“I shall walk you out,” Simon said. “I understand you are something of an expert on shooting, and I have been invited—”
Caroline closed the door the moment the two men made their exit. “You didn’t tell him, did you?” she whispered. “It was the perfect time, the two of you alone in the house.”
Jane moistened her lips. “I almost told him. I might even have gotten to the worst part if the three of you hadn’t barged in here like the Trojan army. Anyway, tomorrow is Friday. I said I would tell him then.”
“Are you frightened of him?” Miranda asked, sitting down on the sofa amid all the fallen cards.
“Terrified,” she admitted.
“We could hide behind the desk during your confession in case he takes a violent turn,” Caroline said thoughtfully.
“Don’t be silly. Sedgecroft isn’t going to hurt me.” She bent at the waist and picked up the King of Hearts, her voice low with emotion. “At least not in a way either of you can prevent.”
Chapter 17
Grayson paused outside his bedroom door as he perceived the faint creaking of bedsprings. He smiled grimly. If his nocturnal visitor was a certain Frenchwoman, he trusted he could evict her with a minimum of hysterics.
It wasn’t that he didn’t crave a night of uninhibited sex; it was just that his current tastes ran to a more sophisticated green-eyed lady who challenged his emotions as well as turned his body into a smoldering hotbed of suppressed frustration.
And if Helene hoped she had the slightest chance of reviving their relationship, well, there was no hope. None at all. He wasn’t the same man he’d been when they met.
Everything had changed tonight anyway. He and Jane had reached a point where their arrangement had become either a beginning or an end. And since he had no intention of giving her up, he realized he was up to his neck in trouble.
Not that trouble bothered him in the least. It appeared to be a Boscastle way of life. But as he was the eldest of the brood, and the first male officially to lose his heart, he supposed he should consider carefully his next step as family pathfinder.
Marriage?
Why not?
He’d realized long ago a wife was a necessity, but he’d privately abandoned hope of finding her among his circle of close friends. He had even formed a vague picture of her in his mind. What color hair, the sound of her voice.
Then Jane had come along, and the image had slowly altered. Reshaped itself into the most contrary female who kept him awake at night, who was nothing at all like what he’d been looking for.
But was everything he needed.
He wasn’t stupid. He’d watched enough of his friends drop like flies when the fatal illness struck.
Now he was himself stricken; he showed all the Six Deadly Symptoms of a Man in Love:
1) Inability to think straight.
2) An alarming propensity to smile at the oddest moments.
3) Constant thoughts of the object of one’s desire.
4) Absolutely no interest in other members of the opposite sex.
5) A startling sense of goodwill toward the world in general.
6) A perpetual state of sexual arousal.
This was it then. Their beginning. He needed her. She had worked her way into his heart and could never be replaced. A sense of rightness stole over him.
He opened his bedroom door, unaware his tidy summary of the situation was about to go up in flames.
He entered his room, his mind resolved. He refused even to glance at the figure reclining on the bed to save them both embarrassment. “If you are not dressed, kindly cover yourself before I turn around. I am not in the mood for a casual toss tonight.”
“Neither am I,” Heath said, swinging his booted feet to the floor. “At least not with you.”
Grayson started to laugh, his left hand frozen on the spotless white cravat he had loosened. “I understand that espionage is in your blood, but is all this sneaking about necessary with Napoleon safely tucked away on his little isle?”
Heath picked up a pair of gloves from the nightstand and made a show of examining them. Grayson stared at him for several seconds before he resumed taking off his cravat and evening coat.
“One never knows.”
“I see. Well, I trust you don’t expect to encounter any problems of that nature in this house.”
Heath glanced up, grinning boyishly. “It’s Mrs. Cleary, if you must know. Ever since your housekeeper caught me posing as a Roman soldier for Miss Summers to paint last month, I have not been able to look her in the face.”
Grayson unbuttoned his waistcoat. In spite of Heath’s joking, something was wrong. He sensed it and hoped it would not hurt Jane. “I thought we were meeting tomorrow at the club.”
Heath settled in one of two armchairs by the window, his face toward the door. “I’ve other business in town. I hope you don’t mind.”
“No.” Grayson sat down opposite him, a little baffled by this change in plans. What revelation could possibly require this degree of secrecy? “I don’t mind. Do you want a drink?”
Heath rarely drank; it was simply a courtesy to ask, and Grayson’s premonition of trouble was confirmed when his brother’s grin slowly gave way to a concerned frown.
“You might need one after I’m finished, Grayson.”
Grayson stroked his chin. “Then you have found him. How was he?”
“Under a sheet when I left him.”
Heath’s blue eyes glinted. In the darkness the two men looked more alike than by daylight, when Grayson’s golden male beauty contrasted with his younger brother’s dark aura of dangerous composure.
It took Grayson a few seconds to react. “Under a—oh, my God, Heath—don’t tell me you’ve gone and killed the moron. Not that I don’t understand your motives. But I had hoped to at least make Nigel apologize publicly to Jane before I throttled the life out of him.”
“He’s alive. Very much so.”
Grayson was surprised at the relief he felt. Nigel probably did deserve to die, but he was family. “You did actually see him then?”
“In the flesh.” Heath blew out a sigh. “Quite literally, I’m afraid to admit. I have now seen much more of Nigel than one would ever wish.”
Grayson leaned forward, fascinated. “You caught him in the act—under a bedsheet—dear God. Don’t tell me it was with another man.”
“It wasn’t.”
“Then not—not with an animal, or anything so perverse I cannot explain it to Jane?”
Heath removed a cigar from his vest pocket. “Do you remember Miss Chasteberry?”
“How odd you should mention her. I was explaining that piece of our boyhood history only yesterday to Jane. The Governess of the Iron Glove, who turned her students to jelly. And let us not forget her infernal rod. Why—”
“Apparently, she is still raising rods.”
Grayson sat back in amusement. What an unexpected development. “Nigel was thumping the family governess?”
“To be more accurate, he was thumping his wife. Or rather, she was thumping him. I did not make the distinction.”
Grayson laughed uneasily. “I don’t believe you.”
“Believe me. I did see the wedding register in Hampshire.”
“He married Chasteberry?”
Heath smiled slowly, staring at his unlit cigar. “She of our youthful fears and fantasies. Perhaps Nigel is one of those men who harbors a penchant for dominant women. There are men who pay for such dubious pleasure.”
There was a long pause. Then Grayson shook his head. “I have no idea how I will break this to Jane.”
“That bit of drama will be unnecessary.”
“The devil,” Grayson said in vexation. “You told her before you told me?”
“Grayson, are you completely besotted? Do I have to explain every detail? My God, you do not make this easy. Jane did not need to be told. She knew all along. She and Nigel sabotaged their own wedding. Most young women will go to any leng
ths to leg-shackle a man. Your Jane did the opposite. You and your noble intentions interrupted an artful plot.”
“A plot?”
“I’m afraid so. Jane and Nigel never wanted to marry each other.”
Grayson looked away from the window, utterly stunned, struck speechless by what his brother had revealed. A plot. A sabotaged wedding. God above, a conspiracy between Jane and his own cousin. He could not believe it. Yet at the same time so many little mysteries now made sense. Of course Jane had not been jilted. The minx had been manipulating her own life, him, all along.
He drew a sharp breath as if to dampen the anger burning in his breast. He couldn’t trust himself to speak. How noble he’d imagined himself. How arrogantly stupid to believe his sacrifice would matter. Damnation, who had he been to label Nigel a nitwit? He was the one who had proven to be the fool, who had let the wool be pulled over his eyes. A plot, and he had been a pawn. No, an obstacle.
He tried to clear the red mist swimming in his mind. Why hadn’t he seen the signs? he asked himself savagely. From the start he had suspected the whole situation was amiss. Why hadn’t he put two and two together? Why hadn’t he guessed?
Because no proper young lady would sabotage her own marriage. No young lady of Jane’s background would dare. His darling paragon had thumbed her nose at Society. At him.
When, if ever, had she intended to tell him the truth? he wondered, his outrage growing by the moment.
How long, how far, would she have carried on this charade?
Had she been too afraid of him to admit what she had done? Good. She ought to be. He was a little afraid himself of what he would do to her. She would pay dearly for this. Oh, how he would enjoy making her pay.
He looked across the room and gave a low humorless laugh. Puzzled by Grayson’s apparent lack of reaction, Heath took the flint and tinder box from the table and carefully lit his cigar.
A cloud of fragrant blue-gray smoke drifted between them as he spoke again. “Perhaps you have misunderstood me,” he said cautiously.
Grayson regarded him with a chilling smile. “Why do you say that?”
Heath shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “You would not be smiling like a satyr if you understood what I had said. She has been deceiving you, Gray, playing you for a fool while the world has watched in wonder.”
A flame flickered in the depths of Grayson eyes. A flame of anger. Of hellfire unleashed.
“It is you who misunderstands,” he replied evenly.
“Oh?”
“This is not the smile of a noble fool you see.” He paused, his tapered fingers gripping the arms of his chair. “It is one of a man plotting a punishment.”
“Now wait a minute,” Heath said in alarm. “This is more of a reaction than I anticipated. Is punishing Jane the right thing to do?”
Grayson’s smile thinned. He would not allow a sense of guilt to manipulate him again. He’d done his duty and look where it had brought him. Practically to his knees. “It was doing the right thing that got me into this situation. Jane needs to be shown that I can give as good as I get.”
“This sounds ominous, Gray. All that biblical eye-for-an-eye nonsense.”
Grayson’s gaze mirrored little mercy. Jane had hurt him in a way he had not dreamed possible. “ ‘He maketh rain on the just and the unjust.’ ”
“Yes, but this sounds more like a thunderstorm than a little shower,” Heath said worriedly. “What exactly are you going to do?”
“Marry her.”
“Marry her?” Heath said in shock.
Grayson laughed at his brother’s incredulous expression. “After I make her pay.”
“And how do you do that?” Heath asked in a guarded voice.
“I am going to play with her, Heath, exactly as she has played with me. The simple fact is that I love Jane.”
A glimmer of good-natured admiration replaced the anxiety in Heath’s dark blue eyes. He could not hide his relief. “I take it this revenge will be sweet? For you, I mean?”
Grayson folded his muscular arms behind his head, closing his eyes in contemplation. “Seduction is always sweet, isn’t it? Revenge will merely add a pinch of spice to the pot.”
Grayson sent Weed for his secretary the instant Heath left the room. The hour was late. It did not matter. The best plots were hatched in the dead of night.
Was that when his clever little mouse had laid her daring scheme?
Why? His initial fury had subsided enough to allow him to think more clearly. Why had she done it?
He mulled the most obvious answer. She and Nigel, being brave young fools, still believed in the concept of a happily-ever-after love. If she had refused her parents outright, they would either have forced her hand, found another match, or disowned her.
And Jane, for all her human foibles, adored her family. So in a rather brilliant but desperate way, she had schemed to have her cake and eat it, too. But her plan had failed, as such desperate schemes are apt to do.
Grayson would be far more devious in constructing his counterplan. He would use all means at his disposal: legal, spiritual, financial. And, yes, sexual, too. Her deception had given him carte blanche to fulfill his deepest fantasies even if he had come perilously close to acting on them more than once.
At last. At last. The rake in him was back in charge. The hero had had his day. He no longer felt unbalanced. Never mind the emotional maze Jane had led him through to reach familiar ground. He was finally back on his feet.
More the pity for Jane.
The irony of it did not escape him. He was plotting to marry a woman who had executed a brash plan to avoid the parson’s mousetrap, a fate he had avoided all his adult life.
Grayson wasn’t stupid. He loved the damned woman not only despite her deception—perhaps even in part because of it. Yes, he was furious at her for playing a game with him. But now the tables had turned. The game was no longer to be played in black and white but rather in the more nebulous shades of gray in between.
A game of revenge?
Perhaps a little. But more than anything it was a game of love.
For somehow he sensed that if Jane were capable of sabotaging her own wedding, she would not respect him if he did not respond in kind. A woman of her passion for life, of her capability to plot her fate, would expect the same of her mate. And who else but Jane could match him misdeed for misdeed, word for word? Who else could bring that hunger to live, that gambler’s daring to a marriage?
He wanted her, and there was absolutely nothing left for him to do but submit, even if he refused to do so gracefully.
He had found his mate, his match, but before he applauded her wiliness, he would have a little fun taking his revenge on her for deceiving him. Let her earn his forgiveness.
Lord Belshire awoke in the darkness of the carriage to feel himself being roughly prodded by an unfamiliar hand. “What? Home already? I was not snoring, Athena. I was not even—” He blinked, staring around the unmoving vehicle in astonishment. “Sedgecroft. Where— What have you done with my wife?”
Grayson rapped on the roof, and the carriage lurched forward into the maze of London streets. “She is safely at home with the rest of your family.” His mouth tightened. “Including your eldest daughter.”
“Jane.” The older man fumbled to pull his gold pocket watch from his embroidered waistcoat. “Where . . . where the blazes are we going at this time of night?”
Grayson settled back against the squabs. “To my house, in order to conduct our business in peace. My solicitors and banker are already awaiting our arrival.”
“Banker—what sort of business is conducted in such a clandestine manner at this hour of night?” Belshire demanded in a thunderous voice. “My God, you scoundrel, if you have brought dishonor on my daughter . . .”
Forty minutes later Lord Belshire understood exactly the nature of Sedgecroft’s “business” and had reluctantly agreed to the terms listed in the marriage contract he signed. The conditio
ns set forth for the betrothal were bizarre to say the least, but then so was Jane and Nigel’s underhanded deception of all those who had loved and trusted them.
“I cannot believe she would do this,” he muttered. “All the same, I insist that she will not suffer as a result of this agreement. Before God you must swear to honor our contract.”
“Make no mistake, Belshire,” Grayson said, his eyes glittering like ice. “I love your daughter.”
“At the moment I cannot say I share the sentiment. That does not mean I will see her misused in any way.”
“Trust me. Jane will be well treated. In a year or less I hope she will present you with a grandchild.”
A glint of hope lit the older man’s face. A grandchild. A future marquess. “I question your methods—”
“You will not question the results,” Grayson said without hesitation.
“I assume that Jane is ready to become your wife.”
“I assure you, she is.”
“It does solve several problems at once, Sedgecroft.”
“I thought so, too.”
As he brooded over Jane’s underhanded plotting, Belshire decided on the ride back home that his willful daughter probably deserved to marry a man like Sedgecroft, who had the same sort of duplicitous mind as she. Or so he tried to explain to his wife when he returned to her.
Athena was reading in bed when he rather dramatically paused in the door to their room. “I am in shock,” he announced. “Complete and utter shock. My entire body is numb.”
She put down her book. “That’s the price you pay for going out drinking with a man practically half your age. Not that you ever had Sedgecroft’s stamina to begin with. What was it he wished to discuss with you anyway?”
He closed the door and strode into the room to explain. When he had finished, she was pacing angrily around the bed upon which he had collapsed.
“And you agreed to this? You put your name to this contract?”
“You are missing the crux of the matter, my dear. Jane deceived us. She never wanted to marry Nigel in the first place.”
The Seduction of an English Scoundrel Page 19
