Page 73 of The Seduction of an English Scoundrel

Why? His initial fury had subsided enough to allow him to think more clearly. Why had she done it?

He mulled the most obvious answer. She and Nigel, being brave young fools, still believed in the concept of a happily-ever-after love. If she had refused her parents outright, they would either have forced her hand, found another match, or disowned her.

And Jane, for all her human foibles, adored her family. So in a rather brilliant but desperate way, she had schemed to have her cake and eat it, too. But her plan had failed, as such desperate schemes are apt to do.

Grayson would be far more devious in constructing his counterplan. He would use all means at his disposal: legal, spiritual, financial. And, yes, sexual, too. Her deception had given him carte blanche to fulfill his deepest fantasies even if he had come perilously close to acting on them more than once.

At last. At last. The rake in him was back in charge. The hero had had his day. He no longer felt unbalanced. Never mind the emotional maze Jane had led him through to reach familiar ground. He was finally back on his feet.

More the pity for Jane.

The irony of it did not escape him. He was plotting to marry a woman who had executed a brash plan to avoid the parson’s mousetrap, a fate he had avoided all his adult life.

Grayson wasn’t stupid. He loved the damned woman not only despite her deception—perhaps even in part because of it. Yes, he was furious at her for playing a game with him. But now the tables had turned. The game was no longer to be played in black and white but rather in the more nebulous shades of gray in between.

A game of revenge?

Perhaps a little. But more than anything it was a game of love.

For somehow he sensed that if Jane were capable of sabotaging her own wedding, she would not respect him if he did not respond in kind. A woman of her passion for life, of her capability to plot her fate, would expect the same of her mate. And who else but Jane could match him misdeed for misdeed, word for word? Who else could bring that hunger to live, that gambler’s daring to a marriage?

He wanted her, and there was absolutely nothing left for him to do but submit, even if he refused to do so gracefully.

He had found his mate, his match, but before he applauded her wiliness, he would have a little fun taking his revenge on her for deceiving him. Let her earn his forgiveness.

Lord Belshire awoke in the darkness of the carriage to feel himself being roughly prodded by an unfamiliar hand. “What? Home already? I was not snoring, Athena. I was not even—” He blinked, staring around the unmoving vehicle in astonishment. “Sedgecroft. Where— What have you done with my wife?”

Grayson rapped on the roof, and the carriage lurched forward into the maze of London streets. “She is safely at home with the rest of your family.” His mouth tightened. “Including your eldest daughter.”

“Jane.” The older man fumbled to pull his gold pocket watch from his embroidered waistcoat. “Where . . . where the blazes are we going at this time of night?”

Grayson settled back against the squabs. “To my house, in order to conduct our business in peace. My solicitors and banker are already awaiting our arrival.”

“Banker—what sort of business is conducted in such a clandestine manner at this hour of night?” Belshire demanded in a thunderous voice. “My God, you scoundrel, if you have brought dishonor on my daughter . . .”

Forty minutes later Lord Belshire understood exactly the nature of Sedgecroft’s “business” and had reluctantly agreed to the terms listed in the marriage contract he signed. The conditions set forth for the betrothal were bizarre to say the least, but then so was Jane and Nigel’s underhanded deception of all those who had loved and trusted them.

“I cannot believe she would do this,” he muttered. “All the same, I insist that she will not suffer as a result of this agreement. Before God you must swear to honor our contract.”

“Make no mistake, Belshire,” Grayson said, his eyes glittering like ice. “I love your daughter.”

“At the moment I cannot say I share the sentiment. That does not mean I will see her misused in any way.”

“Trust me. Jane will be well treated. In a year or less I hope she will present you with a grandchild.”

A glint of hope lit the older man’s face. A grandchild. A future marquess. “I question your methods—”

“You will not question the results,” Grayson said without hesitation.

“I assume that Jane is ready to become your wife.”

“I assure you, she is.”

“It does solve several problems at once, Sedgecroft.”

“I thought so, too.”

As he brooded over Jane’s underhanded plotting, Belshire decided on the ride back home that his willful daughter probably deserved to marry a man like Sedgecroft, who had the same sort of duplicitous mind as she. Or so he tried to explain to his wife when he returned to her.