She looked at him, baffled. “What about your parents?”
Henrietta didn’t know very much about the former viscount and viscountess. Sebastian had never mentioned the couple.
“They didn’t have a very good rapport,” he said. “Father wasn’t the best sort of husband. He was very aloof, strict even. Not an easy man to love.”
Her breath hitched. “What are you saying?”
“I know you’ve had a good upbringing, Henry: a mother and father who care for each other. I want you to have the same in our marriage. I want you to know that I will make you happy, if you give me the chance.”
Henrietta’s heart fluttered. She didn’t know what to say, what to think. He’d offered to make her happy, but did he care for her?
“Once a rogue, always a rogue,” she said. “You said that once.”
“People change, Henry…you did.” He moved toward the door. “I’ll be at the church.”
Quietly he left the room.
Henrietta’s wedding dress swished and swooshed as she paced the room in fretful contemplation. He was asking her to give him a second chance, to trust him. Could she? Dare she?
The hour of ten chimed somewhere in the house. It was time!
Henrietta rushed to the bed and grabbed the snowy, fur-trimmed cape, scarf, and matching gloves. Her belly in a whirl, she quickly quit the room and bustled through the passageway, over to the steps.
But the whisper of voices from the landing below had her rooted to the spot.
“She’s going to be late for her own wedding, Peter.”
“Don’t fuss, Penelope. We’ll get her to the church on time.”
“Oh, I still can’t believe it, Peter! A prostitute?”
“Well, Seb was desperate, Penelope,” her husband hissed. “You know how much trouble he’s been having with Henry”
“But to visit a woman of ill repute two days before his wedding? It’s most unsavory.”
A woozy Henrietta grabbed the banister for support before she rolled down the stairs.
The ache in her belly throbbed. She gasped for breath. Quickly she skirted across the hall before Peter and Penelope saw her, and sprinted down the servant stairwell.
Tears filled her eyes. Sickness roiled in her gut. Two days! She was gone two days and Sebastian grew so “desperate” for a woman he went to see a prostitute!
Henrietta pounded down the steps, surprising the cook in the kitchen. She brushed past Mrs. Quigly and dashed through the scullery, abuzz with preparation for the wedding luncheon. Once she was in the main part of the house, she passed the dinner hall and the sounds of clattering silverware—the table was being set for the guests—making her way to the back of the dwelling.
That fiend! He just couldn’t keep his hands off a doxy, could he? It was in his blood, the wicked inclination to rut about with anything in a skirt. And if she wasn’t around to ease his lust, he’d find some other whore to bed…and that’s all she was to him, wasn’t she? A whore? All that rot about making her happy. The man wanted only one thing from her: carnal pleasure.
Henrietta wiped the blasted tears from her eyes. Oh, she was such a fool! She had considered giving the villain a second chance. She knew she couldn’t trust him, that he was an unredeemable rogue.
A wretched sob in her throat, Henrietta ducked through the terrace doors, and took in a sharp breath to quell her sorrow.
She yanked on her gloves and sniffed. She deserved another broken heart. She always wavered over every decision. Even a sound one. She had marked Sebastian a rogue. And he was. A despicable rogue! So why had she mulled over the idea that he could reform?
It didn’t matter anymore. This time she was sure Ravenswood was a rotten scoundrel. A black devil. And she would not falter in her belief again. She might have to marry the bounder, but she did not have to let him near her heart again.
Henrietta had to stay away from the house. It was stifling, the merriment inside. The festive din of wedding preparations was such a sharp contrast to her crushed spirit. She could not go to the church just yet, either. She needed to be alone.
“Miss Ashby.”
Henrietta looked up, dazed. “Lord Emerson?”
Emerson had his hand tucked inside his breast pocket. “How delightful to see you.”
She sniffed. “What are you doing here, my lord? Why aren’t you at the church with the other guests?”
“Oh, I won’t be attending the wedding, Miss Ashby…and neither will you.”
He pulled out a pistol.
Sebastian stood beside the altar, waiting. It was just like Henrietta to be late for her own wedding.
The preacher flipped through the Bible, the pages snapping. The chapel, brimming with society’s most fashionable members, was quietly abuzz with idle chitchat.
Sebastian girded himself for a long wait.
He reflected upon his earlier talk with Henrietta. Would she accept his offer to make her happy? He hoped so. He didn’t want to spend the rest of his marital days in strife. And he wasn’t quite desperate enough to heed Madam Jacqueline’s advice, and prostrate his corpse at Henrietta’s feet to get her to forgive him.
But what if the chit rebuffed his offer?
It triggered a cramp in his chest, thinking about such a lonely existence. A ruthless irony, really. The girl had adored him for years; he could have snatched her at any time to make her his wife. But now that he was going to marry her, she didn’t want a fig to do with him.
Perhaps he was a villain, as Henrietta had said? Unredeemable, as his father had suggested? It would certainly explain all the trouble he’d been having, if he was damned to live a life apart from his wife…in darkness.
Sebastian had to acknowledge the possibility. Maybe he just wasn’t meant to be with Henrietta?
But then he remembered the fiery pulse of his heart whenever he was with the woman, and he had to wonder, if he wasn’t destined to be with the chit, then why did he feel so at peace with her?
Sebastian wasn’t going to give up on Henrietta just yet—or himself—he vowed. Madam Jacqueline had suggested one practical piece of advice: change. He was going to give it a try. He had frightened Henrietta with his boorish behavior at the Hellfire Club; now the chit didn’t trust him. But he was determined to prove to her he was not the same man anymore; he would reform. It was better than croaking, as the courtesan had suggested.
The chapel door burst opened. A breathless Peter stumbled inside. He righted himself quickly, smiled at the loquacious guests, and with brisk, confident strides, marched down the aisle.
Sebastian growled, “Where the devil is the bride, Peter?”
Peter whispered, “Ah, there’s a bit of a snag, Seb.”
“What sort of snag?”
“Why don’t you come with me?” The man’s fixed smile cracked. “Now.”
Sebastian glowered at his brother. After a few whispered words to the preacher and a courteous nod to the guests, Sebastian strutted down the aisle after his brother.
The Duke and Duchess of Wembury were seated in the pews. Sebastian recognized the couple from the night of the baron’s masquerade ball. At the harried looks on their faces, though, he started to suspect something was dreadfully amiss. Had Henrietta confessed to the couple that she didn’t trust him?…Had she confessed something more? That she didn’t want to marry him?
As soon as he and his brother were clear of the chapel, Sebastian demanded, “What’s happened, Peter?”
There were two horses waiting out front. Both men quickly mounted.
“It’s Henry, Seb. She’s missing.”
Sebastian could feel the blood drain from his face. A cold darkness nestled in his belly, chilling his soul.
With a hard kick, he set the steed at a gallop.
Chapter 30
T he house was in an uproar.
Sebastian and Peter just stood in the door frame, observing the commotion. Fans fluttering, the Ashby sisters either cried or argued. Husbands comforted w
ives. Children ran rampant. The servants bustled this way and that, fetching drinks, blankets…smelling salts?
Had someone fainted?
Sebastian stepped into the tumult. Peter closed the door.
The viscount scanned the polished marble floor, looking for Lady Ashby. But the baroness dashed into the foyer just then, a small bottle in her hand.
So who had fainted?
It was then Sebastian noticed the unconscious baron slumped in a seat by the grandfather clock.
The baroness knelt beside her husband and stuck the small bottle under his nose.
Within moments, the baron stirred, coughing and sputtering. “Gads, get that foul thing away from me!”
Restless, Sebastian snapped, “Where is Henry?”
“Oh God,” the baron groaned. “Henry! Where’s my Henry?”
Penelope stepped forward. “She’s gone, Sebastian.”
The viscount’s breath hitched. “What do you mean, ‘gone’? Gone where?”
“She’s…she’s…”
Penelope, too distraught to answer, looked at her husband for support.
“She’s run away, Seb” said Peter. He paused, then: “With another man.”
Blood throbbed in Sebastian’s head, howled in his ears. Henrietta had left him? Disgraced him at the altar?
“Apparently the other man’s been visiting quite a bit,” said Peter. “The butler remembers seeing him at the engagement party. The young lord came to visit with Henrietta after the accident on the ice, too.”
It was crushing, the pressure on his chest. Sebastian could hardly breathe. All this time he had thought to woo Henrietta, to share a life with her…and she was having an affair. No wonder she had rebuffed him at every turn. She had another lover!
He fisted his palms. The bile in his belly burned. Had she planned to humiliate him at the altar from the start of their engagement? Was this some sort of retaliation for breaking her girlhood dream?
A frantic Peter intruded upon Sebastian’s morbid reflection.
“We have to go after her, Seb.”
Sebastian blinked and swallowed the bitter taste in his mouth. “No, Peter.”
Peter balked. “You’re not serious, brother?”
“I am.”
“But you love the girl, admit it!”
Sebastian snatched his brother by the cravat. “The devil I do! Besides, the girl’s made her choice, and I won’t force her to change her mind.”
Sebastian let go of his brother before he strangled the man. He wasn’t angry with Peter. He was angry with himself.
Curse her! The scheming chit had made him want to be a better man. She had fooled him into thinking he might have a chance at a warm future with her, that he wasn’t damned after all.
What tripe! She and her lover must be roaring with laughter. And that was the greatest reprisal of all, getting the dim-witted viscount to think he’d had an opportunity at happiness. Had she and her paramour bandied that letter all over Town, too? Orchestrated the whole engagement just to devastate him?
The fury inside him billowed, hacked his insides to mush.
“Seb, I know you’re angry, but we have to go after the girl,” Peter implored. “If nothing else, think of the Ashby name!”
Listless, Sebastian said, “It’s not the Ashby name that’s ruined, it’s mine.”
“But she’s run off with another man!”
“She’s off to marry her lover, I’m sure. She’ll be home in a few days, a beaming new bride from Gretna Green. The gossip will fizzle. It always does.”
But the rancor in Sebastian’s gut would never fizzle away; it would haunt him all the rest of his miserable days.
Peter huffed, “It isn’t right, Seb.”
The baron groaned. “Oh, my darling Henry! What will I ever do without the boy?”
Lady Ashby fluttered a frilly lace fan across her husband’s flushed cheeks.
Peter nudged his brother. “Look at the baron, Seb. We have to do something for his sake.”
Sebastian did not like to see the baron in such distress, but Henrietta had made her choice. What right did he have to go after her?
“No, Peter.”
“But the baron doesn’t want the girl to wed another man.”
“The baron doesn’t want Henrietta to wed any man,” said Sebastian. “Even me. But we both know the girl has to get married now.”
Especially now that she might be enceinte.
His heart pounding, a darkness smothered Sebastian. The chit might be pregnant with his child. She needed a husband. She just didn’t want him to play the spousal role.
It was a terrible blow, the image of his child in another man’s arms. A cutting pain that only blanketed him in greater despair.
“But we don’t even know anything about this Emerson!” Peter cried.
Sebastian bristled. “Emerson?”
Peter nodded. “The butler said Lord Emerson had called on the girl, that the couple had dashed off together. He witnessed the two running across the green, hand in hand.”
A great upheaval in his brain, Sebastian tried to recall a scene from the Hellfire Club. It was a bleary scene, though. But he was sure there had been a rousing row between him and Emerson—over Henrietta.
Hand in hand? A lovers’ elopement? Not bloody likely. Emerson had dragged her away—by force. The villain was not the sort of man to settle down. He might have charmed Henrietta, tricked her into thinking him a respectable sort, but he was nothing of the kind. He was a dastardly son of a bitch—and he had a taste for Sebastian’s blood.
The letter! The rumor in the paper! It had to be Emerson’s doing. All of it. Sebastian had been reading the letter when Emerson interrupted him. The fiend must have snatched it from him after the fight, then aired it all over the city to get even with him. And according to the butler, Emerson had attended the engagement party. If he’d overheard Henrietta’s confession, that she wanted a marriage in name only, he must have spread the tale in the society papers.
With brisk and determined strides, Sebastian thundered toward the door.
He could feel it, deep inside his gut. Emerson had taken Henrietta, hauled her out of the house to get back at him for some foolhardy quarrel. Sebastian couldn’t even remember what they had squabbled about, but he knew Emerson a craven knave bent on petty retribution—and Sebastian knew just where the bastard had taken Henrietta.
Outside, the winter winds nipped.
The viscount couldn’t deny it anymore, the throbbing panic in his breast, the compulsion to tear off Emerson’s limbs…Sebastian loved the chit!
“Where are you going, Seb?”
Peter had to sprint to keep up with his brother’s long strides.
“To fetch Henrietta back,” said the viscount, snatching the horse’s reins.
“Thank God!”
Sebastian mounted the great beast. “You are not coming with me, brother.”
“The devil I’m not. You can’t go after the couple alone. You might need me, Seb.”
“No!” Sebastian twisted the reins around his palms. “I want you to fetch the magistrate, Peter. Bring him to the Hellfire Club.”
Peter paled. “Oh, good God. Seb, you have to let me—”
“No! It’s too dangerous, Peter. You have a wife. I don’t want you to come with me; I don’t want you to risk your neck.”
“Oh, blast it! Here, then.” Peter reached behind his back. “You’re going to need this.”
A pistol appeared.
Sebastian eyed the piece. “Where did you get that?”
“From the baron. I figured Emerson might put up a fuss if we tried to bring the girl home. But I didn’t think he was that dangerous.”
Sebastian tucked the weapon into his waist.
“Be careful, Seb.”
But Sebastian was already pounding down the drive at breakneck speed.
It was cold inside the abbey. Dank, too. Tears burned in Henrietta’s eyes. Blood seeped from the wounds a
t her wrists, trussed with rope. But she didn’t care. She thrashed against her dastardly captor, bit him, too.
Emerson hollered, “You bitch!”
He licked the wound at his finger, slapped her soundly for imparting the injury, then grabbed her by the hair and shoved her through the dark passageway.
Bruised cheek throbbing, she gritted, “Why are you doing this?”
“Quiet, you little whore!”
It was clear the man loathed her, considered her a harlot. She didn’t care for his good opinion of her, but she did care to know his motivation.
Oh, what a fool she was! It was a stinging hurt in her belly, the truth. She had failed to see Emerson’s true nature. Well, that wasn’t entirely accurate. She had sensed his nefarious ways, but she had ignored her misgiving. Fearing her heart was a poor judge of character, she had convinced herself to listen to reason. But it was her heart that could spot a rogue at ten paces. And since Emerson was a rogue…
“It was you who flaunted my letter all over London, wasn’t it? It was you who spread that dreadful rumor in the paper?”
“It was indeed.”
“But why did you do it?”
“To avenge myself on Ravenswood.”
There was a terrible ache in Henrietta’s ear, a sort of buzzing sound. “How do you know Ravenswood? And how do you know about the Hellfire Club?”
“Don’t feign innocence with me,” he sneered. “We all three frequent the club.”
Henrietta gasped. Another cold chill gripped her. And this time it was not the winter air making her shiver.
“Oh yes, I know what you are, you strumpet,” he snapped. “I saw you with Ravenswood in the catacombs…right after you stomped on my foot.”
Her mind spinning, memories filled her head: a man in a purple mask, wanting to strap her to the banquet table for an orgy…
Henrietta had a profound urge to retch. “So you’re a member of the Hellfire Club, too?”
“Was a member before your dastardly lover humiliated me in front of the friars. But Ravenswood will pay for what he did to me. He took my pride from me…so I’m going to take something from him. You.”
She shuddered under his biting words. “What do you mean?”
Too Scandalous to Wed Page 24
