To Seduce a Bride

by Nicole Jordan

  “No, not at all. But I must say I agree with them. There are significant advantages to you becoming Claybourne’s marchioness.”

  Her exasperation rising, Lily narrowed her eyes on her traitorous friend. “It amazes me that you would take their side. You never wished to marry.”

  “No…” Fanny replied slowly. “Our childhood in Hampshire was so deadly dull that all I could think of was escape. I wanted to be wild and gay, to fill my life with excitement and pleasure, not settle down as some fat squire’s broodmare. But I sometimes wonder if I made the right decision. I do get lonely at times, Lily, despite the gaiety. And having a husband and family might be the antidote to my doldrums. At least marriage is looking more and more appealing as I grow older.”

  She was entirely serious, Lily realized with astonishment. Yet Fanny’s possible change of heart regarding matrimony had nothing to do with her.

  Lily shook her head. “Being lonely is better than suffering the pain my mother endured all those years of marriage.”

  “You might be happy with the right husband.”

  “I don’t intend to risk it. Now, may we please change the subject?”

  Smiling ruefully, Fanny obliged. “Very well. Do you mean to attend Lady Freemantle’s garden party on Saturday?”

  “Yes…even though Lord Claybourne will likely be there and Winifred is sure to throw us together. I want to see my sisters. It has been over a month since I’ve even laid eyes on them. And now that his lordship knows my location, I have no reason to keep away from home.”

  “Lady Freemantle kindly invited me,” Fanny disclosed. “So would you like to ride with me in my carriage?”

  “Yes, indeed,” Lily replied, “since I have no transportation of my own here in London—”

  Just then Ellen the maid hurried into the drawing room, wringing her hands on her apron in obvious agitation. “Beg pardon, Miss Irwin…Miss Loring…but I think you should come at once. There’s a gent in Miss Delee’s sitting room who won’t leave. Mister O’Rourke is his name.”

  Her face paling, Fanny jumped up and made for the door, and Lily immediately followed her. Mick O’Rourke was the gaming hell owner to whom Fleur and Chantel owed thirty thousand pounds. Most likely he had come to demand the return of his money, and to possibly renew his threat to send them to debtors’ prison.

  “What will you tell him?” Lily asked as they quickly mounted the front staircase in the entrance hall.

  “I don’t know,” Fanny said worriedly. “I will have to implore him to grant us a little more time, since we don’t have the means to pay him just yet. And once I explain our plans for the soiree, perhaps he will be amenable. Mick always was an astute businessman.”

  Upon reaching the top of the stairs, they hastened down the corridor. Lily was directly on Fanny’s heels when they reached the sitting room. But what she saw when they entered made her blood run cold.

  While Chantel cowered on a corner of the settee, a ruggedly built, ebony-haired man stood menacingly close to Fleur, clutching her arm and growling down at her. “I have been lenient so far, woman! I gave you extra time, an entire month. But my patience is at an end. I want my money now, or Fanny will answer to me.”

  Fleur, however, only raised her chin imperiously to stare O’Rourke down. “You ill-bred oaf, I would not give you the time of day! You will not get a single halfpence as long as you continue to behave in this boorish manner. I demand you leave at once!”

  His face mottled with anger. “You dare to call me ill-bred?”

  “Yes, you brute!”

  In response to her aspersion, his grasp on Fleur tightened and he twisted her arm behind her back hard enough to make her cry out.

  “Mick, please! Let her go!” Fanny exclaimed in alarm.

  But Lily didn’t stop to plead or even to think. Rage welling up inside her at seeing her friend’s pain, she lunged across the room in three strides and began pummeling O’Rourke’s back with her fists. And when he abruptly released Fleur’s arm and turned to face Lily in startlement, she aimed a blow at his jaw, connecting with a powerful enough impact to make him stumble backward.

  “What the bloody devil…?” he exclaimed, raising his arms to protect his face.

  “Don’t you dare hurt her!” Lily declared furiously, still attacking with flailing fists.

  Yet when O’Rourke saw the size of his opponent, he stopped retreating and stood his ground, easily blocking her blows.

  Realizing her disadvantage in size and strength, Lily hastily glanced around her for a weapon, her gaze alighting on a thin bronze statue of a naked Aphrodite on a nearby table.

  Picking it up, she brandished it at O’Rourke. “Get out! Get out of this house this instant!”

  When he took a threatening step toward her, his eyes narrowing dangerously on her, Lily swung the statue at his shoulder and managed to hit him squarely on the joint.

  O’Rourke gave a shocked yelp of pain and fell back again, clutching his shoulder.

  “Get out, I say!” she repeated in a fierce hiss.

  He held up both his hands defensively, but his tone remained belligerent. “No one tells Mick O’Rourke what to do, Missy.”

  “Now! I mean it!” Lily demanded again, raising the statue to swing again.

  Practically grinding his teeth, O’Rourke brushed past her and stalked from the room.

  Fanny immediately went to Fleur to offer comfort, while Lily followed O’Rourke to make certain he left the house entirely.

  He stomped down the corridor, his fury obvious, but as he started down the flight of stairs, he called over his shoulder, “You haven’t heard the last of me! Prison will be the least of their worries, I promise you.”

  Wrath vibrated in his tone and in Lily’s retort as well as she moved to the head of the staircase, still wielding her statue. “We will find your money somehow! But you are not welcome here!”

  “I am leaving, you bloody madwoman,” he blustered, “but you’ll regret this, no mistake.”

  It registered on her that Lord Claybourne was mounting the stairs at the same moment and had paused halfway up, arrested by the commotion. But she only had eyes for O’Rourke.

  Lily stood there watching as he bounded down the lower steps and flung open the front door, then fled outside to the safety of his carriage.

  When he finally was gone, her gaze shifted blindly to Claybourne. He looked taken aback to have seen her drive O’Rourke from the house, yet it was hard for her to focus on him since she was so enraged, she was shaking.

  Then just as suddenly, her rage left her and her knees went weak. Reaching out, she grasped the balustrade with her free hand to keep from falling.

  In three strides, the marquess had sprung up the remaining stairs and caught her about the waist to steady her.

  “Sit,” he urged, guiding her down to sit on the top step.

  Having no strength left, she obeyed, even though she wanted to protest when he settled close beside her. But she seemed to have lost her voice. Her breath was coming in short gasps, while her body still trembled.

  He waited as she tried to gather her composure, although he pried the statue from her grasp and set it on the carpet.

  By then several people had gathered below—boarders and servants alike—and Claybourne gave them all a dismissive look as he said tersely, “You may go about your business.”

  His order instantly cleared the entrance hall, leaving Lily alone with him.

  “What happened?” he asked gently.

  “He was hurting Fleur,” Lily rasped.

  Muttering a sharp invective under his breath, he glanced sharply down at the front entrance door, as if he wanted to go after O’Rourke himself. But all he said was, “And you came to her rescue.”

  “Yes.” She had leapt to Fleur’s defense a moment ago, just as she had her mother all those years ago. Except that then it had been her father who had acted the brute, cruelly using his greater male strength against a smaller, weaker woman.
<
br />   Still shivering, Lily wrapped her arms around herself as the awful memory swept over her. Doubtless that was why she had reacted so fiercely this time—because she’d dealt with similar physical violence before.

  When she remained silent, Claybourne spoke again. “I take it that was O’Rourke, here to collect the gaming debt owed him.”

  She emitted a short, humorless laugh. “I believe so. I didn’t take the time to ask. When I found him threatening Fleur, all I could think about was stopping him.”

  Claybourne searched her face as his jaw hardened. “I will be more than happy to deal with O’Rourke for you.”

  It touched her that he was so ready to step in to protect her, Lily thought as his perceptive eyes regarded her intently. There was concern there in the hazel depths, along with anger. Anger she knew was on her behalf.

  Her own anger had mostly dissipated by now, but a darker emotion compressed her chest, welling up inside her with suffocating force. She couldn’t ward off the grim memories of that summer day when she was sixteen, when she’d intervened in her parents’ worst battle.

  For most of her childhood, Lily had taken refuge in the stables whenever they fought, but that particular day she had returned to the house unexpectedly. Upon hearing screams, she rushed into the drawing room, only to find her father striking her mother in a violent rage, pummelling her body…her breasts, her ribs, her stomach.

  For one horrified moment Lily stood frozen with heart-pounding fear, unable to breathe. Then hearing another helpless cry from her mother, she stumbled blindly forward and reached for the only weapon at hand—a knife used to pare quill pens. Her stomach roiling, she raised the blade high, brandishing it at her father threateningly, swearing to stab him with it if he didn’t leave Mama alone.

  Thank God he had heeded her.

  Despite his shock and fury, Sir Charles appeared to believe her warning. He spun on his heel and stalked from the room, leaving Lily to console her bitterly sobbing mother.

  To her knowledge, her father had never again raised a hand to her mother, but Lily had vowed then and there never to let any man hurt her like that.

  Shutting her eyes, she shuddered at the raw remembrance that still burned deep inside her. She still recalled the horror she’d felt. The gut-wrenching helplessness. The revulsion. The fear. She had hated her father in those few moments. And she had never forgiven him for his brutality.

  Lily could feel Claybourne’s penetrating gaze on her now, even before he spoke again in a quiet voice. “What is it, sweetheart? Something has upset you, and I don’t believe it was only that you had to chase a bully from the house.”

  Perhaps she should explain…. But no. She had no desire to share her most intimate fears with the marquess. She already felt too vulnerable to him.

  Why, she had never even told her sisters about the dreadful incident when she’d threatened to kill her own father; her mother hadn’t wanted them to know. Basil was the only one who had learned the ugly truth, and that was because he’d happened upon Lily shortly afterward, when she was still too upset to stop herself from spilling the sordid details.

  Indeed, she had tried to block them from her memory for years. But a woman’s natural fear of physical violence from a bigger, stronger male had always stayed with her.

  Which was why, when Claybourne raised a hand to touch her cheek, Lily flinched and drew back sharply.

  At her instinctively fearful response, he stilled and lowered his hand. “You should allow me to help,” he said quietly.

  His gentleness made her feel even worse, since she knew she had greatly overreacted.

  Biting her lip, Lily dragged in a deep breath. “Thank you, but I think we can deal with O’Rourke ourselves.”

  “At the very least I can make certain he won’t call here again.”

  Perhaps so, Lily thought, but I don’t wish to be so deeply obligated to you. “I think it might be better if Fanny deals with O’Rourke. They once were lovers, so she is most likely to persuade him to give us more time. I suspect he won’t look kindly on your interference, especially after you witnessed what I just did to him.”

  Claybourne hesitated. “Even so, he needs to know that your friends have a protector.”

  Lily’s mouth curled. “I’m afraid that won’t help much. They still owe O’Rourke an enormous sum.”

  “Ah, yes, the thirty thousand pounds.”

  His pause was longer this time, and when it ended, his tone was thoughtful. “I have a proposition for you. I will pay off their debt if you will agree to marry me.”

  Her gaze swung back to him, her eyes narrowing. “You cannot be serious.”

  A hint of rueful amusement flickered in his own eyes. “Why do you always refuse to believe me, love? I know my own mind. Thirty thousand pounds for your hand in marriage. Some might think it a very fair bargain.”

  Lily locked her jaw, vexed that he thought he could simply buy her for his wife. She was anxious to help her friends, yet she didn’t wish to make that immense a sacrifice, entering into a marriage of convenience to absolve their huge debt. Yet hopefully she wouldn’t have to.

  “We don’t require such magnanimity from you, my lord,” she eventually replied. “If we are fortunate, we will have the funds within a few weeks. You know of our plans for the soiree. Our boarders should be able to help pay off the debt to O’Rourke shortly.”

  “What if he insists on being paid now?” Claybourne asked. “You don’t want your friends to wind up in prison.”

  Lily pressed her lips together. “I won’t let that happen. Marcus settled twenty thousand pounds on me. If need be, they can have that.”

  He raised an eyebrow, evidently surprised. “You would donate your entire fortune to save them?”

  “It is far better than the alternative.”

  “What about the other ten thousand they owe?”

  “I will prevail upon Marcus or Lady Freemantle to loan me the money. They are both rich as nabobs. And Fanny has written a book that will be published next month. The publisher believes the subject—advice to young ladies who are searching for husbands—will be in great demand, and if so, the income will help her repay O’Rourke.”

  “But I can fund the entire debt now.”

  His persistence made Lily smile, albeit briefly. “You are exceedingly generous, my lord, but I must decline your proposition. At some point I may be desperate enough to consider it, but not just yet.”

  She doubted she would ever be that desperate, she added to herself. Her fracas with O’Rourke a few moments ago had forcibly reminded her exactly why she didn’t want to turn control of her fate over to a husband. She couldn’t, wouldn’t, trust any man enough to marry him and give him that kind of power over her.

  Lord Claybourne might not be the sort who would ever strike a woman, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t hurt her just as badly if she were legally tied to him, unable to escape. If she were trapped in a union where she was considered his property to do with as he pleased, just as her mother had been her father’s property.

  Uncomfortable with Claybourne’s searching look, Lily changed the subject. “Speaking of the soiree…have you invited some of your acquaintances as you promised?”

  “I have begun issuing invitations, yes.”

  “And were you able to find the sort of gentlemen I hoped for? Bachelors who are kind and gentle and who are wealthy enough to provide our boarders with good lives?”

  “Your standards are not easily met, but I am making progress. I expect to bring close to a dozen suitable candidates.”

  “Good.” She exhaled a sigh. Although her tremors had stopped, her chest still felt heavy, and there was still the grave issue of how to deal with O’Rourke to be determined.

  “I must go,” Lily said. “I need to see how Fleur is after her ordeal, and to help Fanny decide what must be done about O’Rourke.”

  She rose, but when Claybourne stood also, she hesitated. “Forgive me, I forgot. I promised you tea. You
are welcome to remain if you like, or you might prefer to return tomorrow when things should be more settled.”

  His smile was wry. “I’ll stay now, thank you. I can’t afford to turn down an invitation to be with you. I only have a fortnight to win our game, remember?”

  His light tone made Lily relax a little; she felt infinitely more comfortable returning to their game than dealing with his tenderness. “I will be sure to tell Fleur and Chantel of your generous offer to pay their debt. They will likely award you another point.”

  “The points don’t concern me as much as knowing whether O’Rourke will be bent on retaliation. He won’t thank you for showing him up, even if you were entirely in the right.”

  Lily wrinkled her nose. “I know. I suppose I should write him a note of apology and assure him that we plan to repay his debt…although my first inclination is probably best. We should let Fanny deal with him. She knows far better than I how to soothe a man’s wounded pride.”

  When she began moving down the corridor, Claybourne accompanied her. “True. But if you mean to keep attacking men who are much larger than you, you should learn how to fight.”

  Her gaze arresting, she glanced up at him, wondering if he was just making idle conversation. “Are you offering to teach me fisticuffs, my lord?”

  His chuckle was low and amused. “The thought gives me palpitations. I would far rather you cease tilting at windmills and endangering yourself so frequently…but I suppose that is too much to ask.”

  “Indeed it is,” Lily said sweetly. “But I have always wanted to learn how to fence. Mama wouldn’t hear of it when I was growing up. My virtually living in the stables was bad enough for her. I understand that Marcus and you and your friend Arden are expert swordsmen.”

  “We do well enough,” he acknowledged. “We practice regularly…or we did before Marcus and Arden lost their hearts to your sisters.”

  Lily eyed him thoughtfully. “If you were to give me fencing lessons, I could learn how to defend myself better. I know how to shoot but not how to wield a rapier.”

  Claybourne laughed outright at that. “Will I earn points for instructing you?”