Always Proper, Suddenly Scandalous

by Christi Caldwell

  Not like Geoffrey. Selfish, cowardly bastard who couldn’t sort out which was of greater importance—his heart’s desire for Abigail Stone or his familial obligations. “What do you want?” he asked tersely.

  The hard planes of Sinclair’s face settled into an uncharacteristically serious mask. “I thought you might need a friend.”

  Geoffrey chuckled, the sound harsh and raw to his own ears. “And is that what you are? A friend?”

  “Yes.”

  That simple confirmation struck Geoffrey. “I don’t have any friends.”

  An inelegant snort escaped Sinclair. “Probably because you’re such a pompous prig.”

  Geoffrey managed his first half-grin since Lord and Lady Ainsworth’s ball two days past. Odd, he’d imagined he’d never be able to muster a hint of a smile again after Abigail had walked out of his life. The grin died on his lips. Geoffrey reached for the bottle and sloshed several fingerfuls into his glass.

  He took a long swallow, no longer feeling the sharp burn of the brew.

  “You loved her.”

  Geoffrey’s fingers tightened hard about his glass at Sinclair’s statement. The faint tremor in his hands sent liquid drops spraying onto the table. He wanted to snap and snarl like a caged beast. How dare Sinclair come and force him to speak of her, in White’s, with his ragged spirit bared for all to see?

  Geoffrey swirled his brandy. “I did.” The whisper tore from deep inside him. I do.

  Sinclair raised his glass to his lips. He studied Geoffrey over the rim, took a sip, and then tugged his chair closer to the table. “Do you think any of this matters, Redbrooke?” He waved his hand, gesturing to the club. “Do you believe these heartless bastards were more important than your own happiness?”

  Geoffrey’s throat worked up and down. “It is not that simple,” Geoffrey said hoarsely. “She lied. She deliberately deceived me.” He cleared his throat, squaring his jaw. “And, in her actions the lady had sneered in the face of propriety and I cannot in good conscience wed such a woman.”

  “Surely you’re not so foolish as to believe those words.” He dropped his voice to a harsh whisper. “What would you have had the lady do? Bandy her shame about the ton? Would you have had her share the fact that she’d been forced across the ocean because she’d been discovered with her lover?”

  Oh, God. Geoffrey gripped the edge of the table, his nails bit hard into the hardwood surface. Sinclair’s words ate at him like poison that destroyed.

  Sinclair sat his glass down with a loud thunk. He planted his elbows upon the table. “This isn’t about your title or propriety. This is about nothing more than your own jealousy, Redbrooke.”

  Geoffrey froze, allowing that volatile charge to seep into his brandy-laden brain. He shook his head. “No.”

  “Yes. I’m telling you this because I’m your friend.”

  “I don’t have any friends,” Geoffrey said blankly.

  “No, you don’t. With the exception of me, of course.” Sinclair took a sip of his drink. “Have you attempted to speak to the duke?”

  Geoffrey shook his head jerkily. He’d intended to. At Lady Ainsworth’s he’d made plans to call on the duke and request Abigail’s hand in marriage. Had it been only two days since his world had fallen apart.

  “I haven’t.” Nor would he. There was nothing left to say. He’d said everything and then some, on that thunderous night when he’d shoved Abigail into a hired hackney

  Sinclair shook his head. “I never took you for a coward, Redbrooke.”

  His life had been coldly empty and meaningless until her. She’d taught him to again laugh, had forced him to confront the feelings of guilt and shame he carried over his role in Father’s death. Could Geoffrey trade all that he valued, his mother’s stringent expectations, his own self-pride, for her?

  I’m not unlike you. I loved and trusted…and was deceived.

  And how had he repaid her love? He’d turned his back on her, treating her as nothing more than a common strumpet in the street.

  Oh, god, what have I done?

  Geoffrey’s shoulders stiffened, as a steely resolve filled him. “I love her,” he said into the quiet. He shoved his chair back. “I need to see her.”

  Sinclair’s eyes went wide. All the color drained from his olive-hued cheeks. “Christ,” he hissed. He reached for the decanter and poured a glass full of brandy. He proceeded to down the contents in a long, steady swallow.

  Something in the man’s horrified expression, the blend of shock and pity in his blue eyes gave Geoffrey pause. His heart thudded in his breast.

  “What is it?” he asked, his voice hoarse.

  Sinclair set his glass down hard, and shoved it away. He leaned across the table; his eyes seemed to search Geoffrey’s face. “You do not know,” he said, the spoken words a statement, not a question, said more to himself.

  The odd thumping of his heart increased its rhythm, pounding hard, and painful, threatening to shatter his chest. “Know what?” He reached across the table and gripped Sinclair by the lapels of his double-breasted jacket.

  Shocked gasps and loud whispers filled White’s. Geoffrey ignored them. “Know what?” he asked, giving a shake.

  Sinclair turned his palms up. “There was an accident.”

  And Geoffrey’s world stopped.

  ***

  Geoffrey rode at a maddening speed through the streets of London. He kneed his horse Decorum onward toward the Duke of Somerset’s townhouse.

  The pounding of Decorum’s hooves echoed around his mind.

  There was an accident.

  There was an accident.

  Oh, Christ.

  A carriage accident. Head injuries. Injured arm. Possibly broken. Unlikely she’ll survive.

  Bile burned like acid at the back of his throat, and his stomach churned until he nearly cast the contents of his stomach onto the muddied London streets.

  As he came to the duke’s townhouse, Geoffrey jerked on Decorum’s reins with such force, the horse reared and pawed the air with its front legs. Geoffrey leapt down, and tossed the reins over to a nearby street urchin. He tossed the boy a sovereign. “Wait for me. There will be more,” he said, his words harsh and hard.

  He raced up the steps, and pounded upon the front of the door.

  I sent her away.

  I put her in that carriage and sent her off.

  The butler pulled the door open and Geoffrey shoved past the butler.

  “My lord, the family is not receiving callers,” the servant said, his flinty eyes as hard as the edge to his words.

  Geoffrey swept a circle about the foyer. He scraped a hand through his hair, and glanced up the stairway. He considered storming the bloody townhouse until he located her. “Abigail,” he forced out. And then remembered himself, “Miss Stone. I’m here to see Miss Stone.”

  Mayhap Sinclair had been mistaken. Mayhap a gossipy ton had merely circulated a story fashioned on hideous rumors.

  Something flashed in the other man’s eyes and Geoffrey knew with all the intuitiveness of a man who’d suffered great loss, that the rumors were indeed true. “Miss Stone is indisposed.” The butler motioned to the door. “Now if you will, my lord.”

  Geoffrey stepped around the butler and made for the stairs.

  The butler gasped. “My lord,” he planted himself in front of Geoffrey halting his advance.

  “Get the hell out of my way,” he seethed. He knew how he must look; like a madman escaped Bedlam and for the first time in his life, he didn’t give a damn for propriety.

  “What is the meaning of this?” A sharp voice barked from the top of the stairs.

  Geoffrey looked up as the Marquess Westfield stomped down the stairs.

  “You?” Westfield growled. His lip pulled back in a sneer.

  Geoffrey didn’t anticipate the other man’s right handed jab to his cheek.

  The air left Geoffrey as the force of Westfield’s unexpected blow knocked him to his knees.

&nbs
p; “You bloody bastard,” Westfield seethed. Westfield dragged him up by the front of his jacket, and gave him a solid shake. “You dare come here?”

  Geoffrey staggered to his feet. He pressed the back of his coat sleeve to staunch his bleeding nose. He winced, certain Westfield had broken it which was no less than Geoffrey deserved. “I…Abigail…I heard…Is it true…?”

  Westfield’s eyes narrowed to impenetrable slits. “What do you want?” he finally said. “It is my understanding that you were very clear in your feelings for Abigail.”

  His mind raced. “She told you.” That I sent her away. That I handed her up into the carriage. That I said she was unworthy of me. When in actuality, Geoffrey had never deserved her. Abigail had always been entirely too good for him.

  Westfield’s eyes blazed with fury. “The bloody servant who escorted her to your townhouse was very informative.” He stuck his finger out, pointing to the door. “Now get the hell out.” He clasped Geoffrey by the forearm.

  Geoffrey jerked his arm free. He pulled a kerchief from his jacket and held it to his nose. “I’m not leaving, Westfield.”

  “By god, I’ll summon a team of servants to have you removed from this foyer if you do not leave immediately.” As if he’d been waiting in the wings for his master’s orders, the butler reappeared.

  Geoffrey ignored the stocky servant. “Abigail…”

  “Is dead,” Westfield spat, and with a curt nod to the butler, spun on his heel and marched purposefully back up the stairs.

  Geoffrey stared up after him, unblinking. His heart thudded to a slow halt.

  Dead.

  Dead.

  He took his head in his hands, and shook it wildly back and forth. Surely he’d heard Westfield wrong. Surely he’d know if Abigail had died because his heart would have known, and would have ceased to beat. Geoffrey dug his fingers into his temples and searched the foyer.

  “Oh, God,” the agonized entreaty tore from deep inside him. The crimson stained handkerchief fell to the floor.

  Geoffrey searched for purchase, and found none as the life drained from his legs. He collapsed to his knees. He dimly registered the butler speaking to someone, but the voices came as if down a long hall. Geoffrey sucked in deep, gasping breaths as his past and present blurred together with a dreadfully remarkable likeness.

  Someone touched a hand to Geoffrey’s shoulder, and he snarled feeling like a caged beast set free.

  “Lord Redbrooke?” The delicate, gentle female tone broke through the cloud of madness that gripped him.

  He blinked. “Lady Beatrice,” he said, his voice hoarse.

  Lady Beatrice glanced around, and said something to the butler. The servant nodded and with a bow took his leave. “I overheard your conversation with my brother. I do not approve of your treatment of Abby last evening, but my brother’s actions were unforgiveable.”

  Geoffrey struggled to put her words into some semblance of order that made sense.

  “Abigail is not dead,” she said.

  Geoffrey’s eyes slid closed, as a prayer slipped from his lips. He grabbed Lady Beatrice’s hands in his. “Thank you.”

  Lady Beatrice tugged him to his feet. “Hurry. My brother and father mustn’t find out. Come, I’ll take you to her.”

  Energy filled his strides. “How is she?” he rasped.

  Lady Beatrice shot a pointed look over her shoulder, and touched a finger to her lips. “Hush.” She guided him abovestairs and down the hall, past several wide-eyed servants. She stopped in front of a door, and looked up at him. “Abigail injured her arm. She suffered a head injury, and has not awakened since the accident. Now, you must be quick, my lord.” She reached for the door handle, and then hesitated. “She is…not well, my lord.”

  Geoffrey reached past her, and pressed the handle. He entered the room.

  Beatrice closed the door behind him.

  His eyes struggled to adjust to Abigail’s dark chambers. He took a tentative step toward the massive, feather-down four poster bed at the center of the room.

  “Abby,” he called quietly.

  The popping of the embers within the fireplace hearth made the only sound in the ominously quiet chambers.

  Geoffrey took several tentative steps toward the bed, and stopped when his knees knocked the white coverlet. He sucked in an anguished breath, and sank onto the stark white coverlet. “Abby,” he breathed.

  Her face looked an artist’s palate of green, purple, and blue hues. A large, ugly, distended knot marred the center of her forehead. “Oh, Abby,” he whispered. He reached for her hand, and froze at the sight of a sling that had been fashioned to stabilize her arm. He wanted to toss his head back and hurl vile epithets at the heavens. And yet, he had no one to blame except himself. He’d done this. Just as he’d sent his father away, he’d sent Abby fleeing. An odd gurgling rumbled deep in his chest. Geoffrey’s vision blurred, as he realized the great, gasping sobs came from him. “What have I done?” he rasped.

  The cruel emptiness of silence, his only answer.

  Through tear-filled eyes, he studied Abigail’s injured arm and his stomach churned as he imagined the pain she’d suffered when the dislocated limb had been popped back into place.

  Geoffrey reached for her other, uninjured hand. He picked up her delicate palm and turned it over in his hand, studying her long, elegant fingers.

  His mind tripped back to the night she’d interlocked their hands and held them up to the star-studded skies.

  That is Lyra.

  He raised her hand to his mouth, and brushed his lips along the inner portion of her wrist. “Oh, Abby, I love you.” He studied her blackened eyes for any sign of awareness but she remained in the thick haze of slumber that had stolen her from the now, and kept her in the darkened world at the edge of death. “I have loved you since the moment I knocked over Lord and Lady Hughes’s servant’s tray of champagne and nearly toppled you to the floor.” He dropped to his knees beside her bed. “I am nothing without you.” His words broke. “Do you know Abby, I thought the greatest crime I’d committed against my father lie in failing to honor my responsibilities. Only now,” too late, “do I realize, how very wrong I’ve been. My greatest offence lies in not listening to him, and now…you. Forgive me.”

  The door opened and closed.

  Geoffrey didn’t take blurry gaze from Abigail’s swollen, bruised eyes.

  “Lord Redbrooke. You must go,” Lady Beatrice whispered.

  He managed a jerky nod. Except, he could not make his legs move. “I can’t leave her.”

  The soft pad of her slippered feet upon the hardwood floor filled the quiet. She stopped next to Abigail’s bed. “You must, my lord. I promise I’ll send word.”

  “Why would you help me in this way?” Why, when I am the contemptible bastard who treated Abigail like the refuse upon my boots?

  “Because you love her. And she loves you.”

  Or she had. His eyes fixed on her too-still form. She had to get well. Because the alternative would break him down until he was nothing more than an empty shell of a human-being. There was no life worth living if she were not part of it and when she opened her eyes, he would spend the rest of his days proving himself worthy of her, proving himself different than the bastard who’d stolen her innocence and viciously betrayed her. And she would open her eyes. He willed the words to truth.

  Geoffrey stood on shaky legs. “Thank you, my lady.”

  She nodded. “Now, follow me.” Lady Beatrice started for the door.

  “And you’ll send word?” Geoffrey asked, as he walked beside her.

  “Every day,” she promised.

  As Geoffrey slipped from the duke’s townhouse like a silent thief absconding with the Crown’s jewels, Geoffrey resolved to become the man Abigail deserved.

  And propriety and respectability could both go to the devil.

  A gentleman should recognize when he errs, and is not too proud to then make his apologies.

  4th Viscount R
edbrooke

  ~26~

  Abigail lived in a world where reality blended with dream; where pain blended with terror. She thrashed upon her pillow as fingers poked at her person. A cry gurgled up her throat and spilled past her lips as large, sure hands prodded at her shoulder.

  She registered the Duke of Somerset conversing with another man. The tormentor; the prodder whose excruciating touch filled her with agony, murmured something to the duke.

  Head injury.

  Accident.

  Dire.

  Unlikely she’ll live.

  Who did they speak of? Pity filled her for the poor, unfortunate soul who fought for her life. Abigail struggled to open her eyes and form words…as with a mounting horror, hideous memories crept in.

  Geoffrey.

  The numbing throb behind her eyes, intensified until nausea boiled in her stomach and she remembered.

  Geoffrey’s derision.

  His rejection.

  The accident.

  Oh, God. The poor soul they spoke of…

  It is me.

  I hear you. I can’t die. But the fingers of unconsciousness tugged her back into its inky black folds, and this time she gladly sank into the slumberous state.

  She wavered in and out of a murky consciousness, filled with a desperation to see her family and assure them she would survive. In the deepest yearnings of her suffering, Geoffrey came to her, knelt at her side, pleaded forgiveness. And then, the soft, loving gentleman would transform into a derisive, sneering figure she didn’t recognize. Through it all, Abigail remained trapped in the silent state.

  Until at last, she blinked her eyes open.

  A guttural groan wrenched from deep inside and increased the throbbing pressure behind her eyes. She turned her head slightly, taking in the darkness of the still room.

  Abigail closed her eyes again in attempt to rid herself of the piercing pain that pounded at her skull.