by Shana Galen
That was the Lila he remembered.
He didn’t know this Lila who blinked back tears when injured, who worried over stray cats, and who flushed like a pink rose when he touched her.
He didn’t need to know that Lila. In fact, he thought a bit of distance wise. Unfortunately, that was before he heard her request hot water and a hip bath from the maid. Now, instead of listening to the conversation of the two men who were passing through on their way from London to Bridgwater, he was thinking about Lila, wet and naked.
He imagined walking in on her, seeing her rise from the bath, the water sluicing off the pale pink tips of those gorgeous breasts. He would touch her there then allow his hand to skim down to the dip of her waist and out to the flare of her hip.
And then… If he didn’t stop imagining what he would do next, he would embarrass himself here in the common room. Brook sipped his ale and focused on the acrid taste of it. It was truly awful, and he had a passing acquaintance with bad ale from his time in the gin shops of Tooley Street.
“Rumor is,” one of the Londoners said, causing Brook to glance his way, “the Bow Street Runners have been hard at work ferreting out the rabble down in Covent Garden.”
“I saw it myself,” the other, a stout man with wispy reddish hair, concurred. “I know an abbess in Covent Garden, and I paid her a call the other night. Half the men in the streets was in an uproar, making for this hidey-hole or other so the Runners wouldn’t catch them.”
“The Runners go too far when a respectable man can’t have a bit of fun,” his companion said amiably.
Brook did not think visiting an abbess—the name for the owner of a bawdy house—would qualify as a respectable activity in most quarters, but the description of the chaos in what was most likely Seven Dials or somewhere nearby interested him.
Beezle was the arch rogue there. If the Runners had caught him, chaos might certainly ensue as other rogues vied for the top position. On the other hand, he’d watched the Runners chase after their shadows more than once. Beezle had a dozen hidey-holes. He could wait the men out.
“My question,” piped up the redhead, “is where the devil is Sir Brook? Fitzsimmons, that MP, was buried a few days ago and guards posted to keep the Resurrection Men away. Derring was said to be after the murderer, but now he’s all but disappeared and his Runners are running amok.”
Both men laughed at this play on words. Brook sipped his ale. He was commonly thought to be a part of the Bow Street Runners, but though he often worked with them, he did not work for them. He was an investigator and quite independent of Bow Street.
“I heard he got himself leg-shackled and retired to the country for a bit ’o sport. If you know what I mean.” This from the man Brook could not see clearly.
Brook might have rolled his eyes and moved to another table to overhear other conversations, but one small fact bothered him. Although his marriage was not a secret, he had thought his departure from London done covertly. If these two knew he had left London for the country, who else knew?
The most likely place for him to flee was Northbridge Abbey, his family’s estate. Marlowe and Dane were there with their young children. Although Brook knew Marlowe could more than handle herself, he worried about what might happen if Beezle took the family by surprise. He immediately requested foolscap and quill so he might pen a quick note of warning that could be sent on the next mail coach headed in that direction.
Where else might Beezle look? The Derring family had land all over the countryside. Much of it was in the north and west country. Those estates took several days to reach. Only Northbridge and this relatively rustic land his father had used for hunting and farming were close.
Brook closed his hand around the quill. Beezle would never find him here.
Still, he had a bad feeling.
The common room was all but empty by the time Brook made his way to the bedchamber he shared with Lila. It was late, and he moved quietly so as not to wake her when he entered. The room was dark, but he spotted movement by the fire. Lila turned to look at him, her long, raven hair flowing down her back and ending in curls at her waist. She wore her chemise, a simple garment she could don by herself. It was also a thin garment, being made of high-quality linen.
Brook could easily see the lines of her body outlined by the firelight.
He paused in the doorway, catching sight of her, and then slowly closed and locked the door.
“I tarried too long in the bath,” she said by way of explanation. “My hair is still drying.”
“I thought you’d be asleep.”
She nodded. “I wondered if you were waiting so you would not have to speak with me.”
Brook paused in the process of crossing the room. “Why do you think I don’t want to speak with you?”
She looked back at the fire, running a hand through her thick hair to test its dampness. Brook sat on the bed and removed his boots.
“It’s obvious you don’t like me,” she said after a long silence. “I know why.”
Why did her statement send guilt hurtling through him? “It’s not as though you like me,” he said in defense. “This marriage isn’t a love match.”
“It wasn’t, no.”
He rose and took a step toward her, then stood rooted in place. He didn’t understand her. He’d never understood women like her.
“I do wish you would talk about it,” she said. “I’d like to have it out and not leave it standing between us like a great, invisible wall.”
Brook raked a hand over the stubble on his cheek in frustration. “And I wish you would say something that made sense. Talk about what?”
She looked up at him, her eyes the color of hard amber. “The night you proposed to me.”
Pain lanced through him, tinged with embarrassment. It shocked him that he could still suffer pain over the events of that night. He thought he was long past caring.
But for an instant, he felt like a youth of four and twenty again—naive and hopeful and so incredibly foolish.
“What is there to say? I proposed. You said no.” He lifted a glass from the table and filled it with wine.
As he sipped, Lila stroked her hair again, and he followed the progress of her pale fingers on the dark tresses. “I don’t remember it quite that way. As I recall, you asked me to run away with you. Did you think I’d agree to that?”
The old anger rose in him again. He squeezed the wineglass, then threw it against the wall, watching as the glass exploded and red wine ran down the wood panels in rivulets.
He took a deep breath and scrubbed his fingers over his eyes. “I apologize.”
“No, I apologize.” She rose, seeming uncertain what to do with her hands. He could see her move toward him then hesitate and clasp her hands in front of her. She obviously had no idea the fire made her chemise all but transparent.
Brook looked away. This was no time to let his lust get the better of him, especially when the lust was mixed with anger.
“Why do you apologize? You didn’t throw anything.”
“I apologize for my behavior in the past. I led you on,” Lila said. “I knew you fancied me, and I let you believe I felt the same.”
He’d known this. He’d realized it the night she’d finally rejected him, but hearing her say it from her lips drained his remaining anger. Perhaps that was what he’d wanted, what he’d needed all this time—an apology.
“Silence.” She folded her hands under her breasts. “You don’t forgive me.”
He did not. “You think because you say oops I forgive and forget? Now I’m supposed to trust you? I should believe you have really changed?”
“You could give me a chance.”
Brook ignored the way she glanced up at him from under her lashes, the look of vulnerability in her eyes. Better she be vulnerable than him.
“I was in love with you,” he hissed, his voice so forceful she took a step back, although he hadn’t moved closer to her. “I might have been young and foo
lish, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t fall in love.”
She closed her eyes, regret making her features look pinched.
“Do you know the first time I fell in love with you?” he said.
She shook her head, though he hadn’t needed nor wanted a response from her.
“The first ball of that Season. I hadn’t wanted to go to any of the events. I would much rather have caroused with my friends from school or explored one of the rookeries. Even then I was intrigued by crime and punishment. I’d often spend hours at Old Bailey, watching the trials. Not because I received some perverse pleasure from others’ misfortunes, but because I wanted to know how the investigators or the Runners had caught the thieves and murderers.”
“Even then you knew who you were,” she said, and he could see the admiration in the way she smiled at him. “You were not a man who wanted to attend balls. Why did you go?”
“My mother can be quite persuasive. She dragged both Dane and me to as many events as she could. After I saw you, I didn’t need to be dragged.”
Lila shook her head. “Brook, don’t.”
He moved closer to her, until he could smell the faint scent of flower-perfumed soap on her skin. “Why? Does it pain you when a man says he thought you were beautiful? I remember the dress you wore. How pathetic is that? It was gold silk with small red flowers and you had a scarlet ribbon wound through your hair. You danced every single dance. I wanted to ask you, but we hadn’t been introduced. I rectified that the next night at the theater. Do you remember?”
She shook her head.
“It took quite a bit of maneuvering on my part to convince my mother to stop by the Duke of Lennox’s box at the King’s Theater. It took even longer for us to make it inside as it was stuffed with your suitors.”
“Brook. Please—”
“I waited until it was my turn, and the smile you gave me made me float on air for a week. I’m sure it was the smile you gave every man, but I managed to convince myself it had been only for me. I convinced myself I was special to you.”
She covered her face with her hands. “Why are you doing this?”
“You said you wanted to have it out. Isn’t this what you wanted to hear? How I acted like a lovesick puppy, mooning over you? How I attended every single ball, hoping to secure a dance with you? How I thought of you day and night and planned our wedding and our marriage and even named our children?”
“No.” Her voice sounded weak and futile.
“Then one night, it was perhaps the third time I’d danced with you, you called me Mr. Derring, and you made some comment I’m sure meant nothing to you.”
“Don’t tell me what it was.” She turned, her back to him.
He took her by the shoulders and turned her around. “You wanted this. At least do me the courtesy of listening.”
“While you humiliate yourself again? No!”
“What’s the matter? You don’t want to hear of my undying love and devotion?”
“I said I was sorry. Why are you torturing me?”
“Torturing you? Is that what I am doing? How cruel of me, not to consider your fragile feelings.”
She looked away from him, and he shook her until her hair spilled over her shoulders.
“You said, ‘Mr. Derring, tell me you shall run away with me. The Season has barely begun and already I’m so weary of the parade of balls and soirees and fetes.’”
She flinched as though hearing her words caused her pain. He knew how they sounded, how they had almost certainly sounded then—false and silly and spoiled. Only he’d been too much the clodpole to hear them that way. He’d thought she meant it.
“Do you remember the night when I first kissed you?” he asked.
“Of course.”
“Finally something you do remember.”
“I remember it was the Vanbrughs’ ball, and you led me out into the garden.”
“You did not protest.”
She shook her head. “I liked the danger. I liked the possibility you might kiss me.” She clasped his hands in hers. She was cold, despite having been in front of the fire; her hands were ice. “I might not have been in love with you, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t think you were handsome.”
He laughed, a reaction she hadn’t been expecting. Her eyes widened, and she tried to release his hands. He wouldn’t let go.
“Is that what you’ve told yourself all these years?”
She shook her hands, still trying to free them. “No. Truth be told, I rarely ever gave you a second thought.”
“Now that I believe,” he said. “Finally, honesty from you. When I hear you admit to that, I can almost believe you’ve changed. But you did not kiss me that night because you found me handsome. You kissed me because you wanted to make Viscount Ware jealous. You knew he’d followed us out and wanted him to see me kiss you.”
Her cheeks colored.
“Now let’s see how honest you are.”
“Fine. That’s true. I’d forgotten Viscount Ware.”
Brook cupped her chin. “Did he ever kiss you?”
Her eyes were round and large as she nodded.
“Better than me? Be honest.”
Her brow furrowed. “Then or now?”
He released her chin with a laugh. “That answers the question.”
“Brook, no one has ever kissed me the way you do now.”
If she’d thought that admission would melt his heart, she was mistaken. “That’s unfortunate for you. I’ve kissed many women and almost every one of them knows more of the art than you.”
Pain flashed in her eyes, and he was instantly sorry. Hurting her would not curb his pain. He knew that, but he couldn’t take the words back now.
“Then I had kissed precious few women and none like you. I don’t know how I mustered the nerve even to dare to touch you. I was shaking like a new soldier who has had his first taste of battle. I wanted, so desperately, to kiss you perfectly, to show you how I felt without words.”
“Please.” She was begging him now.
“I was out of breath after the kiss, my head spinning as though I’d been waltzing, and I could hardly stop the words before they tumbled out. Do you remember what I said?”
She nodded, swiping at a tear with the back of her hand.
“I said, ‘My dearest Lady Lila, I love you. More than my own life. If you will consent to become my wife, you will make me the happiest man in the world.’”
“It was a lovely proposal,” she said. “Any woman would be lucky to have a man say such words to her. I mean that, Brook.”
“You mean it now, but at the time the words meant nothing to you.”
“You have to understand—”
“Understand? That you’d received a dozen such proposals? That it was all a game to you? That you were spoiled and selfish and vain? I understand, Lila. I could even forgive you all of that, but I can’t forgive you for your answer.”
“My answer? I never said yes! I never gave you leave to go to my father.”
“Then what did you say?”
She pressed her lips together. “I don’t remember.”
“You said, ‘Of course.’”
She shook her head. “No.”
“Yes.”
She let out a breath. “Then I said it to stop the proposal, not to agree to it. I probably wanted to go back inside and give Viscount Ware a chance to show his jealousy.”
He inclined his head.
“Do you want me to feel ashamed of my behavior now? Fine. I am ashamed. Does that change anything? No. I cannot go back, Brook. If I could, I would.”
“And what would you say?”
She paused for just a moment too long.
“Honesty. What would you say, Lila?”
“I would say yes!” She looked up at him, her eyes fierce and burning. “I know you don’t believe me.”
“I think the least you might have done is to tell me not to go to your father. I might have avoided that humilia
tion.”
“And you blame me because you are not an earl? Even if I had said yes, my father would have said no. You are not titled. You had very little chance of ever inheriting a title.”
“And now that my brother has a son, I have even less chance.”
“I don’t care about that. I don’t want a title.”
“Oh, really? Didn’t you tell me you were not Lady Derring just a few days ago?”
She didn’t answer. What answer would she have made at any rate?
“I wasn’t good enough for you then, and I’m not good enough for you now. I might have let it go after your father’s refusal”—he went on before she could defend herself with what he knew would be weak excuses—“except you had asked me to run away with you. I supposed you knew all along your father would never consent to the marriage of his daughter to a lowly second son and that was why you had asked me to take you away.”
She swiped another tear away. “I’m sorry. How many times must I say it?”
“You needn’t ever say it. But you wanted to know why I won’t forgive you. There aren’t enough apologies in the world for what you did.”
“I made a mistake.”
He took her by the shoulders. “You laughed at me when I confessed my feelings. You crushed me.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
“Oh, well, then that makes it all quite all right.”
“No, what I mean is I didn’t understand how you felt then. I’d never been in love. I didn’t understand what it was, how it made you vulnerable.”
“And you understand now?”
“Yes.”
Her gaze met his, and his chest tightened unaccountably. The way she looked at him made him want to take her in his arms and kiss her until she cried out his name, even though at the moment he loathed her more than ever. He pulled on the loathing and tamped down the lust. Brook raised one eyebrow indifferently.
“And who was it you finally fell in love with? Or were there many?”
She laughed bitterly. “Only one man.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “I am all agog with curiosity. Who is the unfortunate man?”
She looked down, then raised her eyes until he saw the tears shimmer on her lashes. “You.”
