The chasm in his chest that had once filled with light whenever he thought of her boiled over with regret.
Of course he could pretend.
Of course.
He could, because adoring her came as naturally as drawing breath.
He had loved her for eight years. What was four more weeks?
“Fine,” he said.
She looked up, and her eyes danced in that way that promised mischief, and for a moment, without thinking, he wanted to lean in and kiss her.
And in that moment he mourned. Mourned all the things he’d wanted that they would never have.
Places he’d imagined taking her.
Secrets he’d always wanted her to know.
Questions he’d always longed to ask her.
A thousand small moments they would never share.
She beamed at him. “Oh good. It will all work out, I promise. Perhaps we will even have a bit of fun staging our little drama. And when it’s over—”
Her enthusiasm was more than he could bear.
“When it’s over,” he interrupted, “we will never speak again.”
She looked up, startled. “Well, that could be difficult, given your cousin is married to mine, but certainly we can—”
“No,” he interrupted. He needed her to really, truly hear him.
“It matters, Constance. It matters what you did. It matters when you hurt people.”
Her fluttering, her fidgeting—the nervous, playful energy that always seethed and popped around her—stopped.
He leaned down toward her so their heads were level. “For the next four weeks, I will be as fawning as any man has ever been in public. But here, between us, let me be honest: the things that you wrote about me are distorted. I have no idea where you heard them or what right you thought you had to print them. Such matters are private, and if you believe my tastes in bed make me so sordid as to be unmarriageable, you might have addressed the matter privately. To shame me with no warning, to make my family suffer—shows a lack of decency that I would never have imagined possible in you.”
Her face went white as the rope of opals knotted around her neck.
“Julian,” she said softly. “I didn’t mean to—”
“Address me by my title. And spare me your excuses. What you have done will expose a place that deliberately operates in darkness because it is a sanctuary to people who the men and women ranting outside my door believe belong in hell for something that harms no one. People who are dear to me may be exposed in consequence, and people whose livelihoods depend on the discretion the place offers may suffer, and for what? So that the public may have the joy of righteous disapproval?”
He said this with extra pointedness, for Lady Constance Stonewell, the most rebellious young woman in all of London, was famously dismissive of conforming to society’s expectations. That a woman who welcomed opera girls and dancing bears into her drawing room could display the precise combination of prurience and prudishness that drove people like himself into the shadows was an act of hypocrisy difficult to fathom.
She’d always mocked him for being careful with appearances. But people like her were the reason people like him needed to be careful.
“I suppose,” she said quietly, looking even more miserable than she had when he’d made her read her poem, “that I didn’t consider … that it did not occur to me …”
He held up a hand. “Just hear this, Constance. I’ll go along with your plan for the sake of my family and my reputation. For the sake of my friends who will be endangered if these rumors continue unabated. But when this farce is over, regardless of where you go or what you do, you will do it without my friendship.”
She chewed her cheek, looking absolutely shaken.
“I understand,” she finally said. “And you have my word.”
“Fine.” He rose feeling stiff and empty, like his soul had given up and left his body in defeat.
“I’ll print rumors of our engagement in my circular to get the ladies talking, and we’ll convince my brother of our love tomorrow night at the Rosecrofts’ supper.”
He nodded. “I’ll get you a litter.”
He went outside and found two burly chairmen idling on the Strand, and led them up the stairs to the entry hall. Constance was waiting in the vestibule, her pretty gown soiled at the knees from kneeling on his floorboards.
She picked up her skirts and stepped into the sedan chair, drawing yards of cloth around her collapsed panniers so that it looked as though she were a princess nestled in a cloud of silk.
He looked away and nodded at the chairmen to remove her.
Constance stuck her head out the window of the conveyance. “Apthorp?”
Her blue eyes were misty and her cheeks were mottled pink.
“Yes?”
“You’re right. I see that now. And I’m truly very sorry.” Her voice broke, and before he could react, she closed the curtains.
His heart lunged painfully and he inhaled against the urge to pull the curtains open, smash his forehead to hers, and tell her that he would forgive her anything because the sight of her in tears did something to his organs that made it difficult to breathe.
But that was the gesture of the kind of man he could no longer afford to be.
And so instead he turned his back and walked inside so he wouldn’t have to hear her muffled sobs.
He had four weeks.
Four weeks to save his life.
Four weeks to learn how to stop loving Constance Stonewell.
Chapter 4
Yesterday I wrote in error
About that lord with golden hair—
The claims about his sullied hide
Were invented by a foe who lied
In a scheme designed to kill
Lord Golden’s most right-minded bill.
* * *
I must ask forgiveness of Lord G—
For subjecting him to mockery
And wish his lordship much felicity
In his future domesticity!
For one hears from sources very sound
He’s betrothed to eighty thousand pounds.
Some call her the loveliest girl in town,
With her silver tresses and cunning gowns
(A claim that one cannot rebuke,
For she’s the sister of a duke).
* * *
So here’s to Golden and his bride—
With apologies to his wronged backside!
* * *
—LETTERS FROM PRINCESS COSIMA
Apthorp checked the knot of his cravat as he stood before the Rosecrofts’ town house door.
Still exact.
He glanced at his gloves to ensure they had not collected dirt during the walk to Mayfair from the Strand.
Still pristine.
He made a final inspection of his cuffs—still impeccable—and cursed himself for stalling.
His valet had taken pains to return him to his usual standards of appearance. That he felt raffish and improper straight down to his liver was between him and his perfect tailoring.
He forced himself to raise his hand to the heavy iron knocker. Before his fingers touched it, the door swung open, revealing the very person he dreaded seeing more than anyone else: Constance’s brother, the Duke of Westmead.
Looking even more irritable than usual.
“Apthorp,” Westmead drawled. “I was curious how long it might take you to find the courage to actually knock at the door, but now I’ve grown bored of watching you merely stare at it. Do come in. You’ve arrived just in time. I’m absolutely itching to hit someone.”
“Your Grace.” Apthorp bowed, stepping inside the vestibule and trying to refrain from cowering at the threat.
Westmead slammed the door behind him so forcefully it echoed through the corridor and rattled the doors to the dining room thirty feet away.
No one stirred.
The house, usually a merriment of children, servants, and dogs on the evenings of the family’s we
ekly Monday suppers, was conspicuously silent. Apthorp glanced down the corridor, hoping for some sign of Constance. But she, the coward, was as absent as the rest of the family.
Westmead folded his arms. “Have anything to say to me?”
Apthorp cleared his throat. “Where is Lady Constance?”
The duke smiled tightly. “I imagine she is hiding, lest she be called as a witness when I am tried for shooting you.”
He sighed. “I gather you’ve heard the news.”
“No, not ‘heard,’ Apthorp, for no one saw fit to speak to me. Seen would be the word. Seen in a third-rate gazette on my way inside a coffeehouse in Shoreditch.” He smacked a palm to Apthorp’s chest and shoved him up against a wall. “Shoreditch, Apthorp. A group of fur traders were discussing news of my sister’s impending marriage to a ruined cully this afternoon in Shoreditch. And so, may I ask: what in the name of ever-living fuck could you be thinking?”
Apthorp winced. “I apologize, Your Grace. I intended to speak to you, but the gazettes got ahead of me. I submit, the situation is not ideal.”
“‘Not ideal.’ Mmm. Do you mean the bit where you cocked up the bill I’ve spent two years touting for you, or the bit where you somehow—in contravention of all sense—betrothed yourself to my sister?”
Westmead could be caustic at the happiest of times, but he was usually tightly controlled. The sheer force of his anger felt like a blow to the ribs and lingered, aching.
Mostly because Apthorp agreed with him.
Westmead had been his closest ally in politics, the unlikely champion of his bill when he’d had little beyond determination to recommend him. And Apthorp had not only failed politically but gone and yoked his failure to the man’s only sister without so much as a word of warning.
His behavior was exactly as noxious as the duke’s disgusted stare implied.
“Your Grace, I’m sorry. None of this was my intention.”
Westmead worked his fingers in the air, like he was looking for a neck to throttle. “Don’t speak to me of intentions, Apthorp. What I’d like to speak about is decency. A quality which before today I would not have said you lacked.”
“First let me assure you that the rumors of my supposed dissipation are exaggerated. You need not worry that—”
Westmead held up a hand to stop him. “Spare me. That isn’t what I mean. Whatever you’ve gotten yourself into at Mistress Brearley’s is your private affair.”
“Mistress Brearley’s?” he repeated. The question was disingenuous, for he knew exactly to whom Westmead referred. He simply could not imagine how Westmead knew of her.
“Don’t play innocent with me,” Westmead growled. “I’m an investor in her club. While I’m baffled by your carelessness in allowing your membership there to become gossip, you don’t need to explain your tastes to me. Your tastes, whatever they may be, are not my concern.”
Apthorp stared at him, not sure whether to be relieved or more alarmed. “Thank you, Your Grace, for your broad-minded—”
“Which of course does not change the fact that you will not be marrying my sister.” Westmead’s eyes drilled into his.
Apthorp swallowed and tried to ignore that Westmead looked at him like he’d grown mold. “With respect, Your Grace, I’m afraid I will be marrying her. She has agreed to be my wife. To my tremendous honor.”
The duke’s lips curled. “Tremendous honor. I see. Or rather, I don’t. I don’t see, Apthorp, because I keep getting stuck on the small fact that Constance cannot stand you.”
“Can’t stand him?” an offended feminine voice trilled. Constance came sailing up from the lower stairs, dressed in a shimmering pink gown with hoops so wide she resembled a schooner made of ballerinas. She was flushed and slightly disheveled, with strands of dust clinging to her hair, exactly as they might had she been eavesdropping in the service cupboard below the stairs. Which, given her history of doing exactly that whenever anyone in the house was peeved with her, would explain her absence.
“What rubbish, Archer,” she said, reaching the landing as she caught her breath. “I adore Apthorp.”
Westmead whirled around. “You. What do you have to say for yourself?”
“Surprise!” She threw out her arms in his direction, as if in expectation of a joyous embrace. “Isn’t it wonderful!”
“Wonderful?” Westmead repeated. “What in bequaking Sodom are you thinking?”
“I’m in love!” she cried. “Rapturously in love!” She spun around, letting her skirts swish about in festive circles. “Oh, Archer, I’ve been dying to tell you, but I was worried you might try to stop me.”
He came and put two hands on her shoulders, forcing her to stop spinning. “I am, without question, going to stop you.”
“Oh, don’t be tiresome,” she chirped, shrugging him off. She wobbled backward, precarious in her hoops and heeled slippers. “I’m so delighted I might swoon.”
Apthorp darted forward and pressed a hand to her shoulder to prevent her from careening into a credenza. She smiled fondly and took his other hand in hers. “My hero,” she whispered in his ear, just loud enough for her brother to hear.
Westmead looked at both of them with the half-focused squint of a man suffering from vertigo or nausea. “What scheme is this you two have concocted?”
Constance wrinkled her nose. “Scheme? I finally find the courage to profess my love for the man I’ve pined for since girlhood, and you accuse me of a scheme? That is cynical even for you, Archer.”
“Constance. You can’t possibly expect me to believe you want to marry Apthorp.”
Apthorp tried not to be offended by the degree of derision in this statement, however much he might privately agree with Westmead’s position.
“Whyever not?” Constance asked. She reached up and cradled Apthorp’s face, cupping his jaw like he was a priceless piece of pottery in a museum. “Is he not the most handsome man you’ve ever seen?”
Apthorp tried not to be moved at the idea she found him handsome.
Was that just for her brother’s benefit? Or does she really—
Westmead closed his eyes and averted his face, as if the sight of his sister touching Apthorp might render him blind, reminding him the question was moot.
“Constance, it has not escaped my notice that you have displayed nothing but contempt for Apthorp for half a decade. You have addressed his Christmas gifts to ‘Lord Bore’ since 1749.”
Constance gave her brother a long-suffering sigh. “I was flirting, Archer. Haven’t you ever been flirted with?” She paused, and looked up conspiratorially at Apthorp. “Upon further reflection, no. I daresay he has not.”
Apthorp choked back a snort of laughter. Constance fluttered her eyelashes at him, evidently pleased to be found amusing. Dear God. Despite his impulse to despise her, it was enjoyable, this feeling of being in league with Constance. It was exactly the thing he’d always wanted.
“Very well,” Westmead interjected, forcing the rupture of their small moment. “Apthorp is your great love, then? The man you feel you deserve? Him? A person who does nothing but lecture you on how bothersome and vulgar you are?”
Apthorp froze. He felt Constance freeze beside him.
Was that true?
Given that she had made exactly the same observation the day before, he could only surmise that he was … guilty.
He ticked through half a decade’s interactions. Since she’d arrived from France at fourteen, she’d been such a bold, fanciful creature that he’d worried she would say the wrong thing to the wrong person. He’d sometimes offered her discreet advice about manners and comportment, but only out of a desire to protect her. He’d meant to help her see that her bold ways left her open to criticism.
He had never meant to imply she was unfit.
Before he could think of what to say, she recovered her composure with an airy wave of her wrist.
“Well, I can be bothersome and vulgar, when it serves my purpose. It’s part of my charm.�
� She looked at him with an arch smile. “Clearly, it worked on Apthorp, didn’t it, darling?”
He nodded with everything he had.
Westmead plucked her hand from Apthorp’s arm and spoke to her with a voice like gravel. “Constance, I regret I have not always been the most attentive or affectionate of brothers. If I could go back and be a better guardian to you in the years when you were small, I would. But in light of what happened to our mother, I have made certain you would never need to marry any man you did not choose. So I beg you, before you make a mistake that is irrevocable, consider whether there might not be some person out there whom you cherish, and who would cherish you in return.”
Constance glanced up at Apthorp, and for first time he saw uncertainty in her eyes. He couldn’t blame her. That speech made him want to weep with sentiment, and he was the villain of it.
There was only one thing he could possibly offer in response: the truth.
He stepped forward and met Westmead’s eyes. “Your Grace, I have loved your sister since I was eighteen years old. I regret I hid my feelings behind a stiff exterior, but it was only because I did not want to prevail on her to consider my suit until I felt confident I could be the kind of husband who deserves her. It is the tragedy of my life that I will never be that man. And the miracle of it is that your sister would have me anyway.” To his astonishment, his voice cracked.
Both Constance and Westmead stared at him, as shocked as he was by his display of emotion. He turned to the wall and collected himself.
Constance came and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. “Oh, my darling. There, there.”
She turned to Westmead. “Don’t you see, Archer? He acts aloof, but only to protect his tender heart. Is it not human to hide our vulnerabilities?”
Apthorp took a minute with the wall. In truth, saying these words to manipulate the duke only made him feel worse. For once, mere days ago, he would have meant them virtuously. Using them in the service of this gambit was a travesty for which he would not soon forgive himself.
Nor soon would he forgive himself for making Constance feel he had rebuked her for the very qualities that made her exceptional. He could see that beneath her laughing dismissal of his criticisms was real hurt. How had he never noticed it before?
The Earl I Ruined Page 4
