Mercy crossed her hands over her stomach. She could tell him that all of this had been arranged before she’d truly known about Lady Plymton, before she’d asked him to take off his cravat and kiss her. But what good would it do? It wouldn’t change their circumstances. She’d been too scared to let him know they couldn’t marry. Well, now she wouldn’t have to. Penelope and Lady Plymton had accomplished that unpleasant task for her. Now that Nicholas had witnessed her artifice and deception firsthand, he wouldn’t want anything to do with her.
She couldn’t look at the hurt and anger written all over Nicholas’s face. “I’m sorry.” Her voice came out as a whisper.
Nicholas returned to his pacing, one hand at the back of his neck as if he was deep in thought, or trying to stop himself from punching a wall. “What about the time Miss Morgan and I got separated from everyone else at the Zoological Garden? Did you plan that as well?”
Mercy swallowed. The absolute shame of what she had done weighed on her, making it hard to breath or talk. It was as if she had suddenly been caught under a landslide and a mountain ofrubble pressed down on her chest. But she would not lie. “Yes.”
He stopped pacing and walked toward her. She dared a glance at him. It was a mistake. His face was twisted in revulsion. “Of course you did,” he said. “Was I so repellant to you that you had to force me onto other women? You could have simply told me.”
Mercy rubbed her forehead. “No, I couldn’t have.” She shook her head. “You saw my parents. They were so happy.”
“And you didn’t have the courage to tell them you had no interest in a man who only sent flowers and asked you to dance and nothing more?”
“That isn’t fair.” Penelope sat up, perfectly unharmed. “True, what we did was wrong, but a woman can’t possibly know right away whether she is in love with a man. She didn’t want to reject you outright.”
Nicholas turned on her. “No, she didn’t. She only wanted to put me into situations that would damage not only my reputation, but that of other women as well.”
“I don’t care about my reputation,” Lady Plymton said with a shrug. “I’d happily risk it for another chance with you.”
“Lady Plymton, you will never have another chance with me. Please keep your distance whenever we have the misfortune of being in a room together. I do not look back at our time together with pleasure—only shame and regret.” He turned to Mercy. “That is how rejection should be handled. Clean, clear, and without misunderstanding. Why—” He shook his head again. “And I’d thought...”
What? What had he thought? As much as she knew it would kill her, she wanted to know. But she was the one in the wrong, and no amount of begging for forgiveness would change her circumstances. He didn’t finish his sentence. Instead, he leaned toward her. Waiting. As if, despite everything, he would, perhaps, give her one more chance to explain herself and make recompense for her wrongs.
But she could not. She mouthed the words,I’m sorry,once again. His jaw clenched, and he straightened. His hand went to his cravat and tore at it. First the knot in front came undone, and then the rest of it fell away at his clawing fingers. He ripped it from his neck and dropped it at her feet.
“I’ll leave this with you as a memento of our time together. I’ll never wear it again,” he said with his lips curved into an awful sneer, before striding out of the room.
Nicholas, the Duke of Harrington, the most proper man she had ever known, stormed past the men and women waiting in the corridor with his neck bare and the offending length of silk left, mocking her, in a pile at her feet.
* * *
Nicholas almost made it out of the Driarwood home without incident. Even Patience and Ottersby didn’t dare stop him as strode past the ballroom. It was only as he stood alone in the entry hall pacing while he waited for the servant to call his carriage and fetch his coat and hat that someone dared approach him.
And it was Lord Rayleigh, blast the deuced man. He must have a death wish. Wasn’t interrupting his speech and arguing with him in Parliament enough?
Lord Rayleigh pulled a monocle out of his breast pocket and surveyed Nicholas’s open neck. “Have you spent so much time with the Irish that you are adopting their style of dress? Your father would be so disappointed.”
Nicholas sighed. His father couldn’t have cared less about his cravat. But he would be disappointed to know that Nicholas had allowed this man to disrespect the title of Harrington time and time again. Nicholas looked down toward his neck as if he wasn’t extremely aware of his open collar. “You don’t think I should be dressed like this?”
Lord Rayleigh grunted. “Of course not. You are a duke, forheaven’s sake. Think of your reputation.”
“Then I suppose there is nothing to do but for you to give me yours.”
“What?”
“I’m fairly certain you heard me. I said give me your cravat.”
Lord Rayleigh took a step back as if he had only just realized he was in the company of a madman. He should have realized it sooner; it wasn’t as if Nicholas were trying to hide it. Lord Rayleigh shook his head. “I’m not going to give you my cravat.”
“Yes, you are. You know who I am. You know my title and rank. After all, you’ve reminded me of those things twice. Are you really going to deny me, a duke, this one request?”
“I—” Lord Rayleigh looked left and right. The only other person in the hall was the same servant, looking for all the world as if he couldn’t hear their conversation, but the corners of his lips turned up just enough for Nicholas to know he was enjoying it.
“If you make me ask for your cravat again, you will no longer be admitted to Whites, any business dealings our estates share will be halted, and every other Sunday, I’ll personally make certain an order of flowers is delivered to your home with your mistress’s name on them.”
“Your father—”
“If you try to use my father’s reputation against me again, the flowers will be arriving twice a week.”
