by Julia London
Grayson hadn’t noticed Kate’s rotund companion until that moment; his gaze was fixed on Kate, and the high color in her cheeks and the glitter of angry disappointment in her eyes.
Nor did he hear the others leave. He only knew when Kate moved across the room with such determination that the hem of her gown kicked up with her stride. She walked past him, brushing against his sleeve. She shut the door, turned around, and crossed her arms. “What do you want?”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he demanded.
“And when precisely might I have told you?” she asked, tossing her arms wide in a fit of pique. “At Marlborough House, when you were so clearly ashamed to have made my acquaintance? Or when you had me in a darkened room?”
“You might have sent a note along with the many I have written you that you returned, unopened!”
“And risked your ruin?”
This was an impossible situation. There was nothing Grayson could say to appease her or to help her understand the pressure he was under. He felt like a fool as it was—he’d always been so bloody careful about pregnancy, but with Kate, he’d been so caught up in the sensation of it that he’d been grievously careless. “Kate,” he said, and ran both hands over his hair in frustration and looked at the floor. “Kate.”
When he lifted his gaze to hers he saw green eyes full of sorrow. Something palpable moved between them; Grayson opened his arms at the same moment Kate ran to him. He caught her in his arms, lifted her off her feet in a tight embrace, and kissed her before putting her on her feet again.
“I have missed you so much!” she said desperately. “I have longed to see you, to hear your voice, to feel your touch.”
“I know, I know—I have missed you, too,” he said into her hair. “Are you all right? Are you well?”
“As well as could be expected.”
He put her back and cupped her beautiful face. “Does he know?”
She pressed her lips together. “Not that I am aware. Digby says he certainly has heard.”
“How … how was it discovered?” he asked, looking at her now.
“I don’t know!” she said tearfully. “I had only just realized it myself! Digby says someone guessed, but I don’t know how, I honestly don’t know!”
Kate looked so lost, and Grayson would give everything he had to remove that look from her face. “Darling,” he said, and dipped down to kiss her. “I will take care of you, you know that, don’t you?” he asked, running a hand over her head.
“You will?” she asked, looking up at him hopefully.
“Yes, of course! Did you doubt it for a moment? I can provide you a country home, something quaint, like Kitridge Lodge if you like. Some place close to London so that I can come to you in two or three hours’ time if necessary.”
Kate’s smile faltered.
“You and the baby will be quite comfortable. We’ll make sure there is room for Digby and your butler.”
“What do you mean?” she asked, frowning now. “Won’t you be there as well?”
“I will visit you as often as I can, but I will be here, in London.”
“Then I … I am to be your mistress?”
“The mother of my child. My lover …” He paused, struggling to find the right words. Lover and mistress sounded all wrong. “All your needs will be met.” That sounded worse.
Kate dropped her hands from his arms and stepped back, staring at him.
“What is the matter?” Grayson asked.
“Your mistress?”
He didn’t like the way she said it, as if she were displeased with what he thought was a very noble offer, especially given the circumstances. “Yes, my mistress. Were you expecting something more?”
“Yes! Yes, of course I was! Did you think I would be grateful to be your mistress?”
“Yes, madam,” Grayson said crossly. “I should think any woman of your standing would be thrilled with such an offer.”
“A woman of my standing,” she repeated hotly.
Grayson instantly regretted those words. “I didn’t mean—”
“I know precisely what you meant. God help me, I am so blind! You really are just like all of them, your protestations to the contrary notwithstanding! I would rather raise my child by myself than be treated like a poor relation raising your bastard child!”
He was stunned. He’d made her a generous offer and she responded as if he’d put her out like a dog. “What in bloody hell would you have me do, Kate?” he demanded angrily.
“I would have you love me as I love you!” she cried earnestly and beseechingly. “I would have you marry me, and be with me when we bring our children into the world, and live and love alongside us!”
“That’s not possible,” he said gruffly. “For either of us.”
“Why not?”
“I am a duke, Kate! It is not in the realm of any possibility that I could marry you. But it is also out of the realm of possibility that you and my child might live apart from me—”
“Oh dear God,” she said, whirling away from him. She rubbed her hands on her arms and paced restlessly before him. “Do you know what pains me most, Christie? It’s that I’ve done the very thing I bloody well promised myself I would never do.”
“What do you mean?”
“I fell in love!” she cried. “I have fallen so hopelessly in love with you that I cannot bear to hear the things you are saying to me now. But I am so angry with myself, for I have always known the rules of this wretched life I live! I knew what would happen if I allowed myself that one small hope, that secret desire …” Her voice broke and she pressed her hands to her abdomen, bending over.
“Kate!” Grayson said, alarmed.
“No,” she said when he put his arms around her. “Please don’t touch me, please don’t make it worse. I love you, Grayson. You say those things and yet I love you. But I cannot bear to have you in my sight.”
“God in heaven, don’t you know that I love you, too?”
She tried to look away.
“I have been surprised and humbled by how much I do. I love you desperately and utterly, Kate, and I confess, I don’t know what to do with it.”
She sagged, sliding to the floor on her knees, Grayson with her.
“Look at me,” he said, putting his hand beneath her chin, lifting her face so that she would look at him. “I had never considered the possibility of falling in love before I met you. I believed I would one day choose a suitable woman and marry her for the sake of producing an heir. I thought love was the game of very young men, not experienced men such as myself. But it happened to me, too, Kate—when I was least expecting it, with the one woman in all of London who is beyond my reach, it happened to me.”
“I am not beyond your reach!” she exclaimed. “I am here, right here,” she said, taking his hand and pressing it to her heart. “If I am beyond your reach it is only because you make it so.”
There were so many things she didn’t understand. He caressed her face, realizing, as he looked at her, that he’d perfected the art of being a lover, but he knew nothing of love. He felt awkward and ungainly trying to explain himself. He preferred to make love to her, to show her how he felt, but he couldn’t do that to her, not when the ugly reality of their disparate lives would once again intrude into the one place they’d known perfect harmony. “Just know that I love you, Kate. More than life,” he said simply.
“You do not know how I have longed to hear you say it these last many days,” she said tearfully.
“Then I’ll say it again. I love you, Kate. I love you as far and as deep as any ocean, as high and as vast as any sky. I love you.”
“Then why is this so difficult? Why can you not love me and be with me?”
“Because, sweetheart, loving you does not change the responsibilities I bear. If it were only my happiness at stake, there would be no question of it. But I am the head of a large family, and my actions, my scandals, my disgrace, reverberates through all of them.”
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br /> Another tear slid down her cheek. “And it would be a disgrace to marry me,” she said flatly.
He didn’t answer. If there was one thing he knew about Kate, it was that she understood her place in this world. She’d never been anything less than practical about it.
“I won’t be your mistress,” she said softly, and stood up. “I don’t need you, Grayson. I have survived all my life without you, and I will survive without you now.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“I do,” she said resolutely.
“Then give me the child,” he said quietly. “I will ensure our child is raised with all due privilege.”
Kate’s lashes fluttered with her wince of pain. “No … thank you, but no. It is good to know you would take my love and my child and discard me, but I will keep my baby.”
“Christ in heaven, Kate, what would you have me do? I don’t want to hurt you, I want to help you—but I cannot be what you want me to be!”
“I don’t care any longer. I just want you to go.”
He made no move to go. He couldn’t bear to leave her like this.
But Kate was resolute. “I am begging you now,” she said. “If you do indeed truly love me, if you ever loved me, please go and leave me be.”
He was so foolish, so raw and inexperienced in the ways of the heart. Give him a tenant problem to solve, a social event to chair, and he could do it in a stupor. But this? He didn’t know how to do this—he’d never done anything like this. He’d never felt such a painful vise about his heart, or such despair. “I am going,” he said. “But only for now.” He walked to the door, where he paused and looked back at Kate. “You should know that I will not, under any circumstance, turn my back on you, or our child.” He opened the door then and walked out of her house, uncertain as to what he would do next.
Kate thought she cried for hours. Digby assured her it was no longer than an hour. After she had emptied herself of all her emotions, she began to wait for the prince to come and remove her from her house and replace her with another courtesan who wasn’t foolish enough to have fallen in love with one of his friends, much less carry his child.
But the prince did not come.
In an effort to determine why he hadn’t, Digby brought the Morning Times with him each day and pored over the news. The best Digby could determine was that the prince was engaged in a battle of wills with the king over the Delicate Investigation. According to Digby, public favor was firmly on the side of the princess, and the prince’s demands for more investigation, particularly after the Lords Commissioners had found the princess guilty of nothing more than bad behavior, had many crying foul. “He’ll not have his trial,” Digby predicted. “The king cannot possibly go against public sentiment.”
Whether the prince had heard the rumors of her pregnancy, Kate did not know. She knew only that as each day passed, she still had a roof over her head.
Three days had passed since the disastrous on dits had appeared in the paper, and still, the prince did not come.
In the course of keeping his finger on the pulse of high society, Digby also felt compelled to keep her abreast of the activities of the Duke of Darlington. He was involved in a scandal surrounding the Earl of Lambourne. The earl had been accused of adultery with the Princess of Wales, a charge of high treason, and the king’s men were attempting to apprehend him. Digby said everyone knew Lambourne had fled to his native Scotland, but then he’d appeared and had asked Darlington to arrange a meeting with the king.
“What happened to him?” Aldous asked curiously.
“I wouldn’t know what Lambourne discussed with the king,” Digby said. “But I have heard he’s been imprisoned in the Tower of London.”
“Bloody hell,” Aldous said.
Digby also noted that Darlington attended a charity event and a tea, wherein all the Season’s debutantes were presented to him. “ ‘Miss Augusta F—— was well received by the family,’ ” he read aloud.
Kate could picture the debutantes parading past Grayson, could imagine how he looked at them, assessing their worthiness to be his duchess. She wondered if he thought of her when he looked at them.
He’d sent a pair of letters to her, which she’d refused to read or allow anyone else to read. She couldn’t bear to see or hear his words. She kept the letters tied with a ribbon in her jewelry box. To keep her mind from it all, Kate spent her days baking and carrying food to St. Katharine’s.
The women were very excited to learn she was carrying a child. They asked after the father, of course they did, but when Kate demurely declined to answer, they did not press her. Such things were not uncommon to them. They planned to make some christening clothes for the infant and begged Digby to get them some fine linen cloth from Mr. Cousineau.
Kate did as Aldous suggested and began to sell some of the jewelry she’d collected from Benoit and the prince, building as much of a nest egg as she could possibly do before the prince dismissed her, which she anticipated with every day that dawned.
Chapter Thirty-four
Word has reached me that Harry has gotten himself into a bit of a bind in Paris,” Grayson’s mother said. She glanced up from her plate. “Gambling debts. In all the years your father was duke, this family did not gamble.”
The duchess was seated at his dining table, having imposed herself on Grayson’s luncheon when he’d refused her invitation to dine. He was aware that the residents of Darlington House, as well as his family, were treading lightly around him and his foul mood, but he’d ceased to care. He resented the lot of them of late.
“Good for Harry,” he muttered.
“Really, Your Grace,” his mother said.
“Young men gamble, Mother. It is not the end of the world as we know it.”
“I don’t know why you are being so cross with me,” she complained. “I think you should send him a letter and tell him he must come home straightaway.”
“If you think he should come home, why don’t you send the letter?” Grayson asked wearily.
“You are the duke, Grayson. It is your responsibility to maintain the family honor.”
Ah yes, the family honor, the thing that held him by the throat. The thing that kept him from openly courting Kate for fear of destroying it and bringing devastating scandal upon the golden heads of the celestial Christopher family.
He was so disgusted, he pushed his plate away. A footman immediately removed it.
“What is the matter?” his mother asked.
“Nothing. I am not hungry.”
“I think Harry has been without proper supervision for far too long,” his mother continued, in a not-so-veiled accusation. As she began to list the ways Harry needed supervision, Grayson’s mind wandered.
He was sick unto death of hearing the lecture of how great and venerable was the Christopher name. He loved his mother, but there were days she wore on him. It didn’t help that he hadn’t eaten properly or slept in days. He could not seem to come to terms with his feelings for Kate. He wanted her, he wanted his child. When he saw his nephews, he thought of his child, growing inside the woman he loved and he, like Kate, wondered why they couldn’t be together.
Would the scandal be so devastating? Would the moon cease to orbit the earth? Would the tide stop moving, the grass stop growing, the rains stop falling? Was his title so oppressive? If it was, then perhaps he ought to give it to Merrick. Merrick was much better suited for it than he.
“Are you listening, Darlington?”
“Pardon?” Grayson said absently, his gaze on Roarke, who had entered the dining room and was walking briskly to where Grayson sat.
“Impropriety makes it very difficult for your sisters.”
“Your Grace,” Roarke whispered, “His Highness, the Prince of Wales, has called.”
“What—now?” Grayson asked curiously.
“Yes, Your Grace. He is in your study.”
Grayson put aside his napkin. “Pardon, Mother, but the Prince of Wales has
come calling.”
“During luncheon?” she asked incredulously. “On my word, doesn’t anyone call at proper hours any longer?” she complained as Grayson went out.
The prince’s usual entourage was seated in chairs outside Grayson’s study. George was standing behind Grayson’s desk, openly perusing some of the papers there. “Your Highness,” Grayson said curtly. “Are you looking for something in particular?”
“I will dispense with the usual greeting in favor of real news,” George said and looked up. His eyes were as hard as ice. “It seems you were right, Darlington. The king has made it quite clear that he will not press for a parliamentary divorce with the nation’s current mood so solidly against me. Therefore, as it seems my wretched fate has been sealed, I shall take solace in the arms of my beautiful mistress. I thought you should be among the first to know.”
Grayson’s heart stopped beating for a moment.
“I will trust her word that you haven’t ruined her for me,” the prince added coldly, watching Grayson closely.
It took a moment for Grayson to find his tongue. The thought of George’s hands on Kate—a thought he’d worked hard to keep at a distance until now—caused a sudden swell of anger in him that felt as if it were choking him.
“I will take your silence as a sign of acquiescence,” George said flippantly. “I intend to introduce her as mine at my annual fête on Friday evening.”
Things were suddenly crystal clear to Grayson. His love for Kate trumped everything else. He would not stand by and let this … this pig, this rooting, loathsome pig, take the woman he loved. Damn the consequences, he would fight. “You mistake me, Your Highness. I am not acquiescing at all,” he said with great equanimity.
George snorted. “Pardon? I don’t think I heard you clearly.”
“I heard you just as clearly as you heard me—I will not step aside.”
A loathsome smile curved George’s lips. “I think you have no choice.”
“The hell I haven’t.”
George walked out from behind Grayson’s desk. “Do you think that because you have put a bastard child in my mistress, you are somehow entitled to her?”
