“Of course she does!” His fist erupted with pain as he slammed it onto his desk. “And I’ve got nothing to say to bloody Abigail either while she’s still under Digby and his fellow conspirators’ toxic bloody spell! She’s obviously been coerced and conditioned by the radicals who have their claws in her.” He tapped his forehead. “She’s been turned. Twisted to their way of thinking and doesn’t recognize the truth anymore!”
“Your sister is too clever and too headstrong for that, and you know it. She’s too stubborn herself, just like her supercilious, I-know-best older brother. Just as you also know, when you aren’t being irrational, that a coincidence is sometimes just a coincidence.”
“All I know is that I brought a Trojan horse into this house and in a moment of sheer madness, I married it!” In case his mother needed any proof of the full extent of Portia’s betrayal, he slid over the damning article that had been found at the offices ofEquitas. Written in her unmistakable hand. An article that she had personally insulted him in too! And to think he had found the constant ink stains on her fingers charming! What an absolute besotted buffoon he had been!
“Can I make an observation, Leo?”
“Will anything I say or do stop you?”
“You could have left her to face the music by herself last night.” She slipped into the seat opposite him, a sure sign this unwelcome lecture was destined to be long. “Nobody would have judged you for it when there was so much evidence of her guilt—none of it that you were aware of until yesterday. But you didn’t. You still wanted to save her. Even with all that damning proof.”
“I felt beholden!”
“You didn’t look beholden to me, my darling. You looked terrified. As if you couldn’t face the prospect of never seeing her again. So you moved heaven and earth to keep her with you.”
He loathed that his mother was right, but denied it anyway. “Actually, I could not care less if I never see her again.”
“Why? Because just looking at her hurts?” His mother’s expression was one of pity. “It is impossible to feel as betrayed as you so obviously do and not to have invested your heart.”
“My heart has never been attached to her!” Perhaps if he said that often enough, the dratted organ would stop bleeding.
“I’ve seen how you look at her, Leo. From the first moment I witnessed the pair of you on the pavement, it was obvious to me that you wanted her.”
“She is an attractive woman and I am not blind, Mother, but I have certainly never been stupid either.” Which was why the constant ache in his chest was so acute. “She is dead to me!”
“That’s not how love works, Leo.” She reached over and squeezed his hand. “I am sure you will figure that out eventually once you’ve calmed down, put aside your pride, and realized that all this love you feel for her is worth fighting for. In the meantime, there is a grateful but terrified young woman upstairs who desperately needs to hear you tell her that everything is going to be all right—even if it isn’t. One pretty much covered from head to toe in bruises that were given to her by that horrid constable of yours. Given, no doubt, as punishment because you punched him.”
That cancerous dollop of fresh guilt delivered, his mother sailed out and left him to fester. Except it was Portia’s bruises now and not her treachery that filled his mind.
With a frustrated growl at his own misguided sense of moral obligation, he took the stairs two at a time and stalked to the bedchamber next to his where his interfering mother had put the duplicitous witch. He went to knock, but when he saw the door was open, just marched on in, then stopped dead.
Because his new wife was standing naked in the bath.
Chapter
TWENTY-TWO
Portia squealed as she snatched up the towel to cover her modesty and he quickly spun around like a gentleman—but he had already seen pretty much everything and there was no way his mind was ever going to allow him to forget it.
“My apologies… the door was open so I thought…”
“The cat opened it.” Water sloshed out of the tub as she clambered out. “And you should have knocked!”
“I should have. I’m sorry. I…” He huffed. “I needed to see for myself all that Nolley had done to you.”
“Well you’ve certainly seen it all now!”
“I certainly have but…” He sighed, wishing that he couldn’t instantly picture the water droplets cascading down her perfect, pert breasts and dripping off her dark puckered nipples. Or the sublime curve where her trim waist flared at her hips. Or the neat triangle of wet, almost jet-black hair that nestled between her alabaster thighs. But he turned around wincing anyway. “I’m sorry.” He flicked a wary finger toward the purple and brown patches that marred her arms poking out of her wrapped towel. “Those bruises are all my fault.” He pushed all his desire aside to scan her bare arms and legs, taking them all in with horrified disgust. “If I hadn’t have hit him, he wouldn’t have hit you.”
“He didn’t hit me, so do not blame yourself. These bruises came from his manhandling, which he thoroughly enjoyed.”
The fury was instant and all-encompassing. “I promise you that he will pay for every bruise!”
“They are only bruises.”
He walked toward her, his focus now solely on the state of her hands, which suggested the bastard had done more than manhandle her. He gently reached for them and turned them palms up. “I’m going to call the physician.”
“Please don’t. Nothing is broken and nothing needs stitching.” Her lovely chestnut eyes were sad. Contrite. Riddled with guilt too. “And I’ve caused you enough trouble, your grace.”
