Alixe shook her head and laughed up at him. ‘Are you really as bad as you make out?’
‘I’m probably worse.’
‘Not at all. There’s a streak of honour in you whether you admit it or not.’
Merrick cocked an eyebrow. ‘There are many who’d disagree with you. I am not the heir, so I am not learning to run the family holdings. I am not the current marquis, so I am not taking up a seat in Parliament. I am not a military man, so I am not considering my next post in some godforsaken region of the empire. I am not a man of the cloth contemplating the philosophies of religion or how to best bore my parish from the pulpit on Sunday. In fact, I follow none of the pursuits that make a man honourable.’
His speech made her uncomfortable. He could see the slight furrowing of her brow. ‘You’re right to be uncomfortable, Alixe. The truth often is. Better to know it now than before you delude yourself into thinking I’m something I not. Here’s another truth. I’m a bounder. I follow the money, I live from one wager to the next.’
‘Then why didn’t you leave? The man you describe wouldn’t have stayed under the conditions my father laid out. That man would have been out of Folkestone as fast as he could saddle a horse,’ Alixe countered.
Merrick favoured her with a fond smile. Apparently, she was not willing to be swayed just yet. ‘It’s nice to think someone still believes I can be redeemed.’ That it was Alixe Burke, a woman who had little to gain from an association with him, touched him beyond measure. This was dangerous ground for them both. Her feelings did not go unreciprocated. For the first time with a woman, he wished it could be different, that he could be different. That was when he knew it. Alixe Burke was in love with him. The realisation was overwhelming. He had to protect her from that before it went any further. He had no business encouraging sentiments he could not return, no matter how he felt.
‘Alixe, you don’t want to get bound up with me.’ He groped for words to make her see that his failings were far too big for her to solve. ‘My family doesn’t know how to love.’ He voiced his worst fear. ‘Why would I be any different?’ He’d never said it out loud, this nagging concern that he would only create an empty, cruel marriage like his father had. But now that he’d started, the words poured out.
‘My father married my mother for her money.’ He put up a hand to stop any questions. ‘I know a lot of people marry for money, but many times it’s mutual and people understand what they’re getting into. They have rules about how to deal with their “arrangement”. But not my mother. She loved my father and I think she thought he’d love her, too, eventually.’ Merrick shook his head. ‘She died still hoping, still believing. Perhaps she even died of a broken heart. She never got over her illusions.’ He drew a deep breath. ‘When I look at you, I fear the same will happen. Don’t love me, Alixe. I’m not worth it.’
Alixe wouldn’t budge from her position. ‘If there is no hope, why didn’t you leave with Ashe this morning?’
‘I wasn’t ready to leave you yet. I can’t have you beyond a few days, but I will take what I can if you will have me.’ He could see her debating the options in her mind. He pressed on, his groin tightening at the prospect that she hadn’t refused yet. ‘It’s hardly a fair proposition.’
Alixe held his gaze with all seriousness. ‘It’s the only proposition, though, isn’t it, Merrick?’ Then she gave a smile that took him entirely by surprise. ‘Well, now that’s settled, we can get back to having a good time today.’
‘Alixe Burke, you astonish me.’ Merrick grinned. ‘I’ll make it worth your while.’
She nudged him with her elbow. ‘You had certainly better. I have expectations.’
It was better this way. They knew where they stood with one another. Merrick’s disclosure had put the fantasy into perspective and now she could enjoy it for what it was. There would be no gallant offer of marriage for which she would eventually be thankful. She had not really expected one. He wasn’t the marrying type and he’d gone to great lengths to explain why. She could not bear the idea that he might have offered out of pity or a sense of misguided honour to save Jamie’s sister from her unwanted fate. She was in love with him and there was nothing worse than unrequited love. That kind of love had the power to enslave. He understood that and wanted to protect her from falling victim to it. What he could offer her was the pleasure of his company and the pleasure of his body for a limited time. If that was all, so be it. She would reach out and take it with both hands, then she would set him free. It would be her gift to him. She would accept the first decent offer she received in London and set him loose from any further obligations. Merrick St Magnus was a wild creature and wild things were meant to be free.
But that was for later. For now he was hers and she was his by mutual consent.
They returned to the fairgrounds and strolled the booths. He bought her pretty ribbons to match her dress and she laughingly tied them to her bonnet. They stopped at the historical booth where she accepted praise over her work on the medieval document. They wandered over to see the games. Targets were being set up for a knife-throwing contest and the men were coaxing Merrick into joining the line of contenders.
‘All right, all right.’ Merrick gave in and laid aside his coat. He began rolling up his sleeves while the instructions were announced. Three knives per thrower. The top scores would move on to a final round.
Alixe stood on the sidelines with the other spectators. She recognised several of the contestants, but she held her breath when Merrick stepped up to the line, hefting the first knife in his hand. Archibald Redfield sidled in beside her, finished with his own throws. ‘Don’t worry, St Magnus is supposed to be a dab hand with throwing knives.’ His tone was jovial, but Alixe sensed something smug lurking beneath. Merrick’s first throw landed in the ring that preceded the bullseye and she straightened her shoulders with pride.
‘I have it on good authority he was involved in a knife-throwing wager at a high-class bordello in London. The winner won a certain lady’s favours for the evening,’ he said in quiet tones for her alone.
Alixe’s skin crawled. ‘I cannot believe you thought such a rumour fit for my hearing.’ Merrick’s second knife found the bullseye. The crowd applauded.
Redfield was not subdued. ‘I cannot believe you wouldn’t want to know such a thing about someone with whom you’ve spent so much time recently.’
‘If I have, that’s your fault,’ Alixe dared to reference the odious wager. ‘You’ve put him in my path.’
‘And I regret it,’ Redfield said. ‘I had hoped he’d play his end of the wager with honour, although your father is more to blame than myself for those particular conditions.’
Merrick’s last knife found the bullseye, making him an easy candidate for the final round. ‘A fair opponent for me,’ Redfield said cockily. ‘I’ll enjoy facing him in the finals. He owes me for last time.’ He leaned close. ‘Surely you know he woos you for himself. He doesn’t care if you succeed in London. He’ll gladly marry you. Your father misjudged him there. He’s a whore of the highest order. If the price is right, he’ll sell himself in marriage. You would solve a lot of problems for him and after you have, he’ll leave you alone and carry on with his usual debaucheries.’
Alixe blanched at Redfield’s coarse warning.
It wasn’t true. She and Merrick had just discussed the improbability of marriage. Surely Merrick couldn’t ensure her failure in London—only she could do that. If she chose, she would dazzle every last bachelor in town. Redfield was wrong. A horrible suspicion came to her: unless Merrick had lied. No. It wasn’t possible. She simply wouldn’t believe it.
Archibald Redfield stepped up to the line and waited his turn while St Magnus threw. A rough childhood on the docksides of London had served him well today. His own throws had been excellent and the competition was down to him and St Magnus now, the other finalists having been eliminated. He’d sown his seed of doubt well. He’d been pleased with how the conversation with Ali
xe had gone.
She was a smart woman and smart women usually had a healthy streak of cynicism, always overthinking things. Just when she’d started to believe in the bounder, he’d come along and punctured that fragile bubble of hers. Oh, he knew she wanted to believe St Magnus—what woman wouldn’t want to believe him? But she hadn’t completely allowed herself to give up all logic yet and he’d played havoc with the small piece that remained. She’d not said as much, but he’d seen it in her face.
Best of all, he’d done it without really telling any lies. If she asked around, she’d find the story of the bordello readily confirmed and probably much more he’d not yet uncovered.
Those kinds of rumours would lead her to the conclusion he’d already put before her. St Magnus needed her money. He had nothing of his own and enjoyed an estranged relationship with his father. She would easily put all the pieces together and conclude St Magnus was using her for his own ends. That was when he’d be there to make his offer of marriage for the second time. This time, he would deal through her father. Folkestone would see that he was the only way out of facing St Magnus at the altar.
The crowd applauded. St Magnus had struck two more bullseyes, beating his own single and two near-misses. The bastard was as lucky as they came. St Magnus strode to the sidelines and swept Alixe Burke into his arms and kissing her full on the mouth in a victor’s kiss. Too bad, Redfield thought, he couldn’t bury those knives in St Magnus’s heart instead of hay targets. But he could beat St Magnus to the prize and he would do that tonight.
Chapter Fourteen
A subdued tension underlay the rest of the afternoon like the heavy stillness that precedes a thunderstorm until Alixe was ready to burst from the anticipation. He’d kissed her in public. Word of it would reach her father and there would be the devil to pay for Merrick’s indiscretion. One could kiss country lasses like that, but one could not kiss the Earl of Folkestone’s daughter. Archibald Redfield’s warning rang through her head. Perhaps Merrick had kissed her on purpose, knowing full well her father would not be able to let it pass.
While her mind cared a great deal about being manipulated by Merrick’s flirtations, her body cared not at all, only that it was aroused with an adventurous curiosity. Her body wanted again the pleasures he’d shown her. With every look, every smile, every touch, her body was drawn taut with wanting until she thought she couldn’t stand it a moment longer.
Merrick was not oblivious to the presence of mounting tensions as they finished touring the booths late in the afternoon. Alixe noted a growing tightness about his mouth when he smiled, an agitated distraction to his gestures. They had promised each other to enjoy the time they had left, but that had changed since the knife throwing. They were both avoiding something, although Alixe doubted it was the same thing. Merrick had been nearly giddy with the win and the small purse that came with it. She had been more restrained, her enjoyment of Merrick’s victory tainted by Redfield’s accusations.
Their amblings took them to the place Merrick had left the gig and he helped her up, both of them implicitly finished with the fair. The gig gave under his weight as Merrick took his seat next to her and grabbed up the reins. Alixe was extraordinarily sensitive to the nearness of him, of every brush of his thigh against hers. There was nothing for it. She knew the tight proximity of the bench seat demanded such touching be permissible.
‘What did Redfield say to you?’ Merrick asked once the fairgrounds were behind them. The grimness of his tone caught her unawares. She’d become accustomed to his usual laughing tones, or his low, sensual murmur. This grimness was a not something she’d come to associate with Merrick.
‘Nothing of merit.’ Alixe shrugged. But she was not convincing in her nonchalance. Merrick eyed her speculatively with a raised eyebrow and a sideways glance that said he didn’t believe it.
‘Clearly it was something of note. It has upset you.’ He paused. ‘Unless it was my kissing that upset you?’
‘No, it was not your kissing,’ Alixe confessed. She looked down at her hands, searching for the right words. ‘You do know my father will hear of it, though.’ Alixe gathered her courage. ‘Is that what you intended? Do you mean to force my father’s hand to see you as an acceptable suitor?’
Merrick gave a sharp bark of laughter. ‘You know it’s not. Did I not assure you of that very thing this morning?’
She felt his eyes on her, his gaze strong and probing. ‘Ah, I see. That’s what Redfield told you while he was over there, whispering his poison in your ear.’ He had nothing but disdain in his tone now and not all of it was for Redfield. A healthy dose of it was reserved for her. ‘You believed him. You believed him over me.’
Alixe felt her cheeks burning. She had not seen it from his point of view, of how it would appear to Merrick.
‘For shame, Alixe—only this morning you thought I might still be redeemable. How fickle is a woman.’ Merrick clucked to the horses and that was the last sound either of them made until they arrived home.
Alixe was in tears by the time she reached the sanctuary of her room. Meg wouldn’t be back until evening to help her dress for dinner and Alixe was glad for the privacy. She wanted to be alone with her misery. She had behaved shabbily towards Merrick. For all his reputation to the contrary, he’d not treated her poorly. Nothing had happened without her consent and he’d shown her a sincerity no suitor before him had.
Yet, at the first hint of chicanery, she’d been influenced by a man whom she’d previously turned down, who might possibly be bent on taking revenge for that rejection. Archibald Redfield might not be a scandalous rake with an obvious history of womanising and wagering, but neither was his reputation without tarnish, mostly because no one knew much about him. He’d simply arrived in the neighbourhood. All anyone knew was that his antecedents were of the murky country-gentry sort with a baronial great-grandfather buried somewhere in his past. He was polite to the ladies and good-looking. But she knew that, at least in one thing, Archibald Redfield was not honest.
Alixe gazed up at the ceiling. It shouldn’t have been enough to sway her from Merrick’s standard. She knew Redfield was not a genuine man. Redfield had been after her money. She’d overheard him talking with his solicitor when she and her mother had come to call at the manor. Her mother had been outside, having forgot something in the carriage. It had been the day before Redfield had proposed to her in private. Wanting her money wasn’t precisely scandalous in the way Merrick’s knife wagers in a bordello were, but it was still intolerable to her. Up until that overheard conversation, she’d thought Redfield had genuinely liked her. She’d known he wasn’t in love with her, but he’d liked her, respected her work. It had all been a ruse.
Which was why it had been so easy to believe Redfield today. Didn’t it take one to know one? Like Redfield, Merrick, too, pretended to like her, had shown respect for her work and he’d been entirely convincing. Much more convincing than Archibald Redfield had ever been.
Even now, it was hard to believe Merrick had designed all this for his benefit while stringently maintaining that he was unattainable. But his presence marked her room. The fan he’d given her lay on her vanity. The ribbons he’d bought her dangled from her bonnet. The faint smell of coumarin-laced fougère lingered on the gown she’d worn to the alfresco party. In small ways, he’d made himself unforgettable and ever present while agreeing to all her demands. He’d acquiesced to her silly requirement that he teach her no more of his unconventional lessons. But that hadn’t stopped them, merely changed their context. In hindsight, lessons would have been better. She could have understood their place. There would have been no confusion.
He loves me, he loves me not. If she’d had a rose handy, she would have denuded it. A thought occurred to her in the midst of her melancholy: she was working the wrong end of the equation. Perhaps it didn’t matter if he loved her or how much. Perhaps what mattered was whether or not she loved him.
The dangerous idea that had begun to bud last
night amid champagne and fireworks was in full bloom now. She loved him. It was hard to say when precisely it had happened. But one thing she was certain of: this was not an impulsive decision, not something that had occurred overnight. In spite of her best efforts, it had crept up on her. Alixe sat down hard on her bed, letting the discovery rock her very being.
She loved the murmur of his voice enticing her to wickedness. She loved the feel of his body beneath her hands. She loved his laughing eyes that took nothing too seriously. It wasn’t just his good looks. It was his soul, which wasn’t nearly as dark as he liked to pretend. He was a good man who’d worked beside villagers, who shared her interest in history, who didn’t despise her mind, who carried with him a thoughtful intellect. He was extraordinary in ways London had not recognised.
Most of all, she loved how she felt when she was with him. He made her feel … She groped for the word in her mind. Alive. He made her feel alive in a way she’d never felt before and, for that, she loved him and it didn’t matter if he loved her.
All she knew was that she felt ashamed of her doubt, ashamed of the way she’d treated Merrick. He deserved so much better. She wanted to apologise. She wanted things back the way they’d been that morning when she and Merrick had kissed behind a tree and he’d pledged all he could offer. If she’d believed in him, she might be off somewhere right now with him, indulging what time they had left instead of moping about her room, wallowing in her regrets.
A frenzy of resolve engulfed her. Within moments she was striding out of the house. Merrick had not stayed once he’d dropped her off. But she knew where she could find him and what she’d do with him once she did.
Merrick dived into the water, letting the water close over him, letting the cool rush of it drown out all else. He wanted to forget. He’d momentarily been a fool and it hurt. Alixe Burke had made him believe he was finer than he was, for a few hours at least. But Alixe had not believed him over Redfield’s lies. The knowledge of it stung.
How to Disgrace a Lady Page 14
