Love's Reward (8 page)

A rattle of carriages and a splashing of horses’ hooves could be faintly heard in the street outside, broken by the steady tolling of church bells. It was raining. The light seeping through the tall windows into Lord Grantley’s study in Whitehall was dull and flat, leaving the room washed in tones of gray.

“We were wrong, sir,” Fitzroy said. “It is not Lady Carhill. Greeks and Trojans mean nothing to her. I was then forced to extricate myself from a rather delicate situation.”

Lord Grantley was a generation older than Fitzroy, his white hair curling away from a balding brow. The buttons on his ivory waistcoat stretched a little too tightly over a portly belly, but he embodied command. He stood looking down at his guest with a slight frown.

“It’s a damnable business, Tarrant. So who’s left?”

Fitzroy smiled up at the older man. “After Lady Carhill? Lady Reed and Lady Kettering. Three ladies, two more campaigns of seduction.”

“You damned dog! Very lovely ladies, too. It shouldn’t be difficult for someone of your talents.”

“There is a small change in my situation, however,” Fitzroy said.

Lord Grantley raised a questioning brow. “Which is—?”

“I’m to marry on Friday.”

“Marry?” The word burst out, an explosion of annoyance and shock.

“Indeed. It’s a common enough human pastime—to tie oneself for life to a perfect stranger in a bond that can never be broken. Who does not marry? Aren’t we all gluttons for punishment?”

“But
marry
! Now? To whom, by God?”

“The lady who honors me with her hand is Lady Joanna Acton, the famous countess’s younger daughter. She favors her mother in looks, so you may believe that I have effected a coup, if you like.”

Lord Grantley still looked completely astonished. “But the chit’s not even had a Season, has she?”

“No. She comes to her nuptials straight from school, unsullied and refreshingly naive. Our fathers have arranged the match. A little gothic, but there you are. The wedding will take place at King’s Acton, a private affair, just immediate family. I shall thus be out of town for a few days.”

“And you agreed to this? At this juncture? When Lady Kettering holds a ball this Friday? It may be critical that you attend. For God’s sake, Tarrant, have you gone mad?”

“Very possibly.” Fitzroy stood up. “But a little delay will probably do no harm. It will keep our villain guessing, at least, and Lady Kettering offers another dance in a fortnight. Apart from missing this one upcoming ball, the marriage will not interfere in any way with my work.”

“Ha! You would not say so if you had ever been—” Lord Grantley broke off and bit his lip.

“But I was married, of course.”

“I’m sorry. For a moment I had forgotten. I shouldn’t have mentioned it.”

Fitzroy’s knuckles shone white as his fingers closed hard on the stem of his glass.

“To Juanita, whom I sacrificed willingly for the cause in the Peninsula. But poor Juanita was an orphan, so my crime went unavenged. Sacrifice should not be necessary, and would most certainly not be wise this time, unless it is mine, of course.”

“For God’s sake, Tarrant!”

“Lady Joanna has several puissant brothers, and her father is well known to you—not a man to cross lightly. I don’t want any of the Actons breathing down my neck, so I shall try to be as discreet with the ladies as you could possibly wish.”

“But what will you do, sir, if the ladies do not wish for discretion?”

Fitzroy kept his voice entirely free of distress as he replied with a certain humor.

“I don’t know, Lord Grantley. My duty, no doubt.”

* * *

Joanna returned to London in an oddly detached daze. It all seemed so unreal. The journey with Lord Evenham and Richard, where the two men talked politely of commonplaces as if nothing momentous had occurred, passed in a blur.

Her arrival at Acton House to face her father should have caused her some consternation, at least. Instead, she walked into the house quite calmly to find that the earl had gone out, and her mother wished to see her.

She went up to the withdrawing room, which looked out over Park Lane, to discover the countess busy at her writing desk, compiling lists. It was too strange to comprehend. Everything seemed unchanged: the gilt chairs, the voluptuous goddess sailing across the ceiling in shades of blue and pink, her mother’s calm, quizzical look as she tapped her perfect cheek with the feathered end of her quill.

“Ah, Joanna! But where is Richard?”

Joanna walked restlessly to the fireplace and back. “He went straight home to Acton Mead. He said he didn’t trust himself to meet Father until he had given Helena a chance to calm him down.”

“Very wise, no doubt. They will join us soon enough at King’s Acton for the wedding. Pray, sit down, my silly child. Now, I have drawn up a list of clothes and other things that you will need. And I have found you a wedding dress. Would you like to see it?”

“To be honest, Mama, I really don’t care if I’m married in sackcloth and ashes.”

“Ah, I was afraid it would be like that. Was Lord Tarrant quite impossible?”

Joanna’s lips twisted just a little as she bit back a derisive grin.

“Richard doesn’t like or trust him. They almost came to blows.”

“A bad sign, I admit. Richard is usually an excellent judge of character. Does he think Tarrant merely offensive, or actually dangerous?”

“He’s an arrogant, self-centered rogue.”

Joanna felt a faint stirring of dread as she said it. They weren’t just words, were they? They meant something real, something quite appalling to face.

She was to be tied to this man for life. Once it was done, it could never be undone. She must swear to love, honor, and obey him till death did them part. As the panic leaped into her throat, threatening to strangle her, she crossed the room to her mother.

Having no idea that she was about to do it, Joanna dropped to her knees and laid her head against Lady Acton’s lap.

“But then so am I. He and I will be well matched. Mama, I’m so sorry.”

Lady Acton touched her daughter tenderly on the cheek, then brushed a wisp of hair back from her forehead.

“You’re not selfish, Joanna. You’re just filled with too much passion and too much burning longing for life. You will find love, my dear, either within this marriage of convenience, or out of it. And there will be children, at least.”

Joanna rocked back on her heels to gaze up at her mother.

“I don’t want children. What if I want something of my own that isn’t dependent on a man or lived through him? I want to
paint
, Mama. Can’t you understand that? And a woman can’t do anything of her own, nothing real anyway, if she’s gone soft in the head for a man and babies. So if it has to be marriage, then very well, let it be to a self-centered, arrogant bastard like Fitzroy Mountfitchet. At least he will leave me alone.”

To Lady Acton’s considerable distress, Joanna fled the room.

* * *

Lord Tarrant came to call the next afternoon. He was charmingly polite to Lady Acton and the earl, and calmly civil to Joanna.

She returned his greeting with an even cooler one of her own.

Yet she dressed in a stylish pelisse and bonnet and went with him in his phaeton to inspect his house, where they were to reside together in wedded bliss, once they returned from King’s Acton.

His home lay a few miles from London in several acres of grounds. He led her through the rooms, from the kitchens in the cellar to the servants’ quarters in the attics.

It was an elegant, formal house, decorated in the latest style, reflecting nothing of its occupant’s personality or taste.

Finally, he took her into another withdrawing room. Large windows faced a quiet lawn to the north.

“You may have this room for your studio.” He strode to the window to look down into the garden. “I have given orders for the furniture to be removed, and the carpets put in storage. Will it do?”

“I should like the wallpaper peeled and the walls whitewashed, please,” Joanna replied.

He turned to her and raised a brow. “For God’s sake! Are you serious? The house is leased. The wallpaper?”

“You said I might do anything to the house that I liked.” Joanna forced herself to face the insult of his incredulity calmly, while she hated herself for caring at all. “And I have a list here of supplies I shall need.”

She reached into her reticule and pulled out her wish list. Easels and canvas stretchers, pigments and brushes, oils and charcoal sticks.

He gave it a perfunctory glance.

“Order anything you like,” he said. “You may have it all charged to my account. I shall see to the whitewash, if it’s so important to you.”

It shook her that he could be so very calm and casual about it—to take on a wife he didn’t want, then tear down the wallpaper to satisfy her whim.

“I didn’t really think that you meant what you said at the Swan Inn.”

Joanna heard the uncertainty in her own voice. This man, Fitzroy Monteith Mountfitchet, Lord Tarrant, was going to be her husband. For a lifetime. A lifetime of frosty exchanges and this rigid, barely controlled civility.

She didn’t know him. She even felt a little afraid of him, perhaps, but there was no reason for them to be enemies, was there?

“I meant every word,” he said. “I promised you a studio. Here it is. If you wish it painted purple, it’s of no interest to me.”

What had Helena said to her once?
We all of us need all the allies we can get, I think.
Joanna took back the list, folded it, and thrust it into her reticule.

“Thank you for that, at least.”

“It’s nothing.”

She fought for the strength to swallow her pride and find something of the grace that Helena had tried to teach her.

“I don’t suppose this marriage is any easier for you, is it?”

He dropped onto the window seat, crossing his arms and gazing up at her, still with that hint of derision at the corner of his mouth. The dull light struck bronzed lights in his hair where it fell forward across his forehead, a shine of burnt sienna and cadmium red against that deep, rich black.

“Good God! Nothing is easier than marriage. A few words spoken in public, a signature, and it’s done. After all, I have done it before.”

It was as if he had slapped her. An overture of peace was to be met by more mockery? A quick rush of anger brought the same sarcasm to Joanna’s voice.

“No wonder Richard would like to shoot you! Was she a singer, like Quentin’s wife?”

She did not expect him to reply, but he didn’t hesitate.

“No, she was Doña Juanita Maria Gorrión Navarro, a nice Spanish lady.”

Your Spanish bride has been dead for two years. As the next Earl of Evenham, it is incumbent upon you to take another wife.

Had he loved her, this Spanish lady?

“You fought in the Peninsula under Wellington. I know. Richard told me while we were traveling back from the Swan. I suppose that’s where he learned that you couldn’t be trusted.”

His face was unreadable. “What else did he tell you?”

“Nothing. How could he? Your father was there.”

Joanna tossed her reticule onto a table and sat down on a Sheraton chair. She knew that her back was rigid and her chin perfectly level. Miss Able would have been proud.

“Very well. Let me fill you in, Lady Joanna, before some busy gossip does it for me. In 1812 we fought the French at Badajoz. It was a long and bloody siege, followed by a long and bloody rape of the town. Our soldiers looted and drank for three days. We officers were powerless to stop them. Perhaps you have heard that Wellington referred to our men as the scum of the earth? This is one reason why. Juanita’s entire family died in a fire set by Englishmen. I found her hiding in a stable. She was sixteen. I married her. Two years later, before the battle at Orthez, she was killed.”

Joanna could not keep the horror and sympathy from her voice. “I’m so sorry. How did she die?”

He smiled, a hollow, dead gesture, filled with disdain.

“If you want the details, you must ask Richard. He was there when it happened. The other thing that Richard can tell you is how beautiful she was. Indeed, my wife not only shared your name, Joanna, but she looked very much like you. That’s not relevant. There’s nothing else you need to know. Now, do you have any other questions or desires concerning this house?”

The vampire might as well ask if you cared to dine.

“No,” Joanna said faintly. “None.”

* * *

It was a three-day journey to King’s Acton. Joanna left with Lord Acton and her mother the next day. It was considered more discreet in the circumstances for her to be married in the church at the Acton country seat than in town, whatever the inconvenience to all concerned.

King’s Acton lay in the west of England. That meant it was impossible for her sister Eleanor and her husband to travel there from Norfolk and arrive in time. It was, of course, out of the question for Harry and Prudence to be summoned from Scotland. Milly and John would remain at school.

Richard and Helena would attend, since Acton Mead also lay west of London. And various elderly relatives from both sides of the family were prepared to lend their consequence to the match, in order to avoid the least hint of scandal.

The Earl and Countess of Evenham with their two sons would travel separately. Their daughter, Mary, was unwell. She had developed a cough, and it was considered unwise for her to travel.

Joanna remembered her from earlier days at Miss Able’s Academy. Lady Mary was some years older and had left school when Joanna was still quite young. But she had noticed her, a tall, grave girl with strong bones, who was kind to the little pupils.

It was oddly disappointing that she wasn’t to meet Lady Mary again very soon.

Yet she had to gulp back a wave of most inappropriate laughter when she heard that Quentin would serve as groom’s man. Would he stay sober long enough to hand his brother the ring?

* * *

They were all tired and worn to irritation when the carriage finally turned in at the great iron gates and swept up the immaculately kept driveway to King’s Acton.