After a while, they crossed over to a grassy field dotted with elms. He knew when the sun was out that it was a beautiful expanse of green. When theyreached the first tree, she released her hold on him, lowered herself to the ground, and patted the area beside her. He couldn’t imagine any other lady of his acquaintance being so unconcerned with the impropriety or the possibility of grass stains. Yet one of the things he liked about her was that she was so incredibly unpretentious.
He dropped down beside her and worked his back against the tree trunk until he found a comfortable position.
“How is your mother taking the loss?”
It pleased him that her first thought revolved around his mother. “She’s made of steel, my mother, but I think his going hit her harder than she’d expected.” He wondered if Aiden might send that fellow from his club who’d given her attention over to the residence to comfort her.
“Even when we’re expecting the death, it still seems to come as a shock when it happens. At least my father’s did. I assume you sent word to Aiden.”
“Yes, and his brother Finn. As well as theTimes. They’ll no doubt do a special edition.”
“You’re in mourning now. We’ll need to postpone the wedding.”
He looked over at her. Most of her was lost to the shadows, except for a faint beam of moonlight and distant streetlamps that illuminated her face. “Your mother won’t like it, but we can have a small, quiet ceremony sooner. Close friends, family.”
He didn’t move when she reached up and combed back strands of his hair that had fallen across his brow. “I’d prefer that actually to the extravagant and attention-getting affair Mama was planning, expecting you to pay for it all.”
“I would have. If it’s what you wanted.” He owed her that for his lapse of control. When she began to move her hand away, he took it and pressed a kiss to the center of her palm. “No honor comes with the title to which you’ll be associated.”
She brought up her knees, pressed her cheek to them, and studied him. “The holder was dishonorable, not the title.”
“Few separate the man from the title.” In spite of the aristocracy usually being given a lot of leeway when it came to misguided behavior, his father had pompously flaunted his sins, making them difficult to overlook.
“People know you. They understand you’re not him.”
He looked up. Clouds of gray blocked out the sight of the stars. He wondered if he’d have many moments like this with her, when desire wasn’t rampaging through him, when he experienced contentment in simply being with her. The calmness of her, the quiet. If he were with the Chessmen, they’d be tossing back scotch and recalling all the times his father had been an unconscionable bastard, justifying this lack of feeling he held for the man who had sired him.
“When I was around six, I was racing along the hallways, slate in hand, because I’d just written my father’s title without any help from my tutor. I wanted him to see how perfect the letters were. But when I rushed into the library, in my haste, I bumped into a small table upon which some statuette sat. It teetered and toppled onto the floor, and of course broke. My father came to his feet and shouted that I was a damned irritating brat. His anger had me immediately running off to get out of his sight, to hide, rather than showhim the prize. That night he woke me from my sleep and told me to dress quickly because we had a chore to tend to. I was so happy to be included, overjoyed that he wanted me with him.
“Soon we were traveling through London, the rain pelting the carriage. I have no memory of the precise time or if I even ever knew it. But I do recall many of the streets being deserted, desolate. We came to a halt in front of a town house. I was ordered to wait. My father disappeared inside and returned several minutes later with a crying babe in his arms. In the doorway stood a weeping woman in a nightdress, keening, ‘I beg of you don’t take her!’
“But my father leapt into the carriage. The infant bawled the entire journey, her tiny fists flailing. I was too young to comprehend the role of the woman and babe in his life. Mistress and by-blow. Eventually, we stopped in front of a tavern. A crone stepped out of the shadows. The earl handed off the babe and a pouch that jingled from the coins housed within it.
“Then we were off again, dashing through the drenched streets, with the rain pelting the carriage roof in an ominously steady beat. ‘’Tis easy enough to rid myself of damned irritating brats,’ he said.”
She gasped in horror. “Dear Lord, but you were his heir. Surely, he wouldn’t have given you away.”
“As I grew older, I became rather certain it was a bluff, but at the time I didn’t fully comprehend the importance of being the heir, of exactly what it meant, and how it quite possibly made me indispensable. What I did understand was the anger in his tone and the threat. Afterward I avoided him the best I could, moving around stealthily, keeping silent, always fearful I’d awaken hiswrath, hoping he might forget I even existed. When I couldn’t elude him, I would be as still as I could be, quiet. I never sought his attention. I doubt there was a more properly behaved lad in all of Britain.”
“Didn’t your mother reassure you that you were safe from his threats?”
“I never told her. I was ashamed for her to know I’d displeased him. And I worried if I told her that he might decide to rid himself of her. I grew to hate him. Or I thought it was hate burning through me. Until eventually I realized it was grief. Overwhelming grief because he was not the father I wanted—needed—him to be. I should feel that grief now but after all these years of experiencing it, I am numb to it. I feel rage, though, at all the people he hurt.”
She rubbed his shoulder. “I think he hurt you most of all, caused damage.”
He started to scoff, to deny her words, but his life rolled before him. It was like looking through a kaleidoscope, watching as the various colors shifted into different images. All the decisions he’d made that had been influenced by his sire. His efforts not to be like him. His desire, his need, to demonstrate he was above reproach, to provide an example of proper behavior.
That example would now include being caught in flagrante delicto with this woman who wasn’t deserving of the scandal. Who was being forced to marry him. Without a proper courtship. Without romantic gestures. Without wooing. Just raw lust, barbaric impulses, and an animalistic need to possess.
Yet here he was, coming to her when he had other choices. What the deuce was this pull she had on him? Yet, he didn’t truly want to be anywhere else.
“I thought you should know that I’m the sort of man who feels no sorrow at his father’s passing.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to. Everything you’ve told me about him... he was horrid. I’m glad he’s gone, that you don’t have to carry the weight of him any longer.” She shifted until she was facing him, and he was grateful for the absence of the light of day. It was so much easier to confess emotions he’d rather not feel. “You are nothing at all like him.”
“Nora, I took you in a bloody greenhouse. Windows all around. Anyone could have seen in. Your brother did. I ruined you for any other man.”
Enough illumination existed for him to see her teasing smile. The tightness that had been in his chest since his arrival at her door eased somewhat, that even now she could smile. “Even if we hadn’t gotten caught, you’d already ruined me for any other man. From the beginning, you offered me so many things to explore. You never judged my need to understand how things worked... whether it was a kiss or a roulette wheel. Let me ask you this. If I had said no last night, would you have stopped?”
