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She’d hoped to inspire Rob’s jealousy—not give him leave to abuse Will’s character. Her temper flaring at his disparagement of a man who possessed qualities she’d come to appreciate and admire, Allegra said, “You wrong Lord Tavener by assuming he is merely flirting with me.”
Stomach beginning to churn, she continued, “In fact, he intends to call on you to ask for my hand…in marriage,” she added, just in case, in the intensity of his dislike, Rob should assume Tavener sought something else.
Eyes wide with a surprise that rendered him speechless, for a moment Rob merely stared at her. “He had the gall to think he might approach me about marrying you?” he said at last. “Why, the effrontery! As if I were sapskulled enough to throw my money away, putting it within the grasp of that doxy-chasing fortune hunter!”
Once again, Allegra had to rein in a heated reply. “Lord Tavener is a much finer gentleman than you give him credit for,” she replied after a moment, striving to keep her voice even. “Besides, I believe ’tis my money that would be ‘thrown away,’ is it not?”
“’Tis I who decide how the funds of this estate should be managed,” he flashed back, clearly as angry as she was. “I’ll hear nothing more of Tavener, Allegra! I may have held the title only two months, but I know enough not to listen to a silly chit whose head has been turned by a skilled seducer. Much less to let her talk me into squandering the assets bequeathed me by furnishing a dowry for the benefit of a rogue who would abandon her as soon as he’d run through it!”
She’d opened her lips to utter a spirited rejoinder when suddenly the import of his words struck her. “I thought Uncle Robert had bequeathed those funds to me, to use as I see fit,” she said slowly. “As a member of the family, someone he valued for having nursed him devotedly his last few months. Did he not do so?”
Rob opened his mouth, then closed it. “I’m sure he’d approve my arranging something,” he began again, “though giving you money outright would hardly be appropriate.”
Allegra felt suddenly chilled, then fever-hot. “He didn’t leave me a bequest?” she asked again.
She must have looked as stricken as she felt, for Rob patted her hand. “I assure you, he truly appreciated—”
“Why did you let me believe he had done so?” she interrupted, pulling her hand back.
“What difference does it make? When we first discussed it and you assumed ’twas his idea, there seemed no reason to disabuse you of that notion.”
“So sponsoring my Season,” she said slowly, wanting to make sure she understood clearly this time, “offering me a dowry, that was all your idea?”
“A Season is necessary—”
“Why?” she interrupted again.
“I should think that would be obvious!” he retorted, running a distracted hand through his hair. “Surely you realized how desperate your situation was, your parents dying unexpectedly and leaving you with no near relations, no dowry, no recourse but to throw yourself upon Sapphira’s uncertain mercy. You are blood kin, regardless of your mother’s regrettable choice of husband. I thought the family owed you a chance to mingle with society and find a kind, forbearing gentleman perceptive enough to recognize you for the fine lady you’ve become in spite of your unfortunate connections. Of course, no gentleman could afford to do so unless you brought him at least a respectable dowry.”
Her “unfortunate connections.” So agonized was she by that punch to the gut that it took her a moment to realize the even more awful truth that must logically follow. For an instant she feared she might disgrace herself by becoming ill right there in the library.
Mastering the nausea with an effort, she forced herself to ask the question that would confirm the humiliating conclusion beyond any possibility of doubt. “So you never considered that you and I…” Unable to voice the rest, she let the sentence trail off.
“You and I?” he repeated, a perplexed look on his face. The several seconds it took before he comprehended her meaning spoke volumes about just how unimaginable that eventuality seemed to him.
“Why, n-no!” he stammered, his face flushing. “I’ve always seen you as my little cousin. It wouldn’t have been seemly for me to…to have that sort of interest in you.”
His flush deepened, and Allegra realized wretchedly that though she might have misjudged the depth of his attachment to her, she had not been mistaken in thinking he found her attractive—on a base physical level.
So hearts really do break, she thought numbly. Or was the shattered feeling within her caused by the razor-edged shards of her splintering dream?
“In any event,” he continued hurriedly, “last year I received permission from the father of an exceptional young lady that, should I return from the army intact, I might begin to court. Indeed, had Evangeline’s papa not unfortunately passed away just a month ago, she would have come to London for the Season and we might even now be announcing our engagement—but enough of that.”
Her misery complete, all Allegra wished to do was quit Rob’s presence and seek the refuge of her chamber where she might in solitude consider the implications of what she’d just learned. Intending to flee before the tears gathering at the corners of her eyes slid down her cheeks to complete her humiliation, she rose unsteadily from her chair.
Rob seized her hand, preventing her escape. “Just because my affections are already engaged does not mean you should despair of finding a respectable husband! But I simply will not countenance offers from out-and-out rogues like Tavener. I always thought dear Mama displayed amazing tolerance, receiving Papa’s beautiful but feckless cousin whenever she chose to descend upon the house. If, as I fondly hope, Evangeline and I marry, I don’t intend to force my wife to exercise similar restraint. I refuse to let you wed a ne’er-do-well who’s likely to leave you alone and penniless, as dependent upon my charity as your mother was upon Papa’s.”
Allegra flinched at the words assaulting her ears. It was not like that with Mama! she wanted to shriek back at him. But ’twould serve no purpose; she doubted she would have any more luck changing his view of her mother than she’d had trying to sway his opinion of Will’s character.
The pretty phrases he’d fed her about having a Season, everything she’d believed about herself, her mother and the Lyntons, had been a lie. Rob saw her as no more than a tedious obligation to be discharged so he might get on with his life—and his marriage.
All she had ever wanted was his love and acceptance. Instead, he offered her money to go away. Anger, pride and the devastation of a bludgeoned heart warred with humiliation as she struggled for words.
“If you wished to be rid of me,” she said at last, “you need only have said so. You didn’t have to buy me a husband.” Yanking her hand free, she made for the door.
“Now, Allegra, don’t go off in a pet!” Rob called from behind her. Not bothering to acknowledge him, she wrenched open the library door and fled to her room.
Writhing at Rob’s axe blow to the heart, Allegra slammed shut and locked the door to her chamber, then fell upon her bed and let the storm of agony overwhelm her. Ignoring the occasional knock and later Lizzie’s entreating voice begging entry, she wept until she was swollen-eyed and spent, then pulled herself up and stumbled to her desk.
Enough useless tears. She must examine all she had learned and decide dispassionately what to do next.
Humiliation swept through her again as she forced herself to acknowledge that Rob must never have had any inclination to wed her, that the partiality she’d tried to ascribe to him had been the product of her own hopeful imagination. Just as gut-wrenchingly painful—and more dire in its implications for her future—was the realization that Uncle Robert had not, out of love and appreciation for her presence, left her a bequest.
She possessed no assets at all. Certainly not the funds to purchase the small country estate she’d thought to acquire should she fail to win Rob’s heart. There could be no home of her own, no safe place of refuge. She choked down another spasm of pain at relinquishing that dream.
The dowry she’d thought she owned actually belonged to Rob, a gift to be presented at his discretion should she marry a ton gentleman of whom he approved. A gift she would never earn, since from the beginning the only ton gentleman she’d wished to marry was Rob himself.
She’d not really expected a bequest from Uncle Robert. But Rob was wrong about her family, she thought fiercely, her anger reviving. She and Mama had never been “penniless” or “abandoned” by Papa; they had visited Uncle Robert between Papa’s performances, when he was preoccupied composing a new work or rehearsing a new orchestra.
Far from “feckless,” Mama was the most responsible and resourceful person Allegra had ever known. She had brought her daughter to visit her favorite cousin because she enjoyed his company—not to hang upon his charity.
And how dare Rob disparage her father! He, who had obtained his wealth by an accident of birth rather than by the exercise of his own talent and effort! She supposed being a competent army officer during a time of war meant he possessed abilities as well, but he had no right to look down upon a man as learned and accomplished as her father simply because he trod a different path in life. Whatever else she might be forced to admit, she would never concede that Mama’s choice of Papa had been a mistake.
