virtuous woman early on in our acquaintance. You did not share your body easily, without trust. I’d told you that you were the first lady to grace the inside of Killard Castle in a dozen years. I insisted on bringing you into my home, in open defiance of etiquette. You must have known where I—where we—were headed, even if the words were not said.”

Gloria was silent for a very long time, but Clare continued to hold her in place. He had no intention of allowing her to run, but he wanted her to talk to him, and patience was the only tool available to him at present. Clare had no idea of how to reassure her, since her panicked moment that had followed on the heels of their last exchange.

He frowned, still holding out, remembering that last exchange. Suspicion grew in his mind that he knew what had frightened her.

She remained stubbornly silent.

Clare didn’t want to approach the problem directly, so he turned to another topic. “Is it money, Gloria? I’m perfectly agreeable to you managing your own funds. In truth, given the difference in our ages, it would be for the best so that you are prepared and able to take care of your own affairs when I have gone. As long as you are reasonably responsible in the matter, I would encourage you to do so.”

Gloria drew a deep breath, still not speaking, so Clare pointed out Port Erin approaching. “I like to stay here in poor weather,” he murmured. “The marina is better protection for the yacht than in Douglas, where storms can blow up from the east with little warning. It’s a charming village, and the inns are comfortable.” He told her about the myths of Bradda Head and of St Catherine’s Well on the opposite side of the port and fell silent.

“That’s one concern,” she eventually admitted, returning to the important point. “But the truth is, I simply don’t want anyone else—not even someone who has my best interests in mind—controlling me. I will age out of Winchester’s control in less than a year now. My sister Fiona has done that. But Lennox will have more control of me than I want for the rest of his life, and his second son—a man I’ve never even met—simply because of Eynon. What if Lennox doesn’t approve of a marriage—any marriage? He could take my son away to Wales and prevent me from ever seeing him again. That’s inescapable. And if I marry—that gives you that same amount of control over me for the rest of your life. Not a year, not a decade until Eynon is at Eton and I have more freedom.”

Her voice broke at those last words, and Clare couldn’t help but rock her back and forth, comforting her. He thought of Colby and Meriden’s tacit approval, and Gloria’s resistance, and a sense of helplessness flooded him.

He thought of Lennox, and Sarah, and March, and his arms tightened around Gloria. Not even for the angel in his arms could he forget the scene enacted seventeen years ago in his father’s library in the Mayfair house.

Clare had arrived late one night, prepared to brief his father on the marriage contracts he and the solicitors had negotiated with Sarah’s father. Lennox had been there, an astronomical bank draft in hand, ready to write a check to Lauderdale that would rescue the Blessings. In return, no announcement of Clare’s engagement to Sarah FitzGerald would be made. Instead, Sarah’s grandfather had negotiated a marriage settlement for Sarah and March.