“Ah, but he knows who I am,” she said with a perverse delight. His face fell, revealing hesitancy in his hard features. “He knows that my letters were never delivered. And do you know, Jack...” She curled her lips up into a hard smile. “Someday he will learn just what you are. A cold, heartless, disloyal bastard.”
Graham had not doubted her since they’d discovered the evil enacted against them, and should she tell him about Jack’s advances, he’d not doubt those, either. Such an understanding came from knowing her since she was a girl of fifteen and he a boy of seventeen, counting stars in the night sky when they should be abed.
He gave his head a faltering shake. “He won’t believe the daughter of a whore.”
She arched an eyebrow. “Ah, but would I be here even now serving as a companion for his ward if he didn’t, at the very least, trust me?” Love had been ruined by time, but it was still there and, now, a fragile, but real, trust. Then she froze, as his words settled around her mind. “What do you know of my mother?” Her voice emerged breathless as her mind raced. Had Graham confided that in this man before her? As soon as the thought slid in, she thrust it aside.
Jack’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “It does not take much to deduce she was a whore,” he said sharply, faltering with that deliverance.
She staggered back. Why was she shocked? Then, I didn’t truly know the ugliness in Jack’s soul until the day he visited when Graham was gone. How could Graham, then, see anything but good in a man he’d known since they were children of seven? “I am telling him, Jack,” she said softly, setting aside her earlier jeering. “I am telling him what you did.”
“By God, you bitch,” he hissed, “The moment you reentered his life, I knew you would set out to destroy the life and reputation I’ve built. One of us will fall, Rowena, and I’ll be damned if it’s me.”
She gave her head a pitying shake. “Your life and reputation are built on a lie of false goodness and friendship.” And with Jack Turner choking in her wake, she marched on, head held high.
“Do you truly believe Miss Hickenbottom’s reputation is safe as long as you are her companion?” he called after her.
An eerie chill scraped her spine. Not pausing to look back, she continued on, in search of her charge. As soon as she rounded the corner, she layered her back to the wall, borrowing support, as she attempted to right her world.
“Mrs. Bryant.”
Rowena shrieked and spun around. “Ainsley,” she managed faintly. Her mind raced, and she searched the girl for a hint that she’d overheard the volatile exchange between herself and Jack.
Ainsley hovered, a tense smile on her face. “Are you nervous as well, Mrs. Bryant?”
The frantic beat of her heart slowed. Nervous?
“I was hiding,” the girl whispered.
Rowena’s heart pulled, and thoughts of Graham receded. “You’re going to do splendidly,” she assured her charge, taking her hands and giving a faint squeeze.
“It will not be fine. I lied to His Grace,” Ainsley whispered. Guilty splotches of red suffused the young lady’s cheeks.
Volatile exchange with Jack forgotten, Rowena picked her way through her words. “What do you mean?”
“I told you both I played the pianoforte.” Ainsley yanked her hands free. “I did not want you or Hampstead to believe I had no skills,” the girl said, her voice, desperate. “And now, he’s assembled a room full of Society’s leading members to hear me and...” And she could not play a note. The muscles of her throat moved.
Oh, dear. I allowed this. Rowena stole a look toward the recital hall. This is what Society makes of women—even bold and proud ones like Ainsley. She knew all too well the sense of being on the outside, of wanting approval. She reclaimed Ainsley’s hands. “Look at me.” With a reluctance she’d never witnessed from the girl, Ainsley lifted her eyes. “Playing pianoforte poorly or as a virtuoso does not make you who you are. Your strength and courage and intellect do.” Ainsley’s eyes widened. “And do not ever let anyone diminish your sense of self-worth.” As I have done.
“But what shall we do?”
Her mind raced. “Run abovestairs. I will find His Grace and speak to him.” And then they would proceed from there.
“Thank you, Mrs. Bryant,” the girl whispered, bussing her on the cheek. With that, she darted off.
Rowena hurried to the recital hall. How to explain to a room full of guests about to meet the Duke of Hampstead’s ward there would be no performance. There would of course be whispers. There always were. Regardless of the type or depth of scandal. As she stepped inside the room, she was met with loud whispers and horrified stares. A frisson of unease rolled through her.
It is all my imagining.
“...Whore...”
“...Mother was a...”
Nausea roiled in her belly as the loud whispers reached her ears. They spoke of someone else. What notice would these people dare pay her? Still, she looked about the recital hall for Graham, foolishly searching him out, needing the comforting reassurance of his presence. Instead, her gaze landed on a familiar woman seated amongst the other guests. The same one who’d been scrutinizing her at Lord Wilkshire’s. Rowena froze as recognition slammed into her at last.
A dragon.
Mrs. Munroe, an instructor sacked by Mrs. Belden for filling the students’ heads with scandalous works. And that fellow dragon now looked back at her with a knowing... and a pitying look. Rowena clutched at her throat. What was happening? Why was everyone staring at her?
Graham stopped before her. “Come,” he said sharply. His face, a cool ducal mask of arrogance and strength, restored some of her strength. He held out his arm to her and she immediately put her fingertips on his sleeve.
“I don’t...” And then she knew.
“...Courtesan’s daughter serving as a companion...”
Oh, God.
They knew. How could they? Then, he stepped into her line of vision. Jack Turner lifted his head in a mocking greeting. He’d made good on his pledge. Her knees went weak, and she dimly registered Graham shooting an arm about her waist and the explosion of shocked gasps at that boldness.
“I can walk,” she said, her tongue thick. But he retained his hold, guiding her from the room.
“Rowena,” Graham said quietly.
“Please, don’t,” she begged.
“We need to speak,” he said as they reached his office. She briefly eyed the opposite end of the hall, and then followed him inside.
Not another word was spoken until he’d closed the door behind them.
She lingered at the door, contemplating escape. Cool as only a duke could be, he crossed over to his sideboard and poured a brandy. He came over and handed her the drink. “I don’t drink spirits,” she said stiffly as he pushed the glass into her hand.
“Some days you need to. This is one of them.”
Rowena hesitated, and then raised the snifter to her lips. She took a swallow and promptly choked as the liquor flooded her throat.
“Small sips,” he instructed. “It becomes easier with each one.”
She took another small, experimental one and grimaced. It was rotten stuff, and yet, with each small drink, a soothing warmth filled her. Mayhap Graham had been right after all.
“They know,” he said quietly, an apology there for a crime that was not his. Not this one.
And mayhap the liquor was grander stuff than she credited for the heady effects of the spirits dulled the potent shock his words should bring. She pressed her eyes closed. “How?” Jack’s venom-filled face crept behind her vision. It was him... and yet, how had he come to know? Her mind attempted to put to rights something that could never be clearly sorted through. Had it been Graham’s father. A panicky half-laugh, half-sob spilled from her lips. Then, did it really matter who had revealed her secret?
Taking the glass from her grip, Graham set it down with a loud thunk. “It does not matter what they believe,” he insisted, claiming her hands. He gave
them a firm squeeze, in a reassuring touch that forced her eyes open.
Oh, Graham. As a duke he could not see. A companion must be above reproach, for one’s reputation was linked to the child in one’s care. For Rowena, that child was no mere stranger... it was Ainsley. Ainsley whose life had already been difficult, and would continue to be so, without compounding Rowena’s past to her existence.
“Know,” she whispered. “It is what they know, as fact.” A person’s birthright, whether Graham wished it another way, determined who they were before Society, and even with his rank, a step below royalty, he could not force their acceptance. Wary, she moved out of his reach and folded her arms close. Society’s hatred mattered little to her when presented with the girl who’d been placed in her care. “I have to leave,” she realized aloud.
A violent curse exploded from his lips, halting her distracted movements. “That is rot. You do not have to go anywhere.”
Poor Graham. She stopped and wheeled slowly to face him. A sad smile played on her lips. “You truly believe that.” It was a statement, and nonetheless, he nodded.
“What of Ainsley?” she gently pressed. For though she despised agreeing with Jack about anything, he’d been correct in this.
“Marry me. Be my duchess, and we will weather this together.” Her palms moistened. His duchess. How very easy he made it sound. Only, as a duke’s noble son, Graham could never know what it was to be an outcast amongst Society. To know the pain that came from derisive sneers and from being the recipient of heartless words. She, however, knew. It had been a lesson learned as a small girl in London, who’d had the word ‘whore’ pounded into her vernacular by the unkind nursemaid assigned her.
“Marry me,” he repeated, with a quiet resolve to that request.
Again, he sought her hand, and once upon a lifetime ago, there had been nothing she’d wanted more in life than to be his wife. But that had been before. When they were young. When he’d not been a duke, and she’d not have to spend the remainder of her days filling that esteemed, unwanted role. A life where she’d forever be reminded by cold, unfeeling people around her about her origins, and that she didn’t belong because of them. She pressed her fingertips against her temple and rubbed. She’d spent her life making decisions with the purpose of avoiding scandal. She’d not bind either of them together for all eternity because Society had discovered her secrets.
She loved him, but she could never marry him. To live here, amongst the ton, would crush her spirit and reduce her to the scared girl she’d once been. I cannot go back to that. But at least, she could, before she left, give him the truth. “You do not wonder how my secret was revealed?”
Rowena spoke with a finality that sent his heart racing into the same panic it had known just before the calls were raised for battle. It did not escape his notice that she had again failed to answer his plea. Now, she’d pose a question.
I am going to lose her. Panic spiraled through him, and he searched for the words to keep her at his side. Instead, he fixed on her question. He shook his head befuddled. In the mayhem of the moment, he’d thought of nothing but getting her away from societal scorn. He’d not given thought to who had been in possession of her secret and revealed it before his guests. He mentally ran through the list of visitors who even now sat in his recital room.
Rowena wandered over to his desk and trailed her fingertips along the edge of the surface, studying those digits as though she could divine the meaning of existence from them. He stood stock still, taking in her every movement. “It was Jack who revealed my secret, Graham.”
He opened and closed his mouth several times. Trying to make sense of that and wholly unable to.
“It was Jack,” she repeated. Her soft-spoken announcement sucked all the life from the room and left him in this netherworld of doubt and shock. The three of them had been closer friends than the Les Trois Mousquetaires. As those useless to their family as second and third-born sons, he and Jack, boys from neighboring estates, had formed a fast friendship. The day they’d come upon Rowena on the hillside, she’d become one of them.
“Jack?” he echoed.
Rowena inhaled. “When you were gone, Jack paid a...” She grimaced. “A call to me. It was the same day your father ordered me gone.” Her eyes took on a dark, distant, haunted look that knifed at his insides. What memories did she live? Only ones of pain, and always because she’d made the foolish mistake of loving him. Loving him when he’d never been deserving of that gift.
A fist was being squeezed about his heart, breaking an organ that had only ever belonged to this woman as her words drew forth images that had once been real moments in her life. Ones that had seen her alone, unguarded, but Jack had been there. Why hadn’t Jack helped her? Unease skittered along his spine.
She stared at those white-knuckled digits, and fear turned his mouth dry. He didn’t want to know the rest, didn’t want to know where her words would lead him.
“My family was in the gardens and Jack came.” Rowena angled her body, presenting herself in profile, and she hugged her arms to her waist. “He asked to speak to me. Alone. Insisted I should marry him.” Graham jerked. Marry him? His heart thudded to a slow stop, and then resumed a quickened pace, knocking against his ribcage. Jack. The man he’d called friend had offered her marriage in his absence. “He told me you were dancing attendance on French beauties all over the Continent,” Rowena said softly.
“Never.” The denial ripped from deep inside where truth dwelled. “I never betrayed you.” He winced. “Not in those days.” After. After he’d returned, and risen from his bed broken-hearted, attempting to drive the memory of Rowena Endicott from his head. Oh, God. I’m going to be ill. He and Jack had vied for her affections, but when she had ultimately professed her love for Graham, the other man had ceased trying to woo her. He’d believed Jack had accepted her decision. Believed he’d set aside his stalwart intentions. Graham gripped the top of his head hard, attempting to squeeze out rationale thought. I asked him to look after Rowena in my absence.
Jack couldn’t have betrayed him... He...
Graham looked up. By the wariness in Rowena’s eyes, she expected his doubt. And he could not. She would not lie to him. Her eyes were windows to her soul, a soul that shared the same vicious agony at Jack’s treachery.
She wetted her lips. “He held me while I cried.” It should have been me who held her. Nay, she should have never been reduced to that misery because I should have been there protecting her from my father’s evil. Shame and regret twisted inside. “And then asked that I marry him. When I said no...” Her gaze took on a vacant quality.
Graham glanced frantically about, wanting to escape the darkness hovering on those unspoken words. “What did he do?” The question ripped from his throat, and he drew in a breath, forcing himself to ask the question that needed to be asked. “Did he put his hands on you?” Dead. He would kill Jack with his bare hands, then reassemble him and kill him all over again.
Her eyes formed wide circles. She expects I’ll doubt her. God, how he hated that he’d given her no reason to trust his word or his worth. “He kissed me,” she said, her voice devoid of emotion. “Touched me...” She brushed her fingertips over her breast, creating an image of Jack forcing his kiss on her.
An animalistic growl better suited for an untamed beast thundered around the room and Rowena drew in a breath. “I wrested myself free, and that was the last I saw of him... until I returned to Wallingford Castle. You were home, and he greeted me in the foyer as though he owned it,” she spat. “And then left me alone with your father.”
I trusted him. I entrusted him with caring for her in my absence. His gut roiled. He’d called Jack friend, and all this time, he’d kept secret after secret. Withholding the single most important detail that would have saved Graham from madness. Rowena had come to him. He closed his eyes and concentrated on his breathing to keep from throwing up. “I made him my man-of-affairs,” he said hoarsely. Invited him into his
home even now.
Rowena lifted her slender but strong shoulders in a shrug. “You trusted him.” He flinched. She shot her eyebrows to her hairline. “I did not mean—”
He waved off any apology she would make. He was wholly undeserving of it. She’d been the only one wronged. If he spent the remainder of his life trying to right the past, it still would not be enough.
Energy thrummed through his veins, rolling together regret, hatred, horror, and love—love for this woman who’d been all he’d ever wanted in a partner. With a violent curse, Graham stalked over to the sideboard. He spread his hands on the smooth surface and leaned over it, taking in her words that lingered in the air and his own pain. “I would have never sent you away,” he said, unable to open his eyes. “I loved you. I never stopped loving you.” Though she, with every justifiable reason, had stopped loving him. Why should she accept his offer of marriage? He opened his eyes and forced himself to face her.
She stood stoic, her body erect, like a warrior princess. How strong she was. He and the men who’d fought years to defeat Boney hadn’t an ounce of her courage. “I did not tell you this to make you feel guilt, for there is nothing to feel guilty of.” And his father. “I told you this,” she said calmly, “so you know who he is. He is no friend, Graham. He is a man who would have you hide from the world.” And a man who’d betrayed him, countless times. “I cannot stay here.”
That unexpected pronouncement jolted him back, and he stared blankly at her. “You can.” It emerged as a plea.
“I cannot,” she repeated with quiet insistence.
Why should she wish to remain? He’d cut her from his life and trusted another... a man who’d been privy to the truth of her birth and bandied that story inside his own home to ruthless strangers. He had no right to her. He never had. “Where will you go?” he asked, his voice hoarse.
Schooling the Duke (The Heart of a Scandal, #1) Page 28
