The Offer

by Catherine Coulter

  “How would you like me to change, Phillip? Whatever you wish, I will certainly do my best to comply.”

  At that moment he believed he’d give just about anything to have her hurl a plate at his head. But she didn’t. She was sitting silently, her hands now folded in her lap. All that immense vitality of hers was extinguished. He hated it. Hell, he would lock her into the tower once it was built, if she was still acting this way.

  “I want you to stand up. I want you to walk to me. I want you to kiss me.”

  Without hesitation, she rose and walked to him. She stood beside his chair, then leaned down and touched her mouth to his. A fleeting light touch, nothing at all behind it, no feeling, no anger, just nothing.

  Then she simply walked away, toward the window. She pulled back the draperies and looked out at the gray, overcast winter day.

  “Would you like to go to Almack’s this evening? You love to waltz. Would that please you?”

  “If it would please you, then naturally it would be my pleasure as well.”

  She didn’t even turn to face him as she spoke. It enraged him. “I’m asking what you’d prefer, Sabrina.”

  She turned and lowered her head. The toes of her slippers were more important, more interesting, than he was. She said, “I thought you found Almack’s boring. It also looks as if it might snow today. The clouds are low and very dark.”

  “Who cares if it bloody well snows? I like to waltz with you.”

  “I see,” she said. She drew her shawl more closely around her shoulders, nodding to him, and said, “I will naturally do your bidding.”

  “Don’t leave. Sit down.”

  Without a word, she sat down.

  “I’ve asked you for your wishes in this matter. It’s not a question of your doing my bidding.”

  “But my desire must perforce be to do your bidding, my lord.”

  “Very well. My bidding is for you to cease acting like a spiritless old horse.” He thought he saw a spark of anger in her eyes and found that he wanted nothing more than to fan that spark into a flame that would burn him but good. He wanted blood in her eyes. He wanted to see her fists. But she remained infuriatingly silent.

  He continued, doggedly, “Perhaps Richard Clarendon will be there. I realize that he’s just a friend, to both of us. Perhaps you would like to see him.” It was as close as he’d ever get to an apology. He didn’t believe that men were fashioned for abject apologies. It didn’t matter how wrong they were. But it was an offer of one. Surely she saw that.

  “In that case, my lord,” she said, raising her head to face him, “yes, I should very much like to go.”

  “What the devil did you say?”

  “I said I’d really like to go. And as you said, it matters not if it snows.”

  He wasn’t at all certain now that she’d understood his apology. Did she want to go just because Clarendon would be there? He didn’t know. He eyed her with growing frustration.

  “I don’t like this marriage business,” he said finally, rose from the table, flung down his napkin, and strode from the dining room.

  “I know you don’t,” she called after him. “As a matter of fact, I don’t much like it either.” Yes, she thought, staring again toward the window, this marriage business is the very devil.

  Sabrina walked slowly to the windows and pressed her cheek to the chill glass. She supposed she’d wanted to goad him, and she had succeeded, not that it had solved anything.

  She wandered into the library. For want of anything better to do, she pulled out a novel from one of the lower shelves and curled up in a curtained window seat.

  She opened the small vellum tome of Voltaire and forced herself to concentrate on the French that was surely brimming with wit. Her attention soon wandered to the light flakes of snow that pattered gently against the windowpane, dissolved into small drops of water, and streaked in slender rivulets down the glass. She traced the brief existence of each splashing snowflake with the tip of her finger.

  She must have dozed, for her head snapped up at the sound of voices in the library.

  “I merely wanted to ask you, my lord,” she heard Paul Blackador say to Phillip, “for it indeed is a strange bill to receive from a tradesman.”

  She was alert in an instant. Phillip’s voice held her utterly still.

  “Ah yes, the carpenter. Martine told me he was a saucy one. For your information, Paul, I had thought I’d be smashed during the night by a piece of falling plaster in the bedroom. Do pay the man.”

  Sabrina’s fingers tightened about the thin book until she could picture the male grins on their faces. She’d never felt such fury in her entire life. Well, maybe she had, but all her grand fury had happened only since she’d met Phillip.

  “There’s another bill, my lord, for a gown from Madame Giselle. The total, I think, is a trifle excessive.”

  Sabrina heard the brief rustling of paper as, she supposed, the bill changed hands.

  “It is a bit much,” Phillip said, without much interest. “As I’m off to see the lady, I’ll ask her about it. Anything else pressing, Paul?”

  There was nothing more except a speech about the Corn Laws that Paul wanted him to present to the House of Lords. After a bit of discussion, Phillip left, Paul after him.

  The library door closed upon the rest of Paul’s words. Sabrina bounded from her hiding place and shook her fist at the closed door. She had married the greatest hypocrite imaginable. She was to remain chaste—he was even jealous of Richard Clarendon—while he continued doing what he’d always done.

  Phillip had told her to cease being a spiritless old horse. Very well, she would certainly grant him his wish. She felt life and rage sing in her blood.

  She found Martine Nicholsby’s direction on the carpenter’s bill. She memorized the address on Fitton Place, then tossed the paper back on its neat stack.

  Ten minutes later, a warm cloak around her and gloves on her hands, she met Greybar in the entrance hall. He was staring at her, as if she’d suddenly become someone else. Well, she had.

  “His lordship has left, Greybar?” At his nod, she said then, “Call me a hackney. I wish to leave right now, no longer than a minute from now.”

  For a minute it looked like he would question her. She gave him the most arrogant look she’d ever seen her grandfather make. It worked.

  Thirty minutes later Sabrina found herself staring at a two-story brick town house, sandwiched between other houses in a very quiet, unpretentious street, not a mile from Phillip’s house. She pulled her ermine-lined cloak more closely about her and stepped quickly from the hackney. From the corner of her eye, Sabrina saw Lanscombe, Phillip’s tiger, climb into the box and prepare to drive the curricle around the corner. How like Phillip, she thought, to ensure that his horses received the proper exercise while he made love to his mistress inside. She wondered how long poor Lanscombe was to tool the curricle about before fetching his master. Sabrina saw Lanscombe’s jaw drop open when he spotted her. He gazed at her dumbly, shaking his head.

  Sabrina turned her back on him, walked up the front steps, raised her gloved hand, and pounded upon the door.

  After some moments the door slid cautiously open and a frowning maid’s face appeared.

  “What do you want?”

  “I want my husband,” Sabrina said coldly, and shoved the door open, knocking the maid aside. She was standing in a square entranceway. On one side she could see into a small drawing room. Straight ahead of her was a slightly winding staircase that led to the upper floor. She heard a light, tinkling laugh from above, and without further thought, she grasped her skirts and rushed to the stairs.

  “Oh, Gawd, wait, miss, wait! You can’t go up there.”

  “You just watch me,” Sabrina said over her shoulder, and began running up the stairs. She followed the sound of a woman’s lovely husky voice from inside a room. The door stood some inches open. She stood for an instant, indecisive. At the sound of Phillip’s low laugh, she pu
shed the door open and rushed inside. She drew up short, panting.

  She stood inside a large bedchamber, dominated by a huge bed. Upon the bed a woman lay upon her back, clothed in nothing but alabaster skin. In an instant, Sabrina took in every detail of her exquisite body. She looked like a painting, damn her.

  But it was Phillip who quickly captured her attention. He was standing next to the bed, his cravat hanging loose, his coat flung over a chair. At least he wasn’t naked, but it didn’t matter. He would have been as naked as his mistress in another three minutes.

  The brief frozen tableau suddenly turned into furious life.

  Phillip, who had been laughing at Martine’s verbal baiting of him, turned to see his wife burst into the bedchamber.

  He stared at her openmouthed, incredulous, disbelieving. Then he yelled, “What the devil are you doing here?”

  38

  “My goodness,” Martine said, rising on her elbow as she slowly pulled her peignoir over her lovely self. “I hadn’t expected this.”

  Sabrina looked again at his now nearly naked mistress, and yelled back at him, “I wish the plaster had fallen on your head while you were making love to her, you bastard! How dare you even be here? It makes me want to slay you, Phillip. Damn you, you’re my husband!”

  “What are you yammering about plaster? Oh! So you were eavesdropping, were you? Not a very ladylike thing to do, Sabrina.” He stopped. He’d never felt such a fool in his life. Dammit, this couldn’t be happening, not to him. It was more worthy of a farce in Drury Lane. He took several furious steps toward her.

  “Ladylike! You rotter, you’re mine, yet you won’t even give me a chance.”

  “It’s true that you’re my wife, and as such, why the devil aren’t you at home, where you belong?”

  “It’s your home, you faithless bastard, not mine. I don’t belong there, I merely reside there. She could reside there as well. It wouldn’t matter to you.”

  “Dammit, Sabrina, that makes no sense at all. I won’t tolerate any more of this. Go home now. I’ll deal with you later.”

  “Later? You mean after you’ve bedded her? Then perhaps you’ll have time to spend with me? How kind you are. My heart nearly expires with the joy of it.”

  “What I do with her is none of your business. You’re the one who offered me my freedom, freedom I told you I already had and always would have.”

  “You dared to accuse me of flirting with Richard Clarendon and all the while you have a mistress. A mistress!” Sabrina waved toward Martine who was sitting on the side of the bed. “How dare you do this to me? Do I mean so little to you that you don’t hesitate to humiliate me? Does our marriage mean so little to you?”

  “Enough of this idiocy. Listen. Our marriage, madam, was meant to provide you a home and the protection of my name. You wanted that, don’t you remember? You offered me marriage, don’t you remember? You offered me my freedom.”

  She actually shook her fist at him, yelling, “That was then. This is now. I love you. You’re my husband. I won’t allow you any more freedom unless the freedom is with me!” She looked over at Martine to see the woman smiling at her, nodding. It made no sense. It didn’t stop her. “I know that she is beautiful and much more nicely put together than I am, but she didn’t get ruined, I did. You didn’t have to marry her, you had to marry me. So it’s done. Accept it, damn you.”

  “Accept it like I did when I saw you take Richard Clarendon into that very private little room of yours?”

  “Will you forever play that same tired song? It’s absurd, and you know it.” Then her eyes narrowed, her hands were on her hips. “Well, perhaps you weren’t wrong. Perhaps Richard is so pleasing to me that I just might go see him right now while you remain here to enjoy yourself.”

  “You won’t take Richard Clarendon as your lover. You won’t take any man as a lover.”

  She stared at him, unable to believe his perversity.

  He smote his forehead with his palm. “Ah, you’re driving me to the brink of madness. Go home, Sabrina. I won’t take any more of this. Get out of here. By God, you’re ranting like the lowest trollop in Soho.”

  “You bastard,” she screamed at him. “I catch you with your mistress and you have the gall to call me a trollop?” She ran at him, pounding on his chest with her fists with all her strength.

  Martine came to her feet, then just shook her head and sat back down again.

  Phillip clamped his arms about his wife and dragged her to the small dressing room adjoining the bedchamber. He kicked the door closed with his booted foot. “Stop it, Sabrina, stop it.” He was shaking her until her neck snapped back.

  She became rigid in his arms and he released her. She took a stumbling step backward. She opened her mouth, but he interrupted her.

  “Your behavior is inexcusable. You won’t question what I do. Now you will take yourself quietly away from here, else I will seriously consider sending you to Dinwitty Manor to learn your place.”

  “My place? I don’t have a place, Phillip. Now that I’ve seen how you’ve humiliated me, stripped me of even any pretense of worth—” She broke off. “You don’t even understand, do you?”

  “I understand enough to want to thrash you,” he said low and grabbed her shoulders.

  Sabrina drove her knee with all her strength into his groin. He dropped his hands and stared at her in amazement. “I’m a big man. You could have kicked me anywhere but there.” Then he doubled over in pain.

  Sabrina ran from the small dressing room. She wouldn’t think about him holding himself, on his knees. She pulled the door open and, without another look at his mistress, fled from the bedchamber.

  For several minutes Phillip thought death would be preferable to the exquisite bowing pain that had brought him to his knees. As the bouts of nausea slowly lessened, thank God, it was Sabrina’s death he thought about. He pulled himself shakily to his feet and walked slowly back into the bedchamber. Without a word, he pulled on his coat.

  “You look whiter than a trout’s belly. What happened?”

  “She kicked me in the groin,” he said as he grabbed his greatcoat.

  “That is an extreme thing to do, but she was very angry, the little one.”

  “She’ll regret it soon enough,” he said as he jerked on his gloves.

  “You will beat her? Surely not, Phillip. She’s half your size. That would hardly be fair. Besides, you’re a gentleman. A gentleman wouldn’t beat his wife.”

  He was already to her bedchamber door.

  “But she’s in love with you,” Martine shouted. “She told you that.”

  “Ha! It’s a girl’s infatuation, nothing more. Surely she lost that after I took her three times in one night and never once gave her pleasure. Yes, she’s over that. She’s just saying it by rote. It means nothing at all. Now I’m going to murder her.”

  He turned at the door. “I will always have my freedom. I will always do just as I please. I’ll be back later, Martine.”

  Martine sat back down on the bed and leaned back against the pillows, listening to his galloping footsteps on the stairs.

  Lanscombe said not a word as his master jumped into the curricle and grabbed the reins. The furious working of the viscount’s jaw didn’t bode well for the viscountess. Like a frightened little animal, she’d flown down the steps, running full speed toward a hackney.

  Ten minutes later the viscount pulled his stallions to a steaming halt.

  “Stable them,” he said over his shoulder to Lanscombe as he took the front steps of the Derencourt town house two at a time.

  “Where is the viscountess?” Phillip said the moment he saw Greybar.

  “She returned just a short time ago, my lord. I believe she went up to her room.”

  Phillip stopped in front of Sabrina’s bedchamber door. He turned the handle. The door was locked. The pulse pounded in his neck.

  “Open the door, Sabrina.”

  Her voice came back to him, loud and quite clear.
“Go away, Phillip. Go back to Martine. I don’t want to see you. Go away.”

  “I’ll go back to Martine whenever it pleases me to do so,” he shouted, took a step back, raised his booted leg, and crashed it against the door. He heard splintering wood. He aimed one more kick nearer to the lock and the door flew open, straining at its hinges.

  Sabrina stood with her back against the windows. She stared at him, standing there in her doorway, breathing hard. “Go away, Phillip. Go away.”

  He walked toward her, slowly, his eyes never leaving her face. He was very, very angry.

  Sabrina pulled her hand up from the folds of her skirt. She was clutching a riding crop tightly in her fingers. “Stay away from me, Phillip, or I’ll hurt you, I swear it.”

  “The only thing I’ll stay away from is your damned knee.”

  “I mean it. Go away.” She raised the riding crop and shook it at him.

  “Try your best, you little witch.” He was on her. She swung it wildly at him, but he took a quick sideways step, and she merely flicked his sleeve. He lunged forward and gripped her arm just above the elbow. As he forced her arm down she tried again to kick him. He turned to his side, letting her strike his thigh.

  He gripped her arm more tightly. She felt the numbness, felt the riding crop slip from her fingers. He pulled her close. “I can’t believe you struck me,” he said.

  “In your groin or now?”

  He looked down at the riding crop. She’d hit him. He looked at her now, saw her face washed of color, saw the bruises beneath her expressive eyes, saw the fear in them. Lightly, he caressed his fingers over her cheek. He said quietly, “What have we come to, Sabrina?”

  She shook her head, saying nothing.