“Have I….?”
“Offered.”
“I…no.” Jeffrey shook his head. “No, I haven’t asked her…anything.”
“Do you intend to?”
The Duke’s gaze was hard now, peering over the rim of his spectacles at Jeffrey as though he could look into Jeffrey’s mind.
“I…I’m at sea so often.” Jeffrey fell back on his best and most tried-and-true excuse.
“You won’t be forever. And when your commission comes to an end, you will be wanting a wife and a family to come home to, I’ll wager.”
This struck to the heart of a fear that was so deep in Jeffrey that he rarely allowed himself to think of it. Being alone was fine when he was young. He had a full life, and many things to keep him too busy to let the self-pity work its way into his mind. But one day he would be old. He would be tired and alone, with no wife to love him, no children to comfort him.
“My daughter could never abide by the sorts of fine gentlemen that go around in society, Captain Pemberton. She finds them dull, I’m told.” The Duke smiled gently to himself. His pride in his daughter was palpable. “I don’t think she would begrudge you your time at sea. She has her own work to attend to and keep her busy. So long as you could entertain her with tales of your adventures when you come back to her. In fact, I’m not surprised that she would find such an arrangement…romantic.”
“Has she…” Jeffrey cleared his throat. “Has she spoken to you…about these things?”
“Oh no. No. Keeps these sorts of matters close to her chest, my girl. I know her, though. And I have eyes.”
“Ah,” Jeffrey said, relieved.
“I will leave it at this, son,” the Duke said, standing up once more. A pang went to Jeffrey’s heart at being called “son” and he thought of his father. “You know as well as I how cruel this world can be to ladies who reach a certain age without finding a husband. It isn’t fair, but it’s the way things are. Don’t waste her time.”
The Duke’s gaze was hard again, and the look he gave Jeffrey was as stern as such a kindly gentleman could muster.
“No, Sir. I understand,” Jeffrey said.
They were soon reunited with the ladies in the drawing room. Barbara was seated quietly in a chair, her head held high despite the embarrassment that she surely was feeling. Jeffrey shuddered to think of what his mother had subjected her to on their journey to the aviary. His mother didn’t hate birds, but he’d never heard of her having any great love for them, either. What had surely seemed like a perfectly innocent interest in domesticated birds was transparently a ploy to him. She had just wanted to speak to Barbara alone.
He watched Barbara now, hoping to get some clue as to their conversation in her manner. She was perfectly poised though. Calm and pleasant, smiling at the correct moments and offering little bits of conversation here and there.
She was almost too composed. Perhaps he was reading too much into it, but she seemed unusually formal, uncharacteristically correct in her manner.
She was hiding her true feelings.
She hates me for taking advantage of her. She wants nothing more than for me and my impertinent mother to leave and never come back.
“I’m afraid it’s getting late,” he said in a welcome lull in conversation. “I’ve been ordered by my commander to rest, after all.”
“Oh, but My Lord, we were about to get the card table out,” his mother protested.
“I really must insist,” he said with a placating smile that was just slightly too syrupy, betraying his true state of mind to her.
“I suppose he’s right,” his mother said, smiling to the Duke. “Always the pragmatist. It was a perfectly lovely evening, Your Grace. We simply must get together again soon.”
As the Duke said his goodbyes to his mother, Jeffrey turned to Barbara. They had gone the entire evening never once speaking directly to each other. Moving toward her, he reached for her hand. She stiffened, but she seemed to know that it would draw attention if she snatched her hand away from him. He took advantage of her gentility, bringing her small gloved hand to his lips as he bowed.
“Lady Barbara,” he said.
“Captain.”
Her voice was guarded, her tone wary. It was so different from the way she had sighed his name in the grove. Hearing her call him Captain again, even if it might have just been pretense to mask their prior intimacy in front of their parents, struck him like a blow.
“I’ll come tomorrow,” he said in a low voice. He couldn’t avoid her anymore. If nothing else, this night had brought into light the necessity of speaking to her alone again, one way or another.
She nodded silently. He squeezed her hand, but she offered no reassurance that she didn’t hate him for what he’d done.
In the carriage on the ride back to his mother’s house, Jeffrey gripped onto the handle of the door. It was black as pitch outside, but he stared out the window anyway.
“Well Jeffrey, that was lovely, just lovely,” his mother said, checking the setting of her gray curls with her hand. “Your Lady Barbara grows more charming every time I see her. And the Duke is a fine man, most gracious, don’t you think?”
“Yes,” Jeffrey said, hoping that monosyllabic answers would stifle his mother’s urge to chatter on.
“What did the Duke talk to you about while Lady Barbara and I were looking at the aviary?”
“I never knew you had an interest in birds, mother,” Jeffrey said.
“I have an interest in her. She expects you to propose to her, you know. It isn’t right to keep her waiting like this. I assume that the Duke said as such to you. Am I correct?”
“She expects it? She told you this?” Jeffrey asked, ignoring her question.
“Why, of course she expects it. Everyone does. I will have you know that your riding out to the orphanage day after day has not gone unnoticed. Whatever are you waiting for? She’s getting older, that one.”
“She’s practically a child yet,” Jeffrey said, remembering her father’s words about the cruelty of the world toward women her age. “When I was her age, no one was hounding me about marriage.”
“Oh Jeffrey” his mother tittered. “You know it’s different for ladies. A man may fritter his youth away and still produce an heir in his later years. Women cannot be so frivolous with their vital years.”
Jeffrey turned back toward the window to hide a grimace.
Perhaps Barbara had said that she loved him out of desperation. She was tired of being told that she was getting too old to marry and had decided that marriage to a captain who would spend much of his time at sea would be her least painful option.
He took a slow breath. Perhaps that was good enough for him. She may not truly love him, but she tolerated him, and he could give her security and the legitimacy she craved as a capable, respectable lady. Perhaps, as the years went on, she would come to grow used to his scars, and think warmly about him.
Their children could bind them together.
His blood surged at that thought. Would she turn him out of the marriage bed after the heir was born? Or would she want more? She was a natural mother, her love for children shone through from every deed of her public life.
Yes, it would be enough. Even if he was nothing more than a means to an end for her, he would be grateful to be in her bed at all.
Chapter 26
The ride from his mother’s home to his townhouse felt long. Jeffrey stewed in his own thoughts of Barbara. He couldn’t imagine what she might have said to his mother in response to the needling she surely received, but he wished he knew. He had almost broken down and pressed his mother for details about Barbara’s reaction, but he knew that to do so would be as good as a confession that he wanted to marry her in the first place.
And for his mother to know that would only make her double down on her efforts to finagle a wedding.
Jeffrey slouched low in the carriage seat, gazing at his reflection in the blackened window. When he arrived at home
, he strode into the house only to be stopped by Gibson, who had been lounging in the drawing room under the light of a single lamp.
“Hey hey hey, where are you off to so quick?” Gibson asked, standing up.
Jeffrey halted mid-stride. “Oh, I—”
Gibson laughed. “You forgot I was here!”
Jeffrey scratched the back of his neck. “It’s been quite a night.”
“Come, drink with me. Tell me how it went. I assume your mother was as charming as ever?” Gibson seemed to be fairly deep into his cups already, his cravat hanging loosely around his neck and his shirt rumpled. Despite how mature he seemed now after getting married and starting a family, he was still the same man, after all.
“Did you wait up for me?” Jeffrey asked jokingly as he poured himself a drink as well and collapsed onto the settee. It was strange, to come home to a house that wasn’t empty. Part of him wished he could just go to bed, but he didn’t want to take his friend’s rare company for granted either. He pulled on his own cravat and tossed it aside.
“Sure I did. I want to know what happened with you and Barbara.”
“What could happen? I hardly got a word in with her in private.” Jeffrey had confessed to his friend what had happened on the road to Barbara’s house the other day. There’d been no use in trying to conceal that something had transpired when he had arrived home, anyway.
“Truthfully? I half expected the parents to force you onto your knee right there at the table. I thought you might come home a betrothed man.” Gibson cocked his head to the side, studying Jeffrey. “No?”
“No.” Jeffrey swallowed thickly of his second drink of the night.
“How did she seem? Angry? Lovesick?”
Jeffrey sighed heavily, dragging his finger along the pattern on the upholstered arm of the settee. He didn’t know how Gibson could sound so light about the whole ordeal. It was as if he was gossiping idly about a schoolboy crush. Jeffrey just waited for Gibson to suggest writing her an anonymous love letter.
“Neither. Just, distant, I suppose. Ashamed, most likely.”
Gibson clicked his tongue. “That’s not good.”
Jeffrey chuckled darkly. “No, it’s not. Her father pulled me aside and I was sure for a moment that I was going to be shot.”
“You think she’d tell her father?”
Jeffrey shrugged. “I thought, maybe. But I don’t think she did. He just told me not to waste her time.”
“He’s quite right there, old boy. Better propose now rather than wait until the next time you’re carried off in a secluded corner with her. If you wait until the next time it happens, she’ll think you’re only marrying her out of duty.” Gibson was lounging in a chair, his long legs splayed out across the rug. How could he look so comfortable discussing this? Jeffrey felt like he was about to crawl out of his skin with frustration and worry.
“Next time? There won’t be a next time. I never should have touched her in the first place. It’s cast this whole thing into confusion and misery. I’ll never make that mistake again.”
His vows were cut off by Gibson’s sudden peal of laughter. Jeffrey frowned, taking another hearty swig of his drink.
“You’re a damned fool, Jeffrey Pemberton. It’ll never happen again, y’say? And when’s the next time you’ve arranged to see her in private?”
Jeffrey’s frown deepened. “Tomorrow.”
Gibson giggled into his cup. “Tomorrow, he says.”
“To talk to her. That’s all.”
Gibson laughed again and a flash of anger went through him.
Damn drunken fool.
“Why, though? Why only talk? Why not propose? Why not kiss her whenever you want? Why not bring her home and make her your wife, eh? Why punish yourself?” Gibson asked. The lamp next to him flickered. There had apparently been a fire in the fireplace before, some embers still glowed under the white layer of ash, but the room was cold. Jeffrey longed to go to bed.
“She doesn’t really want me,” he answered. It seemed too obvious to him, he didn’t understand why Gibson and his mother couldn’t see it.
“That’s not what she said. She said she loves you. And clearly she wanted you enough to let you lay her down in a bed of grass in broad daylight.”
It was clover.
“She just—”
“Why not trust her, Jeffrey? She’s not some foolish chit experiencing the first blush of excitement at the hand of men. She’s old enough to know her own mind. Or don’t you respect her?”
“Of course, I do,” Jeffrey snapped, standing up.
“Really? Because you act like you think she’s too stupid to know what she wants. Maybe you are the one who was simply taking out your sexual frustration on the first willing participant you could find? I don’t begrudge you the urge but perhaps the daughter of a Duke wasn’t the wisest candidate.”
Jeffrey tipped his glass back, emptying it and placing it down on the table. “I’m going to bed.”
“Don’t be angry, Jeffrey,” Gibson said lazily. “You’re being an ass and you know it.”
“Goodnight,” Jeffrey said, leaving the room.
“Goodnight!” Gibson called out behind him.
Jeffrey stalked up to his room, slamming the door closed once he got there. He fairly ripped off his evening attire, grumbling to himself the whole time as he readied himself for bed.
I wish they’d all just leave me be. They don’t know what it’s like to grow up with this face. Just propose to her….easy for them to say!
He was still muttering irritatedly when he pulled the covers up over his head, rolling onto his side and forced himself to sleep.
* * *
The following morning, Jeffrey left before Gibson woke up. The very last thing he needed was a reprisal of the argument from the night before, which was still ringing in his ears as he woke with the dawn. Woke being a generous term in this case, as he had hardly slept. He had passed the night half conscious, his thoughts and emotions racing from one extreme to the other. First he would believe that all was hopeless, that he would die old and alone with no one to love him, and then he would swing to the other extreme and convince himself that if he asked Barbara to marry him she would throw her arms around his neck again and love him to the end of time.
It was exhausting.
In the blueish half-light of early morning, he dressed himself warmly. He didn’t want to take a carriage. Despite his sleeplessness, he was brimming with nervous energy. He still didn’t know what he would say to her when he saw her, he only knew that he had to say something. They couldn’t leave it as it was. One way or another, he needed to sort this thing out. And soon, because these long nights were beginning to take their toll on him.
“Shall I call the carriage, Sir?” Alfred asked while Jeffrey inhaled his breakfast.
“No. No,” Jeffrey shook his head. “I’m going to walk. Gibson will be ill when he wakes up. Bring him plenty of water and dark coffee. Dry toast. You know,” he waved his hand.
“Yes, Sir.”
“It’s no wonder he got married. He never did learn self-discipline. That wife of his must be the brains of the marriage.” He was speaking mostly to himself, but the hint of a wry smile played on the butler’s mouth and he had to wonder what kind of mischief Gibson had gotten into while he’d been away. It was impossible to stay angry at him.
There was a fine mist hanging in the air during his walk to the orphanage, and dew clung heavily onto each blade of grass. The streets were largely empty still, and the air was cool and crisp. It would have been a lovely morning, were his thoughts not so muddled. He still didn’t quite know what he would say to her once he saw her, only that he couldn’t go another day without speaking to her.
He had to smooth things over, somehow. The coldness in her eyes at dinner had been too much to bear.
As he rounded the corner to where the orphanage was, his breath caught in his throat. There she was, up the road, coming down from her house. A wild urge t
o dive into the bushes came over him, but he maintained his composure, even when she looked up from her feet and saw him standing there. She stopped for just a moment, apparently as surprised to see him as he was to see her. It appeared that they had both thought to gain the upper hand by being the first to arrive.
Her surprise lasted only a fleeting moment though, and he watched as she seemed to steel herself, straightening her spine and continuing along the road until they met at the steps to the orphanage.
“Good morning, Captain Pemberton,” she said rather haughtily, not stopping as she climbed the steps. She retrieved a key from her reticule and opened the heavy door, letting him in first.
A Seductive Lady For The Scarred Earl (Steamy Regency Romance) Page 18
