by Mary Brendan
She approached him, emboldened by a wrath that tightened her fists into quivering, knife-edged balls. She forced them close to her sides lest they lashed out at him, beat at his arrogant, heathen head. She half-circled him at a distance, looking his powerful physique up and down. ‘Firstly,’ she enunciated carefully, frowning in concentration, ‘I must congratulate you on your excellent memory. Yes, I was compromised ten years ago; yes, I have been shunned by people who class themselves as better than me. People like you who shield their disgusting habits behind sham morals and manners. Secondly, had I any wish to sneak back into the beau monde, I would choose nobler coat tails than yours to cling to. Perhaps in your conceit you believe I should be grateful…flattered, even, at having been propositioned by an upstart Viscount; a thug who has managed to brawl his way into favour. I’m afraid I must now disappoint you. I’ve had far better offers than yours. Over ten years, two dukes and two earls have pursued me, along with numerous less eminent but often wealthier gentlemen. A coal merchant once offered me the freehold of a house on Park Lane, together with all the servants, clothes and carriages I could use. Oh, and an allowance of two thousand a year.’
She stared, vivid-eyed, into middle distance. ‘The Earl of Cadmore is less generous but more persistent. Just a few weeks ago he wrote again to let me know how greatly I would benefit from allowing his ardent attention.’ She spun about to gaze at her tormentor as though he had crawled from the wainscotting. ‘And you…a paltry Viscount…a paltry, parsimonious Viscount at that, think to stable me amongst your mongrel harlots? Are you really so stupid, so vain, that you imagine a Marquess’s daughter, even a sullied Marquess’s daughter, would ever contemplate a union with a Cornish brigand? If my silly grandmother hadn’t made the circumstances so tiresome, I swear I might die laughing at your pathetic fantasies…’
She got no further. Two hard, brown hands gripped the tops of her slender, ivory arms, abbreviating her jeering tirade. The speed and ease at which he lifted her made her sure he would jerk her up against him so their faces were level. But he dropped her just before him, abruptly, as though she had become scalding. Her silky, silver head grazed his dark chin, then recoiled to rest inches away.
‘Quiet! Or I might now share those pathetic fantasies…just for the hell of it. I promise you won’t laugh,’ he added with a hint of apology that chilled her.
Elizabeth back-paced, rubbing at her arms as though removing taint. ‘Oh, I believe that. I was being ironic, of course. Anyone less diverting than you I cannot imagine,’ she sneered, contempt sliding from beneath dusky lashes.
‘Well, let me imagine for you,’ he whipped back mellifluously. ‘How diverting did you find Lieutenant Havering? Was it his pathetic fantasy or yours that you play mongrel harlot for some gentlemen of the road?’
Elizabeth stumbled to a halt. Her pale complexion lost what little colour stained her cheeks. She ran a dry tongue over arid lips. So there it was. He had to let her know that he recalled all her disgrace. Every sordid part. And at that moment it seemed as though the raucous guffaws that had echoed in her ears as she and her stiff-backed papa quit Caledon Square in their elegant carriage were rolling within this room. The walls seemed to undulate with the vicious male amusement that accompanied the start of their journey back to Hertfordshire and thence into exile. Ross Trelawney might not have bothered witnessing her banishment with those crowing dandies, but he was gloating now, determined she understand how equally he despised her. A shaking hand went behind to grip at the sofa-back, as her legs weakened. Slowly her chin came up. ‘I have considered it. No, I still cannot imagine anyone less entertaining than you,’ she whispered.
Threat of retribution savaged the mockery in his eyes making her sure he was about to come after her. It shocked her out of petrification and into a tottering retreat. ‘I must again impose on your patience, sir,’ she croaked distractingly. ‘Please wait here. It is in your interest to stay for I hope to return in a moment with something that ensures neither of us need ever again endure the other’s company.’ Without awaiting his agreement, Elizabeth swished about and sped from the room.
Ross watched her go. He stared at the door for a moment before closing his eyes. He felt shattered. He’d limped away from battlefields with more energy and better spirits. A grunt of laughter scratched at his throat as he looked about the sedate, cosy room with its tasteful mix of blue and gold furnishings. But this was a war zone and no mistake. And he had the feeling, despite holding the high ground and an arsenal of weapons, he’d just lost and made an implacable enemy. And for some reason that wounded him to the core.
And then it came to him, sidled into his mind and wouldn’t leave. She hadn’t withdrawn to find a gun to level at his head, or even to collaborate with Edwina on better strategies. She wasn’t involved in Edwina’s scheme to get her wed at all. She was innocent of that and he was guilty of barbarism. She’d retreated to fetch something valuable to offer as loot rather than risk his revenge. He smiled ruefully, hoping she wasn’t about to struggle back with a sackful of family silver. Idiotically, he didn’t even want her to return with a banker’s draft…not yet. So much for tactical, wounding words and manoeuvring to keep distance between them. He hadn’t resisted the lure of her small, sensual body. He hadn’t managed to keep his hands to himself. Now his palms seemed to tingle with the loss of satiny skin beneath them. The fragrance of flowers that had wafted up from her tangled pearly tresses teased his nostrils anew, the infinitesimal stroke of silky hair against his jaw made him irritably toss his head to prevent another phantom caress. The memory of her was narcotic. He wanted more. Now. He wanted her back so he could look at her again…touch her again.
He’d called her a bitch and, innocent or not of plotting with Edwina, his opinion hadn’t much altered. Yet Lady Elizabeth Rowe aroused something in him Cecily never touched: few women stirred his mind as well as his body. She fascinated him. He wanted to know everything about her. Everything that had occurred, good and bad, since the first time their eyes met at Vauxhall Gardens. He placed a hot palm against cold glass, then curled it into a fist as his thoughts weaved back through the years to a sultry summer and a blonde debutante.
He’d wanted her then too. But she was too young, too popular…and so was he. He’d known if he approached her, joined that band of fools awaiting a kind glance, permission to call…to dance…to flirt, it might have finished him. For as she had just rightly proclaimed, daughters of marquesses, especially those of rare beauty, didn’t forge unions with sons of Cornish freetraders. They married aristocrats; and she hadn’t exaggerated the number of noblemen who had pursued her. She had constantly been surrounded by the bluest young bloods. So that summer he’d steered himself clear of her innocently provocative glances, too youthfully vain himself to face enduring the rebuff that was sure to come.
At that time he had wealth but no status…apart from a reputation as a marauder. But there were always women, some classed as ladies, who wanted him because of his rough lineage rather than despite it. Women who were excited by his piratical looks and cavalier manners, who liked him to relate tales of sea skirmishes and plundered cargoes while they traced the marks on his body with sharp fingernails and shivered naked in his arms. The only time they were disappointed was on realising he was happy to stimulate any number of them and no one in particular. It was pleasurable and easy that way and, at twenty-three, he saw no reason for strife or self-denial.
Yet, along with the rest of society, he’d been wrong in guessing Lady Elizabeth Rowe to be ambitious in the marriage stakes and stalking a title and wealth. Her lover had been the youngest son of a baronet and impecunious to boot.
Their reckless elopement had floundered into disaster. En route to Gretna Green, the callow youth was alleged to have panicked and fled, abandoning Elizabeth to a couple of highwaymen who’d stopped his carriage. Her father, so the tale went, eventually tracked her to a tavern in Cambridgeshire where she’d been found partially clothed and alone. A n
atural conclusion had been drawn to her fate once given over to the felons’ tender mercies. And apparently she’d offered no defence to that. Neither had her father.
The scandal had rocked society. Ross first learned of the affair at White’s, while playing Faro with Guy Markham and his brother Luke. The redolence of cigar smoke and stewing beef mingling, hanging thick in the air, filled his nostrils. He recalled losing heavily as the ribald jesting crescendoed around him. Inwardly he had felt the angry sorrow of desecration. Outwardly he had chipped in some cynical comment about the sanctity of virgins.
From that moment, for about a month, the gentlemen’s clubs had resounded with ever more salacious conjecture on the circumstances of her abasement and how best to tempt the lady back to town for an encore after such a promising debut. And many a titled rake had put his money where his mouth was and offered her his protection. He assumed, from what she’d said, none had tempted her sufficiently.
But one had persevered. He could believe that: Linus Savage, Earl of Cadmore, was known as a man to hold grudges. He was also once known as the man believed to be leading the field in Lady Elizabeth Rowe’s affections. A decade ago their betrothal had been expected. When it was discovered she had played a rich peer of the realm for a fool, using him to camouflage an affair with an indigent officer in the army, the Earl became a risible figure, too. Ross could imagine Cadmore to be unremitting in his need for vengeance, even though years had passed and he’d since wed an heiress.
As Lady Elizabeth was guessed to be in the marriage mart to lure a fortune to reline her papa’s pockets, Cadmore had seemed a natural choice. When it foundered into farce, in every sense the Marquess was sure to have been disappointed. Thus, for a while, wild predictions on his jezebel daughter’s fate were bandied about. He would incarcerate her in the nearest convent; he would despatch her to some remote relative; he would negotiate a discreet deal with a wealthy gentleman prepared to take her as concubine or, paradoxically, borrow the means to buy her a modest husband and respectability. But the Marquess did nothing of the sort. The last Ross heard, as gossip faded for want of any fuel to fire the rumours, was that the Marquess was still devoted to his lovely daughter and they were living a reclusive life at Thorneycroft.
A woman of gentle birth was to be congratulated for retaining her pride after such degradation. Ravished and ostracised, maybe, but she had spirit. She despised him and was quick to let him know it. And there had been no reason for him to know it, or to have met her again at all and now be brooding over ten-year-old tragedies and regrets like a sentimental fool. His teeth met. ‘Damn you, Edwina,’ he muttered irritably into the mellow afternoon.
Her fingers were shaking so much it took several attempts before the key slotted into the lock. Jerking open the secret drawer in her grandmother’s escritoire, Elizabeth withdrew the burgundy velvet roll. Her first instinct was to open it out, feast her eyes one last, private time on the treasure within. She resisted, simply snatching it up, and within a moment was rushing headlong down the stairs. The thought that the beastly bastard might leave without a settlement being reached today; that she might toss and turn the night through, uncertain if the vile man was firmly banished to her past, made her burst through the double doors in a most unladylike fashion.
Although Elizabeth ignored him, and slowed to a graceful walk, she did utter with cool civility, ‘Thank you for waiting.’ It was honest gratitude and helped to steady the quivering of her fingers as they hovered, then reverentially laid bare her peace offering on the sofa table.
The diamond-and-amethyst collar glittered as sunlight dappled over it. As always when she looked upon it, its magnificence caught the breath at the back of her throat; as did memories it evoked of a certain person. She took a few steps back and tossed up her head, meeting green-gold watching eyes.
A nervous gesture indicated the heirloom. ‘It was my mother’s,’ she brusquely explained. ‘Now it is mine. It was Edwina’s gift to my mother on her twenty-first birthday. Soon after that she married my papa, the Marquess of Thorneycroft.’ She hesitated in reciting the gem’s provenance as she became aware of him approaching. She moved away to the other side of the table, wordlessly inviting him to fully appreciate its opulence.
‘You might be thinking it is not worth ten thousand pounds. I expect you are.’ Elizabeth hastily removed his need to scorn her sacrifice. ‘And…and that is quite true. This piece was last valued at two thousand guineas.’ She glanced at him, at intervals, searching for signs of anger or impatience.
He raised his eyes from the superbly matched violet and white stones and gazed into something similar. Her eyes were equally cold, equally beautiful. ‘Your mother looked like you…’ he stated with a half-smile.
Elizabeth blinked, swallowed, half-turned away from him. ‘How could you possibly know that?’ she demanded, angrily, absently dragging fingers through her tangles. ‘This is her necklace, not her portrait.’
‘It was bought by someone who loved her…to reflect her beauty. You’ve the same eyes. I’m guessing you look like her in other ways, too.’
Elizabeth glared accusingly at the collar as though it had betrayed her. It lay glistening between them, shieldlike, protecting a flimsy treaty. Ignoring his astute personal observation as best she could, she recommenced stiltedly, ‘My papa was pleased with how well this suited my mother and wanted to add to it. He had a matching suite made by the same craftsman and presented it as my mother’s wedding gift. It includes a bracelet, two styles of eardrops, a brooch and a small hair ornament. I believe the parure was last valued at approaching eight thousand pounds. It must be worth more now. A decade has since passed. All the pieces, save this one, are kept in a bank vault. But they are all mine. I own it in entirety so you need not fret they are the property of the Thorneycroft estate and will be reclaimed. My mama left them to me. Edwina likes to keep this one here. As she purchased it originally, I saw no reason to deny her the pleasure of looking at it from time to time.’ She met his watching gaze, trying to glean from his expression whether he intended rejecting her proposal.
‘Are you expecting me to feel too ashamed to take it?’
Elizabeth sensed her face flame but said icily, ‘Not at all, my lord. In our brief acquaintance there’s been nothing that would let me credit you with a conscience. Your reputation as a heartless villain is quite safe with me.’
His smile strengthened, the crinkles at the corners of his eyes and mouth deepened. She realised he was, for the first time, genuinely amused. ‘That sounds like a challenge to prove equal to such trust, my lady.’
‘I should like a receipt…’ Elizabeth burst out.
That made him laugh. ‘Of course. And how shall I lay my pillaging hands on the other pieces?’
Elizabeth moved to the small writing desk by the window and selected quill and parchment. She dipped, began to write, tutted as her unsteady fingers caused a blot of ink to mar the paper. She hesitated, dithering over whether to crumple it and restart. She finished quickly, in a few sentences, sealed, then immediately proffered the note. ‘That gives you the right to remove and dispose of the set as you will. No doubt Sir Joshua will first contact me for verification. It is an unusual occurrence….’
Ross took the letter she was holding by its very edge and slipped it in a pocket. He rolled the velvet into a cylinder again, obliterating her inheritance with deft casualness. The rich, red cloth looked lost in his large dark hand.
‘Receipt…’ Elizabeth whispered, realising that he could walk away now with all her financial security…her most precious possession…and no one would ever be the wiser. She held out the quill towards him. ‘Please…’ she forced through a clog in her throat, while her mind chanted, I’m sorry, mama…I’m so sorry…so sorry…
He wrote fast, fluently, then placed the pen back in its rest. Her rigid fingers stabbed the paper, drew it towards her as though frightened he might take it back. She looked blankly at him. ‘Thank you,’ she murmured in the tone
of voice that let him know she’d sooner curse him as a devil.
A tiny movement of his head acknowledged her faux gratitude. Unable to take a polite leave of him, any sort of leave of him, she stood, backed off two steps, then turned immediately for the door.
‘You’ll want it returned,’ was addressed to her stiff back. ‘Persuade Edwina to be sensible and repay me within a week and I’ll let you have it. After that time, I can’t promise anything.’
Elizabeth swallowed. She should face him, thank him again, but the two simple words burned like acid in her throat. She felt her eyes fill with needling tears. Without another word or glance, but with dignity in every endless step that eventually brought her to the door, she left him.
‘I thought you were long gone, Stratton!’
Ross tore his eyes from leaping flames and turned. He removed from the mantel the glass of whisky he’d helped himself to from the decanter on the sideboard. Sipping, he looked at Edwina over the rim.
‘Thought you had to be in Kent before sundown.’ Edwina consulted the clock on the wall. ‘Doubt you’ll make it now…’ At his continuing silence she mentioned drily, with a flick of a fat finger at the tumbler now held low by a muscular thigh, ‘I see you found the decanter.’ She smiled. ‘Or perhaps m’granddaughter remembered her manners and served you refreshment. She can be a charming hostess. Did she look after you?’
Ross’s smile was intensely sardonic. ‘I think you know damn well she didn’t.’ He assessed her from under low lids until she shifted uneasily. ‘You know when I arrived here earlier, Edwina, I was worried you were losing your mind and didn’t know what you were about.’
Edwina adopted a shocked look. ‘No! What made you think that?’ she asked, humour quivering her voice.
‘Oh…just some odd notion that you might be foolish enough to intend defrauding me.’
