Blame It on Bath: The Truth About the Duke

by Caroline Linden

  Gerard closed his eyes. Not at first sight—not at the hundredth sight. But whether it was the thousandth sight, or the ten thousandth, the persistent need to see Kate was driving him mad. He still didn’t know what to say to her, but he believed, more and more strongly, that everything would fall into place when he saw her. It wasn’t just that he had left things badly between them. He missed her. Only Charlie’s unexpected arrival was staving off crushing disappointment that she wasn’t at home now. The prospect of making her smile had made the long, hard ride back to Bath, undertaken at an impatient pace, seem both endless and a trifle. “Not quite,” he said quietly to his brother’s question. “But only because I was a damned fool.”

  “Ah. So tell me about her. Is she a beauty?”

  Gerard lifted his head. “What do you mean? You haven’t met her yet? Foley said you’d been waiting since yesterday.”

  “I have been. But your lady was not at home when I arrived yesterday, and the servant said both you and she had left Bath.”

  The blood drained from Gerard’s face. He could feel it; he was actually light-headed for a moment. In three steps he was at the door. “Foley!” he shouted into the hall. “Foley!”

  The footman came running. “Sir?”

  “Where is Lady Gerard?” he demanded.

  “Sh-she left, sir,” he stammered. “A carriage came for her yesterday morning, and she and Mrs. Dennis went off in it. I don’t know where, but they took some baggage.”

  Gerard reeled. She’d left him. Holy blessed God, he’d lost her before truly realizing he had her.

  “She bade me tell you she left a note, sir,” added the footman quickly. “I forgot a moment ago.”

  “Where is it?”

  Foley opened his mouth, then closed it, looking uneasy.

  “There was nothing on the desk,” said Charlie, when Gerard swung a harsh glare on him. “It was quite bare.”

  With a muttered curse, Gerard pushed past his footman and went into the parlor. There was no letter on the mantel or either table. He bounded up the stairs to look in the dressing room, then the bedroom. Finally, there, a white rectangle caught his eye, lying on the writing desk by the window. He seized it with relief, hoping it meant she hadn’t truly left, or she wanted him to follow, or something that could counter the sharp pain throbbing in his chest.

  It did not.

  At first he felt nothing but a stark, frozen numbness. It quickly wore off, burned away by fury. His hands shook as he folded the letter and forced it into his pocket, but his steps were steady as he went back down the stairs and through the hall past his brother.

  “Where are you going?” exclaimed Charlie, as Gerard threw open the front door and strode out, hatless and coatless.

  “To kill someone,” he replied grimly.

  Chapter 26

  It was a brisk walk to the White Hart Inn. Charlie caught up to him as he turned up Barton Street. “What happened?” he demanded, breathing hard. “And must we run there like a pair of footmen?”

  “You don’t have to come at all.”

  “Edward would draw and quarter me if I let you commit murder.” Charlie muttered a quick apology to a pair of gentlemen Gerard had roughly brushed past. “And who is the poor devil?”

  “Lucien Howe.”

  He felt Charlie’s keen glance. “London is whispering that he’s on the verge of ruin.”

  “How thrilling it will be to tell them you witnessed his ultimate fall.”

  “I’d rather not, particularly not in a court where any judges might be listening. Why are you planning to kill Howe?”

  Gerard just shook his head. He couldn’t even say it out loud. Without pausing, he fished the note out of his pocket and handed it to his brother. Charlie inhaled sharply as he read, then returned it in silence. He didn’t say another word of protest about Gerard’s purpose.

  They turned another corner, toward the crenellated towers atop the Abbey Church, which loomed over the buildings lining the street. The White Hart Inn stood opposite the church. Gerard headed directly for it, and a few minutes later was shown up to Lord Howe’s room; it seemed he was expected. With Charlie still dogging his heels, he pressed a coin into the porter’s hand and dismissed him, then knocked on the door.

  Howe’s face lit with satisfaction at the sight of him. “Ah, de Lacey.” He gave a little bow. “I thought you might call on me.”

  “No doubt.” Gerard tossed down the offensive letter. Unsealed, it flipped open so he could read it again: If you wish to know where your wife is, call upon me at the White Hart. “Where is she?”

  “Katherine? Perfectly safe, I’m sure.” Howe smiled, but only for a moment.

  After a week struggling to sort out his feelings for Kate, and discovering that they ran deeper than he’d realized, Gerard was in no mood for Howe’s prevarication or manipulation. He’d been fair—he’d asked politely first—and that was as far as he could restrain himself. He clipped Howe on the chin with a swift right, stepping into it for good effect. The viscount’s head snapped up with a satisfying clack of teeth on teeth. “Where?” he repeated, fists still raised in threat. Howe stared at him in horror and staggered away, throwing up his hands protectively as Gerard lunged after him, catching him by the throat with one hand and the lapel with his other. With a thump he shoved Howe backward into the wall behind him, forcing the shorter man up onto his toes.

  “Where is she?” he demanded again.

  “Let me . . . down,” wheezed Howe, clawing at Gerard’s grip on his throat.

  Gerard gave him a sharp shake, and Howe’s head cracked against the wall. “Where’s Kate? I’m not a patient man.”

  Howe’s alarmed gaze darted past him. “Help!”

  “I don’t think he needs my help strangling you,” said Charlie in a bored tone. “But if you don’t answer his question, I’ll gladly give it.” Gerard gave Howe another thump against the wall for emphasis.

  “Cobham!” squeaked Howe. He was an unhealthy shade of purple now. “She’s only gone . . . to Cobham!”

  Gerard loosened his grip on the man’s throat. “Where the devil is Cobham?”

  “Near Hungerford,” he gasped. “A few miles off the Bath Road.”

  “Why?” growled Gerard.

  “She went with her mother! Cobham is Mrs. Hollenbrook’s home.”

  Gerard scowled but reluctantly released Howe, thrusting the man away from him. “You’ve got a dangerous disregard for your health, Howe, sending me a note like that.” Then something struck him, and he frowned again. “Where’s her note? My footman said she’d left one. And how the bloody hell did your letter come to be in its place?”

  Massaging his throat, Howe backed warily away to the desk in the corner. He groped around for a moment, then held out a sealed letter. “The upstairs maid switched them for me,” he said a little hoarsely, as Gerard snatched the letter from his hand. “Perhaps not the wisest move, but I did nothing to your wife. I merely seized the opportunity of her departure. I must speak to you—de Lacey, I am desperate.”

  “And exceptionally stupid,” remarked Charlie. He hadn’t batted an eye at Gerard’s attack and was now watching in mild amusement, one elbow propped on the mantel.

  Howe glanced at him in angry dismay. “I have little choice! If you call in that note, I’ll be utterly ruined. I attempted to make my case decently, and you refused to discuss the matter. I beg you, for the sake of my tenants and dependents, grant me some leniency.”

  Gerard barely heard him. Kate’s letter simply said she felt a separation would suit them both, and she was going with her mother for a visit at Cobham. She expressed her hope that he had found something useful in his trip to Allenton and concluded by wishing him a quick resolution to his family’s trouble. She said nothing of when she would return.

  “This debt was not of my making,” Howe pleaded when Gerard made no answer. “I swear I shall honor it as any decent gentleman would, but I must ha
ve time. For God’s sake, man, have some pity!”

  But why would she go with her mother? Her mother was shallow and vain and had made Kate feel small and insignificant for most of her life. She was hardly the image of a loving and devoted mother. Surely even he was a better companion, great fool that he was. When Mrs. Hollenbrook first arrived in Bath, Kate seemed relieved when he said they didn’t have to see her and Lucien Howe. And now she had left Gerard to go away with her mother?

  He raised his head. Perhaps he’d gotten it all wrong. Perhaps her dislike had really been of Lucien. The man could have threatened her or made her miserable once Gerard was no longer in town to keep him at bay, and she left to escape him. Eyes narrowing, he jerked out a chair from the round table in the center of the room. “All right,” he said. “Let us negotiate.”

  Howe’s eyes skittered to Charlie, who merely drew out his pocket watch and made a show of checking it. The rashness of his actions seemed to have sunk in. “Thank you,” he said warily, and took another chair.

  They sat, each taking the other’s measure. “I understand you pressured my wife to marry you at one time,” Gerard said abruptly.

  Howe flushed deep red. “It would have been a very prudent match.”

  “For you.”

  “Also for her,” said the viscount stiffly. “She was a widow of advanced years. She was quiet and withdrawn, unlikely to attract suitors. Her only attraction was her fortune, which would have made her an object of prey to a host of villains.” His glare said he included Gerard in their number. “I offered her a safe home, a respectable marriage, and a continuation of the life she led.”

  “How noble,” said Gerard without sympathy. “You, naturally, had no interest in her fortune.”

  “Of course I did. My uncle left me no choice,” Howe retorted. “You know very well why I wished to marry her—why I had to marry her, instead of a younger lady who might bear me children and better suit my temperament. It was not my most ardent desire, but I was prepared to make the best of it.”

  The best of it. Gerard had thought something like that, too, once upon a time. Before he’d become dependent on Kate’s company. Entranced by her rare laugh. Thoroughly addicted to making her smile and cry out in pleasure. Before he realized that her absence opened a gaping hole inside him that had nothing to do with making the best of their hasty marriage.

  Perhaps he was no better than Howe.

  He raised his eyes to the other man’s. “Did you ever hit her, as your uncle did?”

  “Never!” Howe appeared genuinely appalled. “Never once! My uncle—?”

  “If you were so desperate to beg my leniency, why did you follow her to Bath?” he interrupted. “Surely you could guess she wouldn’t be eager for your company, and hounding a woman is no way to win favors with her husband.”

  For the first time the viscount looked vaguely uncomfortable. “It was not my idea. When her mother proposed the visit, though, I agreed because—because London had grown unwelcoming. Rumors of my ruin were everywhere.”

  “Yes, I know how that feels,” said Gerard dryly. “You might also have reconsidered spreading that Durham Dilemma rubbish if you wished to renegotiate your debts.”

  Howe stiffened. “I confess I heard those rumors.” He paused to master himself. ”Not without some un-Christian enjoyment. But I did nothing to spread them. I believe gossip is a sin and an affront to God. I do not contribute to it.”

  Gerard remembered what his aunt and her friend Lady Eccleston had called Howe: the young zealot. “The stories grew quite lurid immediately following your arrival, by some odd coincidence.”

  For a moment Howe said nothing. “I believe . . .” he began. “Mrs. Hollenbrook does not share my beliefs. I believe she felt no restraint in discussing the matter in public conversation.”

  Great God. His own mother-in-law was trying to ruin him? He exchanged a glance with Charlie, who raised his eyebrows. He turned back to Lord Howe. “You’re blaming my wife’s mother?”

  Now the viscount’s expression turned pitying. “You might as well learn her nature now. She wants but a cordial companion, and every rumor and whisper she’s ever heard are readily shared. And she is, as you may have noticed, a very handsome woman; she rarely lacks for company. She depends upon it. Mrs. Hollenbrook becomes restive and cross without a man nearby to admire her, and the higher the man’s rank and status, the better.

  “From the moment you arrived as Katherine’s husband, she spoke constantly of wishing to be on better terms with you, your family, your friends. Visiting Bath was the only way she could insert herself into your circles, although her hopes were mainly disappointed. In truth, I think her only gratification came from Lord Worley’s company, and once he left, her interest in the city waned.”

  The name caught Gerard’s attention. Worley again. It was undoubtedly mere coincidence, but it was a conspicuous one. He’d made a few subtle inquiries into the man but never learned much of interest. “Worley?”

  Howe nodded. “Yes. The Earl of Worley. He’s got property in Wiltshire. He and Mrs. Hollenbrook spent many evenings together.”

  Behind him Charlie made a slight noise. Gerard looked at his brother. There was an odd expression on Charlie’s face, as if he’d just thought of something long forgotten. His brother said nothing, though, just turning away and walking to the window. Gerard focused his attention back on the man across the table from him, once again shoving aside the mention of Worley. “Is Mrs. Hollenbrook given to whims? She came to Bath barely a fortnight ago and now has gone home, not back to London.”

  “Whims,” Howe repeated with a sour smile. “Whims and fancies and fits of temper that change course with the wind. I tell you, she was a principal reason I cared little for marrying Katherine. If the daughter should turn out to be like the mother, a man might run mad. She’s thoroughly absorbed in herself—not from malice, I believe, but her desires are always paramount, and she wears away one’s resistance. Even a man of discipline and resolve would find himself buckling under her entreaties. She weeps like a Madonna at the foot of the cross.” He sighed heavily. “But now she is your mama-in-law, and not my concern. And if we could just strike a more equitable bargain—”

  “Yes,” murmured Gerard, his mind racing. “You may have six months’ grace, and I shall drop the interest to two percent. I trust that will enable you to retrench.”

  Howe’s expression broke with relief. “Blessed be! Thank you, sir.”

  Gerard shook his hand. “You will hear from my solicitor, confirming it.”

  He and Charlie left the inn in silence. Gerard shuffled things around in his mind, connecting parts and filling in gaps. He’d long thought her mother wasn’t a good influence on Kate. Any woman who told Kate the hideous brown dress flattered her was either blind or cruel—and it was clear Mrs. Hollenbrook wasn’t blind where fashion was concerned. Howe claimed it wasn’t malicious, but Gerard wondered if, just perhaps, Mrs. Hollenbrook preferred Kate to remain a quiet, obedient creature so there was no possible chance of anyone’s diverting attention from the mother to the daughter. It might not even be a deliberate choice, but he had known too many society beauties to think it was impossible.

  In Kate’s case, it was far from impossible that it might happen. Dressed in stylish, flattering gowns, buoyed with a bit of confidence, and encouraged by friends like Cora and even those two magpies, Lady Darby and Mrs. Woodforde, his Kate was arresting. She would never have the stunning looks and vivacious manners that often caught men’s eyes and struck them dumb at first glance—like her mother—but she was something even more appealing at second glance: she was kind and warm and genuinely interested in others. Her wit was quiet but keen, and she never exercised it cruelly. Any man who spent half an hour in her company would quickly agree with Gerard that she was the proverbial hidden pearl, with a soft, quiet glow rather than the alluring sparkle of some women.

  So why had she gone away with her mother? To teach h
im a lesson? He almost hoped so; first, because he’d learned the lesson too well, and second because he was ready to repent until she forgave him. It would also mean she still loved him. He fervently hoped that was still true. If she’d gone away because she’d given up on him, it would be very bad.

  His thoughts were interrupted when Charlie spoke. He stopped and turned, and heard another voice calling his name. A thin, balding fellow was chasing them, waving one arm and holding his hat with the other hand. “Captain de Lacey!”

  “Yes?” As the man stumbled to a halt in front of them, breathing heavily, Gerard recognized him. “You’re the postal clerk.”

  “Yes, sir,” gasped the fellow, clutching one hand to his side. “William Brynfield, sir, of the Bath Post Office.”

  There was only one reason the postal clerk would be chasing him down the street. Gerard felt a flash of triumph. Beside him, Charlie cleared his throat expectantly. Damn it, he should have written more often to his brothers. But first he had to learn what the clerk knew. “Won’t you come inside, Mr. Brynfield?” he said, giving Charlie a quick nod. “You look in need of a bit of rest.”

  “Thank you, sir. I could use a moment at that.”

  Gerard led the way into the house, torn between elation and frustration. Brynfield could be about to hand him the blackmailer, leaving his way open to ending the infuriating, nebulous threat over his name. But he burned to go after Kate that instant, blackmailer be damned. Impatiently he threw open the drawing-room door and waved the clerk to a seat.

  “Yes, what is it?”

  Mr. Brynfield perched on the edge of the sofa, breathing almost normally again. “I remembered what you said, my lord, about the letters you brought in, and the man who sent them. I’ve come to let you know—that is, I saw him again today.”

  His muscles tightened instinctively. “Today? In Bath?” Gerard demanded. “Just now?”