“No.” Nick nodded a curt dismissal then crossed the room to shut the door completely. He would prefer to fight Firthley to the death over his wife’s honor than have the servants, even Blakeley, listening to what might be said about the future duchess. Or rather, the potential future duchess, who might or might not ever speak to the duke again.
On his way back to his seat, he said, “You opposed my suit not so many days ago. Might I ask why the change?”
Her lips tightened and her fingernails tapped on the arm of the loveseat, face screwed up. Because he wanted to test the theory that Charlotte would speak to fill silence whenever it was offered, he said nothing. His hypothesis was borne out.
“You are preferable to Lord Malbourne, the only other suitor in contention.”
“Malbourne!” he barked, standing before he could stop himself, lurching as though he might throw a muzzler at the invisible man. “That insufferable louse. I will commit murder before he sets one finger on her.”
“Good,” Charlotte said, filling the teapot with hot water and setting it to steep as Nick slowly reseated himself. “For her husband is perfectly correct in every respect, which means that to a lesser extent, you are, too. Bella is in love with you, and you with her. You are an excellent match, and I believe this marriage best. Provided you reform your wicked ways.”
He sat up straight and choked down a mouthful of cognac. Even after he swallowed, his throat kept working. “I thank you, but am not entirely certain I would say,” he coughed, “in love.”
“Perhaps not,” Charlotte said, “but you and Bella would be the only two in London to argue, and only because you are both as stubborn as Scotsmen.”
He stood then to tie back the wine-colored curtains over the bow window, staring out over the garden his grandmother had planned and executed, a labyrinth of sorts, but the box hedges too symmetrical and trimmed too low to make it a game or a trysting spot.
This garden really was too small for such an installation, he thought, but a hedge maze might be a very nice addition at Wellstone. He could see himself chasing after Bella, the hidden prize, following the sound of her laughter, her lilac scent, the taste of her in the wind, to a magical, blind alley where they might lose themselves in the manner of the Ancients.
He stared at the brandy, then set it aside. Charlotte tipped her head to acknowledge the concession, but Nick was lost imagining Bella digging in this garden, planting the dead-looking bulbs he had once helped his grandmother bury every autumn until he turned seven, when his brother contracted a fever and Nick was sent away to school.
“Can you explain how she ended up with Huntleigh?”
Charlotte’s color rose and her fingernails looked like they would pierce the horsehair upholstery. Her voice gained pitch even as she whispered, “You do not want to hear it.”
“I have little doubt,” he said, crossing the room to sit, bringing his drink and the decanter, ignoring Charlotte’s pointed looks. “Indulge me?”
Charlotte consciously relaxed her hands and silenced the tumult crossing her face, but her back remained so stiff, he was afraid with one sharp word, impassivity might turn to tears.
Instead, she regained her ladylike poise, forcing her face to utter stillness. “Uncle Jasper and her brothers—John and Jeremy—sold her to Myron for ten thousand pounds. They beat her and said they would give her to a brothel if she refused to comply.”
Nick’s face felt like granite, back molars chewing on his most natural response. He set his almost-empty glass down on the table before it shattered in his hand, then removed the stopper on the decanter to refill it.
Charlotte murmured, as though she hoped he wouldn’t hear, “The episode was not unlike the rest of her life.”
With more delicacy than he thought he could manage, after he poured, he replaced the crystal teardrop in the narrow neck of the bottle. If he weren’t in the company of a lady, he would hurl the entire thing against the wall.
To further distract from the homicidal thoughts overwhelming his good sense, he poured Charlotte’s tea, adding milk because he could see it in the bottom of her used cup. “Do you take sugar?” he asked, a rote pleasantry he didn’t remember from a quarter-hour ago.
“No, thank you. Milk is sufficient.”
She focused her attention on the cup and saucer, seeming to understand he was not at all considering beverages. While he continued to try to bring his unaccountable rage under control, she stirred the hot tea to cool it, warming her free hand on the china. Because he could not work out his wrath remaining motionless, he stood and began pacing the floor.
He had known Bella was insecure, had even guessed at the reasons. He had assumed the most central was that Charlotte had been a celebrated beauty when she was younger. But this was much, much worse than anything he had imagined.
He had more experience than he wanted with women whose sense of themselves had been beaten out by a man’s fists and foul words. He had seen thousands in his travels and in the working classes of England, and dozens in the British aristocracy. He had just never fallen in—infatuation—with one before.
His own mother had never buckled under his father’s chastisement, but not for lack of trying on the part of the old duke. In her case, the attacks were only verbal; rare physical altercations were saved for his younger son. Unlike David, Nick had always been healthy, had never been the heir apparent, and was perpetually disinclined to blind obedience.
But once he had begun at Eton, Nick visited Wellstone no more than a few days each year at Yuletide, instead spending school breaks with friends whose familial connections might prove advantageous to the Northopes. As long as his friends’ parents remained valuable to his, financially, politically, or socially, Nick’s bruises had been minimal.
Charlotte chanced filling the silence. “Many women of the gentry are forced to marry for their families’ financial gain.”
Nick snapped, “‘Many women of the gentry’ are not sent to near-certain death on a boat filled with sailors under threat of carnal servitude.”
Charlotte just agreed quietly, “No,” apparently now content to let the silence fill itself.
Nick cleared his throat and finished the brandy in two swallows. He said nothing as he walked back to his seat to pour another, then loosened his cravat. He couldn’t seem to fill his lungs; his breath had gone dangerously shallow.
The thought of Bella brutalized was sour in his mouth, bringing up emotions he hadn’t felt since his last “punishment” by his father. Nick had just finished at Eton and would soon remove to Oxford. During the brutal caning, Nick had finally taken a swing and connected—hard. His father had never touched or spoken to him again, except to provide Nick funds to buy his own townhouse in London and travel anywhere he wanted outside England.
Adding bitter bile to the mixture of fear, sorrow, and anger once again roiling in his gut, he envisioned Huntleigh, the foul cur, taking Bella’s maidenhead while she was covered in bruises. If Huntleigh weren’t her husband and entitled to treat her anyway he liked, and if Nick hadn’t seen the care he took with her now, he would call the man out just for that, no matter his age and infirmity.
After a long sip, then a long silence, then another sip, he resolved to remain friendly with Huntleigh, especially since he couldn’t prove such brutality, but he now had no compunction about stealing his wife as soon as possible. If Nick could escape London with her today and place her under his protection at Wellstone Grange, he would do so, but Bella would never allow it while Huntleigh lay dying. Besides, it would ruin any chance of her being accepted as his duchess. Prinny would most certainly never approve.
“Are you listening to me, Wellbridge?”
Apparently, he had been too busy plotting to gather the information he needed to accomplish his plot. He shook his head to set new cogs turning.
“Yes. Well, no, but my apologies. Pray, continue.” He sat forward in his chair, clutching his glass like a rope saving him from a stormy sea.
She began, “As I was saying, and not for my own edification, Bella has always acted the part of baroness commendably. Now she acts the countess. If she commits to you, she will act the duchess. But her confidence is only an act, no matter how many heathen stories she tells, no matter how many times Prinny kisses her hand. Underneath the facade, she is a bookish girl who wants only to live in a country cottage and raise vegetables in her garden. You must understand that if nothing else.”
He straightened, placing the brandy on a side table. “She trades witticisms with the king like she was born to it.”
“You have approached her as a woman of the world, but she is not one, nor ever will be. For all his faults, His Majesty understands that, which is why they get on so well.”
Nick grumbled, “They get on so well, I’m surprised he hasn’t given her carte-blanche.”
Charlotte lightly slapped his knee, and her laughter trilled through the room. “Oh Heavens, you are jealous! Bella is not to Prinny’s taste at all. She is not stupid or devious enough for his kind of bed-sport. Besides, Lady Conyngham would snatch her bald if there were any hint of it.”
Nick feigned shock to hold a wicked grin in check. “My lady! What can you be thinking, to speak of such things?”
“La, Wellbridge. Don’t be stodgy. Although they are not at all suited, should you wish to win Bella, you might be wise to listen to his discussions with her.”
His face fell, and Charlotte’s lips turned up. Apparently, his contrition was convincing. “Gardening, folk art, ancient manuscripts, architecture. He does ask for political opinions about her experiences abroad, as she is quite astute about such things—in some ways, she is more valuable than Myron—but he never makes it seem his decisions might rest on her opinion, even if they do. And he asks his questions when they are walking in the gardens or dining at Windsor or enjoying a musicale, not sitting in the throne room at St. James. He always treats her tenderly—always. If King George were wooing Bella, her skirts would already be about her ears, and Myron would be a duke, not an earl.”
If that thought weren’t hard enough to swallow, now Nick remembered every single time Prinny had warned him to be gentle—not to do exactly what he had done—and there had been many. He had taken it as rare royal over-protectiveness and assumed he knew more about seducing married women than the king, a ridiculous assumption just on its face. Even when he had been told if he broke her heart, Prinny would take out his indignation in equal measure, Nick hadn’t changed his tactics one iota.
He dropped his face into his hand, massaging his temples. After a lengthy round of self-flagellation for not seeing what had been in front of his eyes, and not listening to what he should have heard, he looked up at Charlotte, patiently waiting for him to come to the right conclusion on his own. At the look on his face, her eyes softened.
Clearing his throat of self-disgust, he croaked, “Her parties are celebrated on every continent. She is a favorite of the Kings of France and England, the Emperor of Austria, and the tsar, to say nothing of their queens, ministers, and ambassadors, and endless nobles everywhere. She is a woman of the world, in every part of the world. How can she not be worldly?”
Charlotte patted his hand. “You can be forgiven the misapprehension, as she has learned to hide it well. She overcame her timidity to be a proper wife to Myron, but never lost her shyness. No matter the rumors, her life required her to be entirely circumspect—and I do mean entirely. The least of flirtations cause exponential problems in places where there are no women, even under the protection of Prinny’s hand-picked naval officers.
“Since she’s returned, well,” Charlotte set down her cup, “it is a miracle she can speak to you at all, especially in London. The City itself leaves her tongue-tied. You cannot imagine the dread she built up about the ton all her life, and how spectacularly her fears came to fruition when she was presented. I am not entirely sure she didn’t marry Myron so quickly to avoid the second half of her own Season.”
His right forefinger tapped against the arm of his chair in time with his left boot on the carpet. “I should have realized. I hadn’t thought.”
“Have you done any thinking at all?” she admonished.
“No.” He again dropped his head into his hands, mumbling through his fingers, “I’ve gone about this entirely the wrong way.”
“Indeed. Even if you only meant her as your mistress, you’ve made a bungle of things. Really, Wellbridge. I had heard you were masterful at seducing men’s wives.”
The chair was nearly upset and Charlotte almost dropped her tea when he shot up onto his feet, no longer able to still himself. Pacing again in front of the fireplace, he was reminded of countless hours in similar pursuit since Huntleigh had made his ridiculous—astute—ridiculous proposal. He eyeballed the drink, but decided against it. It would only inhibit the thinking he now needed to do.
“Demme!” He stopped himself. “My apologies, Lady Firthley.”
“I take no offense, and my name is Charlotte. It is indeed a mess.”
His pacing took on a frenetic quality he’d never before experienced. Face turned down to pull out any insights he could drag from the carpet, he wanted nothing more than to throw off his coat and cravat and mount his horse for the two-day ride to Wellstone.
Not that he had any idea what he would do when he got there. He wasn’t entirely sure it was still staffed. Only he had the strangest desire to sleep in the suite he had so rarely used, earmarked for his infrequent use when he had turned twelve. As though in so doing, he might put down the mantle of the Duke of Wellbridge and only consider himself as a man.
If he had met Bella as a blacksmith or a crofter or a footman, he thought, not as a duke and a rake and an erstwhile Corinthian, he might have gone about things properly, not like every other degenerate in London who had listened to on-dit about Bella being a wanton and so treated her as one.
Nick had, once more, let his hard cock make decisions about his honor, and used his title to costume his appalling behavior in a gentleman’s overcoat. He had tried to buy her to install in his home as an amusement, and her husband had tried to sell her—as she had been sold to him. No wonder she had slammed the door in Nick’s face. He had been lucky to get away without a knife in the gut. Huntleigh might yet be in danger, living with her temper ’round the clock.
Charlotte interrupted his cogitation again, but was halfway through her thought before he stopped pacing to listen.
“…should take from this conversation is that Bella has never in her life been pursued. Myron danced with her once and spoke to her twice, then applied to her father. Her only ideas of romance come from books, which she disdains as pure fiction.”
He banged his fist against his thigh, for if he didn’t he might slam it into the plaster wall. When he saw Charlotte draw back in slight distress, he calmed himself. He was a peer, after all, and a gentleman. He should have more control than to make a woman frightened by word or deed. He had seen enough fearful women for a lifetime.
Retaking his chair, he apologized for his demeanor, then took a small sip of his brandy, still miraculously almost full, and he not remotely inebriated.
“So, how does one romance a woman unfamiliar with the art? I assume you have suggestions for my continued pursuit?”
“Of course.”
“Shall I ring for more tea?”
“Please. And just for fun, do you think your butler might be convinced I am your new chère-amie?” Nick choked as she teased, “It would be most entertaining if he could.”
Chapter 18
“Might I have this dance, Lady Huntleigh?” Nick held out his hand to lead Bella to the floor in Lady Chesfield’s ballroom. Supper was over, she had just finished a cup of lemonade, the musicians were preparing their instruments again, and Charlotte had gone to the retiring room with a significant stare in his direction, clearing the field for his invitation.
“I think not, Your Grace,” Bella declined.
Nick
wanted to beg but restrained himself in public. The five-hour candles were only half-burned, so there was still time to overcome the anger she had been leveling at him for almost a fortnight. Between “I-prefer-to-be-alone” and “No-need-for-apology” and “I-would-not-like-to-lend-credence-to-gossip,” Nick might as well be an unwelcome stranger in her home, no matter how much latitude he had been granted by Lord Huntleigh.
“I believe the next set is promised to Lord Malbourne.”
He dropped his hand and hissed, “Malbourne? You know perfectly well that is unacceptable. Huntleigh will have my—”
She kept her voice hushed and even and her face gentle, but not her tone. “Then you may go find Lord Huntleigh in the card room and the two of you may bloody well kill each other whilst I dance with Lord Malbourne.”
Even Huntleigh had been unable to entirely control her actions since the ill-fated day Nick had proposed. Huntleigh confided she had softened somewhat toward her husband, as they never knew from one day to the next if he would be ill, seemingly on his deathbed.
The last time he had been unwell, Bella was so solicitous, she barely noticed Nick’s uninvited presence, merely using him as a footman to carry basins of water, roll bandages, and prepare foul-smelling teas from roots and bark and dried flowers. However, on nights when Huntleigh was healthy enough to demand no special treatment, like tonight, she still behaved like both men were mud on the hem of her gown.
Huntleigh took the whole thing in stride, having managed her anger before, but she was driving Nick out of his mind. If he wanted to be treated like mud, he had a perfectly good sister. If he wanted to be thought a footman, he would close his account at Weston’s and give up his membership at White’s.
Flowers hadn’t resolved the upset, nor grandiloquent poetry, French pastries, expensive books, even framed prints of her own floral sketches, pilfered from the king’s library. Clothing of any sort, even hats or gloves, was entirely too intimate, and when he suggested to Lady Firthley he buy ribbons to remind Bella of the day they had met at Gunter’s, she had shaken her head so hard she nearly dislodged her coiffure.
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