by Claudia Dain
Jed instantly stilled.
So did Edenham.
“What have you done to my sister?” Edenham growled, pulling Lady Richard’s hand away from Jed.
“Less than what you’ve done to mine,” Jed said. “And with far more . . . provocation.”
It had been clear he had been about to say something else, but no one could determine exactly what. The crowd, as discreetly as possible, which wasn’t much, edged closer to the diverting wedding breakfast entertainment.
“Kay? What is he is saying?” Edenham asked.
“I have no idea,” Lady Richard answered, looking at Jed beseechingly.
Well, that could only mean one thing. This was London, after all. They had all seen that look before.
“Who are you to question Jed?” Joel said, elbowing Jed aside. Jed did not seem to enjoy it. “You must answer for Jane. You will answer for Jane. You won’t treat her as these London ladies beg to be treated. Not a bit of difference to a harbor whore, except a bit cleaner.”
“Joel!” Jane said sharply, and loudly.
“Just whom have you treated as a whore in my home?”
Lord Iveston asked Joel sternly.
“Not my sister,” Edenham said. It was a challenge.
Someone on the other side of the room, somewhere toward the windows, dropped a glass. He was instantly hushed by at least ten people.
“And I haven’t been treated like a whore?” Jane said, pushing past Joel and Iveston to face Edenham. Jed made a disapproving sound. Jane snapped at him over her shoulder, “Oh, mercy, Jed. I’ve heard the word more than a time or two. Answer me, your grace. Haven’t you treated me rather carelessly?”
Edenham swallowed a bit heavily, but then said, “I have treated you as you seemed to prefer. I would say that is the mark of a gentleman.”
“In what country?” Joel asked sarcastically.
“In the only one that matters,” Edenham said. “This one.”
Jed reached back to hit him, but Henry caught his arm and held him fast.
The crowd breathed a heavy sigh of disappointment.
After all, they had gone without eating for hour upon hour; was a little bloodletting not in order?
Jane was feeling most definitely outnumbered. She could manage Edenham on her own, usually, but having Jed and Joel tossed in, plus her male cousins . . . but where was Jos, the youngest Blakesley? She hadn’t seen him since the wedding. In any regard, it was just too much for her.
She could admit it. She was not experienced enough to handle six enraged men. How many women could?
It was at that perfect moment that Sophia Dalby entered the music room, Lord Ruan at her side, Louisa, Amelia, and Penelope rushing along behind her. Well, then. Things should get much more interesting from now on, as if they weren’t already interesting enough.
Aunt Molly, most tellingly, had been silent throughout the altercation and looked nearly smug at Sophia’s entrance.
Jane felt a violent impulse to practice extreme caution.
Unfortunately, things became so hectic that the impulse was quickly lost. Oh, well.
“But Jane,” Sophia said pleasantly, “are they all fighting over you? How charming.”
“Not all,” Edenham said. “There is some question about what Jane’s brothers have been doing whilst waiting for breakfast. It seems they may have accosted some of the female guests. One of them being my sister.”
At that comment, Jed reached back again, fist clenched.
Henry and George between them held him in check. It was not done without a great deal of grunting and huffing. What a complete waste of time.
“Hugh, nothing of the sort happened,” Katherine, Lady Richard said softly, looking at Jed, and then at Edenham, and then back at Jed.
She was lying, clearly. Jane thought it very wise of her.
“You are in no position to make accusations, Hugh,”
Jane said, a bit snidely and with a great deal of relish.
“Are you going to make accusations, Jane?” Jed said. “I should like to hear a recounting of what he did to offend you.”
“But, darling,” Sophia said before Jane could answer what was an impossible question. Bless Sophia Dalby. “Are you so very confident that Jane was offended? Were you, Miss Elliot? Did Edenham offend you?”
“I think the word is annoy, Lady Dalby. Perhaps pester and even bedevil. Yes, definitely bedevil.”
“Which can so often be so pleasant, can it not?” Sophia asked, her dark eyes sparkling.
The truth was not an answer she could give with two brothers and four cousins staring at her.
“I’m afraid I can’t say,” Jane said. “I’m very young, you see, and so inexperienced.” She looked at Edenham as she said it, smirking unrepentantly.
Edenham’s mouth turned up at one corner in response.
“Ah, from the lady’s lips,” Iveston said, “she is inexperienced. Shall we eat?”
“Iveston, it is not yet time for breakfast,” Molly said from her spot near the pianoforte, her fan moving briskly.
She said nothing more, which was highly irregular. Jane felt a prickle of suspicion, but it disappeared instantly when Edenham opened his mouth to speak.
“I suppose one may define inexperience differently, depending upon one’s standards, even one’s national rituals,” Edenham said, smirking boldly at Jane. She returned the look. “By England’s standards, which are of course my own, I would say Jane Elliot is far more experienced than an unmarried girl should be. I refuse to marry an experienced maiden, her maiden status being therefore in doubt.”
Before Jed or Joel or Iveston or Henry or any of the other dozens of men in the room found it necessary to hit the Duke of Edenham, and certainly they all might have, Jane strode right up to Edenham and poked her finger against the third button of his waistcoat. “You know perfectly well the extent of my experience, you snake, as you have been my very aged tutor!” As Edenham was opening his mouth to speak, she poked him again, harder, and said, “And we both know that you want to marry me. Refuse me? You don’t have the strength to refuse me. You are cream and I am the churn. You are powder and I am spark. You are—”
“Cream?” He interrupted what was a very fine romantic analogy on her part. “I don’t care to be compared to cream.
And I know you believe yourself plain, but you have more appeal than a butter churn, Jane. Really, I could never marry a woman who thinks so ill of herself. What would such an influence have upon my children?”
Jane laughed, catching her finger behind the button of his waistcoat and pulling him toward her. The button popped off. He was now missing three. “What influence? A wonderful one. I would dilute your outrageous and highly misin-formed aristocratic arrogance, for one.”
“And for another?” Edenham said, looking down at her quite arrogantly. It was most inexplicable, but she found it quite charming, even amusing.
“I could give them siblings. Your daughter will require many, many brothers, don’t you think?” she said.
Edenham nodded and quirked a smile. “Never a bad idea. I don’t know, though. You’re very . . . American.”
“The perfect compliment,” she said. “Thank you.”
“As amusing as this all is,” Jed said, sounding not even slightly amused, “Jane is not going to marry you. Jane will have nothing further to do with you. Come, Jane. We’ll stay on the ship. Aunt Molly, I apologize. This has no bearing on our feelings toward you and your family.” Which, of course, made it sound precisely that: that he disliked and distrusted all of them, with the possible exception of American-born Molly.
Molly merely nodded her head in reply, which was entirely unlike her. Molly looked at Sophia. Sophia looked at Edenham, her inky brows raised expectantly.
Expectantly?
Edenham removed Jane’s hand from his waistcoat and moved her to stand behind him. She moved back to his side. He moved her back behi
nd him, and held her there.
“I shall marry her if I choose to do so,” Edenham said quietly.
“If I choose to do so,” Jane said from behind his shoulder, which was very tall and very broad and which she couldn’t see around, “which I have not as yet, and likely never will,” she added, more for her brothers than Edenham. She rather suspected Edenham wouldn’t believe her.
She was right.
“You shall not,” Jed said.
Jane knew that tone; it was his master of the seas voice.
She pulled at Edenham’s hand, seeking release. He did not give it.
“I shall do what I wish with Jane. I will either marry her. Or not,” Edenham said, which was the most insulting and provocative thing he could have said. Didn’t he realize that?
“You will marry her if she wishes it,” Joel said. Oh, no.
That was Joel at his protective best. This conversation was not going well at all.
“No one can force me to do what I have chosen not to do, or can force me away from what I have chosen,” Edenham said, gripping her hand more firmly, which might have been because she was yanking on it violently. From around Edenham’s shoulder, Sophia caught her eye. And winked.
Jane stopped yanking her hand for the merest moment.
That’s when it happened.
“No?” Jed said.
“No,” Edenham replied.
Which was when Edenham finally released her hand, but only because Jed hit him and he needed it for other things.
It did not, quite surprisingly, go as it had gone before.
This time, Edenham hit back. That was shocking enough, but when Edenham, after two or three punches, she did think she’d missed one, had Jed on his arse on the floor, well then, Joel jumped in and got in a good hit or two, but Edenham did return a sound two or three, and then Jed was back up and Henry was holding him back, mouthing something about fair play, which enraged Jed for obvious reasons—the British and fair play? Completely ironic.
The direct result being that Jed punched Henry in the mouth. Which got Cranleigh involved, naturally, as he was a known brawler, and Jed took a solid blow to the ribs, which doubled him over briefly, but when he’d taken a full breath, was on Cranleigh snarling something about fair play and two on one, which was most apt, if she did say so, and Henry tried to back up but elbowed Joel in the kidney, so Joel turned around and dealt a blow to the side of Henry’s jaw, which clearly enraged George, who pulled Henry aside to attack Joel from the rear, but Jed saw it and shoved Edenham back a few steps so that he could hit George, but was stopped by Iveston who almost calmly hit Jed twice, once to the face and again to the midsection.
It was at that moment that Jane took a breath and looked briefly around the room.
Sophia and Molly were grinning like well-fed cats.
Louisa, Amelia, and Penelope were watching the men, their husbands presumably, with an avid gleam of pure intoxication.
Katherine was looking at . . . Jed?
And Jane? Who was Jane watching?
Her brothers and her cousins, most definitely. But Edenham most specifically.
Mercy. She just might have to marry the man.
He was acquitting himself very well, wasn’t he? His cravat had come unraveled, his hair was hanging over his forehead, his mouth was bleeding again, and he had a fresh bruise coming up on his left eye.
He looked as happy as a lamb in spring grass.
The fight continued, and seemed to be gaining. Lord Ruan, who had no true cause to fight, watched as Jed and Joel battled the five Englishmen swarming about them, shrugged, smiled, and landed a blow to Cranleigh’s face in the general vicinity of his nose. It gushed blood promptly.
No one seemed to notice or care.
The battle was now five to three, though nothing so simple as Americans versus British, not with Ruan fighting with Jed and Joel.
And then the battle turned again in a most surprising direction. George Prestwick moved through the crowd and turned George Blakesley around by the arm and hit him a good one to the gut.
“George! What are you doing?” Penelope shouted, looking very deeply annoyed.
“Have to, Pen,” he said, his fists raised as he faced George Blakesley. “I feel responsible for Jane somehow.”
He did? How sweet.
It was at that moment that George Blakesley hit George Prestwick in the face, a rounding blow that whipped George Prestwick’s head around.
It was now five to four, though she didn’t suppose anyone else was counting.
Edenham was locked with Jed, the two of them looking quite the worse for wear. The strange thing was, Edenham was smiling. Even stranger, so was Jed, albeit much more mildly.
“I didn’t think you knew how to fight,” Jed said, furiously blinking his left eye. It did look very red.
“Didn’t you? That was stupid of you,” Edenham said.
Jed responded by hitting Edenham in the gut. Only he missed. Edenham backed up quickly, nearly losing his footing, the harp base wobbling beneath his heel.
“Not the harp!” Molly shouted out, her hand to her throat.
One would have thought that a woman both a mother and an aunt would have been more concerned about her sons and nephews than a newly purchased gilded harp.
One would have been wrong. As the mother of five sons, Molly saved her concern for defenseless harps.
“Jane will never have you,” Jed said, stalking Edenham.
“You hope,” Edenham said, lunging and catching a glancing blow to Jed’s chin.
“I only want her to be happy,” Jed said.
“As do I,” Edenham said, dodging Jed’s fist as it aimed for his head.
“You’ll never convince her,” Jed said, his shoulder bumping against the harp.
“And if I do?” Edenham said, pushing the harp down so that Jed’s fist caught in the strings.
Someone cursed. Jane was certain it was Molly.
“Then welcome to the family,” Jed said, reaching through the strings to grab Edenham’s loose cravat to pull his face into the harp frame.
It was a direct hit.
Edenham, however, held Jed’s hand to his chest and leaned back sharply. Jed’s face hit the harp frame with a thud.
“Thank you,” Edenham said, spitting out a wad of bloody saliva. “Not to worry, Molly. I’ll buy you a new harp.”
“You certainly shall,” Molly said, rising to her feet.
“Now, I do believe it is time to eat.”
“Wait!” Jane said.
The entire room quieted, and that included the bleeding, contented men.
“Yes, Libby?” Edenham said, looking at her politely. His face was a ruin, bruised and bleeding, his clothing mussed and torn, his hair a tangle over one eye, and he was looking at her as calmly as if asking her the weather conditions.
“You seem very confident that you will convince me to accept you.”
“I am confident. Now, shall we go in to dine?” He actually offered her his arm, the sot.
“What have you to offer, Hugh? I should like an accounting.”
He straightened his waistcoat as best he could and lifted his chin above his wreck of a cravat.
“Very well,” he said. “I have something you have neglected to consider, for all that you have no use for dukes.
I have a seat in the House of Lords, Libby. Do you understand what that means?”
Actually, not really. A vapor of an impression, nothing more.
“It means that I may influence policy. Policies regarding, say, impressment?”
Jane’s eyes widened. Even Jed looked intrigued.
“You would do something to stop the impressment of Americans onto British ships?” she said.
“I would certainly try,” he said, oh so seriously.
“Well then,” she said, walking over to him, tying up his cravat in the simplest of bows. “I suppose then I can’t
deny you. I’d be marrying you for the good of my countrymen.
A simple act of patriotism on my part. It would be nearly treasonous for me to refuse you, wouldn’t it?”
Edenham smiled, his eyes twinkling. “I thought you’d see it that way. Then we’ll be married at the earliest convenience.”
“Yes, which will be once you’ve met my father,” she said, linking her arm through his, leading the grand and curious company out of the music room and into the blue reception room.
“He’s coming here?”
“No, you’ll have to go to him. He’ll much appreciate the effort.”
“I see,” Edenham said solemnly. “I suppose we should take the children.”
“Oh, definitely bring the children. I want them to get to know me before I become their mother. Besides, my father is extremely softhearted regarding small, lovely children. I take it your children are lovely?”
“Extremely,” he said as they moved regally through the blue reception room, nodding pleasantly to any who had not been witness to the entertainment offered in the music room. There were not many, only the very old and the very drunk. “But it is your father who has a weakness for children? Not your mother?”
“Oh, no,” Jane said. “Mother thinks all children are good for is bringing dirt into the house and making general mischief. As you’ve met Jed and Joel, you can understand why. My father sees children so rarely that he has quite ide-alized them, or so Mother has always alleged. She makes a strong point.”
The red reception room was fully dressed to receive and pamper the wedding guests, the table laid out with heavy silver and Venetian glass, French porcelain, and English linen. If the footmen and the butler looked harried and frustrated, no one was willing to comment on it.
“If my children won’t sway her, what reason will you give for wanting to marry me, Libby?”
Jane turned to face Edenham and laid her hand against his face. He had heavy bruising at his jaw and eye, green and purple and black mottling, his mouth was cut and swollen, his nose red.
He was the most handsome man she had ever seen.
“Because you’re so very pretty, Hugh. I took one look, and that was that.”
“I’ve never heard of such a thing, Libby. It sounds absurdly impulsive,” he said, lifting her hand to his mouth and kissing it softly. “No one has ever called me pretty before.”
