The Dangerous Lord (33 page)

He laughed. “In the words of the immortal Lord X, ‘Man doth not live by bed alone.' You must get up,
querida
. I hope to be off by one o'clock.”

She gazed up at him, her heart beating triple time. “Why so early?”

“Don't you want to spend a few hours with your brothers before the ball? And you'll need time to dress.”

A relieved sigh escaped her lips. “So you're not…still going to visit that solicitor about the annulment.”

He glanced away. “I'm afraid that's no longer possible. Now that we've consummated the marriage, we can't pursue the matter until we make sure you're not pregnant. By then no judge with eyes will believe we haven't had conjugal relations, even if you don't prove to be pregnant.”

The tinge of regret in his tone made her tip up her chin and say stoutly, “Good.”

His gaze swung back to her. “We'll see if you feel the same later.”

“What do you mean?”

“We need to talk. We should have talked about this last night before it was too late, but we were—”

“I don't regret last night.”

The brief flicker of satisfaction in his eyes told her he didn't either, no matter what he said. “I only hope you can say the same after we talk. But we can do that in the carriage on the way to London.” He grabbed the edge of the covers tucked up under her chin. “Now get out of bed and get dressed, lazybones. Or I'll dress you myself.”

With a taunting smile, he whisked back the covers, then froze. Apparently he'd forgotten she hadn't donned a nightgown last night. His gaze trailed hungrily over her naked body.

“Dress me?” she teased. “You'd never manage it.” She
reached up and grabbed his cravat, then tugged him toward her.

He went willingly. “I suppose we
could
leave a little later,” he conceded as he lowered his head to nibble on her ear. “An hour will do no harm.”

“Or two. Or three.” She unbuttoned his waistcoat. “In the words of the immortal Lord X, passion must never be hurried.”

“He never said that.”

“He just did.” Then she muffled his laughter with her kiss.

Four hours later, they entered the St. Clair carriage. All plans for stopping by the Taylor home had been abandoned now that they were so late, since she didn't wish to excite her brothers by showing up for only an hour or so, then flitting off to a ball. They weren't expecting her until tomorrow anyway, so she and Ian would go to the St. Clair town house and dress.

Felicity sank back onto her seat, feeling warm, sated, and yes, loved. Ian had yet to say the words, but she felt his love in every caress, every look. She was sure he loved her. And one day she'd make him say the words. Just see if she didn't.

This wouldn't be the day, however. Judging from the grim set to his face as he took the seat across from her, he was intent upon his “talk,” and it didn't look as if it would be pleasant for either of them.

The carriage set off, and they traveled a mile or so in silence with her watching out the window and dreading the coming discussion. Nor did the day look promising for it. The sunlight that had shone so brightly while they made love had vanished behind a blanket of sullen clouds that threatened snow. A bleak, dreary day, to be sure.

Suddenly, Ian cleared his throat. “It's time I told you everything.”

Her heart pounded as she turned her gaze to his. “About
what?” But she knew and braced herself for the worst.

“My past. All that ‘truth' you were so intent upon getting at a week ago.”

“Why now?” It dawned on her that she feared knowing the truth almost as much as she wanted it. His telling her might change them both irrevocably.

“You deserve to know. We can't annul the marriage, but we could still dissolve it some other way. Divorce, separation, whatever you wish. I want you to know what kind of man you've married before you continue in this…illusion that you love me.”

There was such pain in his countenance, it banished her reluctance to hear him. He needed to reveal the thorn in his heart, and she could endure it. “My love for you isn't an illusion,” she said softly. “Nothing you can say will change it.”

He glanced out the window, a muscle working in his jaw. “What if I…tell you I did something so awful it left several people's lives in ruin?”

“If you mean that story about your seduction of your aunt—”

“The truth is worse than that—ten times worse.”

Did he imply that his uncle's darker accusation was the truth? No, she couldn't believe it. “I know in my heart that you're decent and good, no matter what you tell me.”

“You think so?” He paused. “Very well. We'll see what you think after you hear everything. You see, I didn't seduce my aunt as Lady Brumley claimed, or even force myself on her as my uncle claimed.”

His gaze swung back to hers, wrought with grief and guilt and self-hatred. “The truth is—I killed her.”

F
elicity sat frozen, uncertain how to understand him. “You mean, because she killed herself for love of you—”

“No. She never loved me, and she didn't kill herself, not for love or anything else.
I
killed her.”

Her hands began to shake so much she clasped them tightly together in her lap. “I-I don't believe you. How could that be?”

He sighed heavily. “I should start at the beginning. The year I reached nineteen, I spent a long holiday at Chesterley with my father. We fought about everything. My aunt and uncle were often around during those battles. Uncle Edgar always took Father's side, which aggravated matters. But my aunt…”

His voice softened. “My aunt tried to smooth things over. She listened to my complaints with understanding, having endured my uncle's formidable temper for three years. Although she wasn't much older than I, she was a sensible
woman who offered sound advice, so I turned to her a great deal. We spent so much time in each other's company and she was so kind that I came to care for her very much.”

The carriage hit a rut, jolting them, but Ian hardly seemed to notice. “And yes, I suppose I was infatuated with her and even desired her, although at that age young men desire anything in a petticoat. I doubt she realized my feelings. Despite the tales you've heard, Aunt Cynthia was always conscious of her duty to my uncle and never behaved toward me with anything but the most circumspect propriety.”

Though he looked at her, she could tell he didn't see her. He saw his own past, and his despairing expression tore at Felicity's heart. She wished he would come sit by her while he told his sad tale, but he wasn't the sort of man to want a woman's coddling at such a time. And she feared stopping the flow of words.

“One afternoon,” he went on, “I was walking past a cottage on my uncle's estate when I noises coming from within. The unmistakable sound of flesh hitting flesh. A woman weeping. A man shouting. I recognized my uncle's voice.”

His large hands tightened into cannonball fists where they lay on his thighs. “I'd noticed bruises on my aunt before without realizing that her plausible explanations for them were lies. But I couldn't mistake what I was hearing. So I stopped outside the door.”

It was so like her dear husband to leap to the defense of a woman. She could imagine how painful it must have been for him to hear his aunt being mistreated.

He uttered a low curse. “If I'd taken even a moment to think, I would have realized that any direct interference on my part would only further enrage my uncle. I could have either found my father and begged him to come, or knocked on the door with some lie about needing my uncle's assistance.” He paused, as if unable to continue.

She willed him silently to go on. He turned his gaze out the window. “But I
didn't
take a moment to think. I acted in exactly the thoughtless manner my father always criticized. I burst through the door.”

He was silent so long that she finally whispered, “And was he…Had he—”

“Hit her? Oh, yes. She already had red marks on her cheeks and a black eye. She was huddled in a corner, sobbing as he stood over her with his hands still fisted—
fisted
, mind you!” His voice grew hoarse and thick. “My God, she was half his size, a little wisp of a thing. And the bastard had been using his
fists
on her!”

Horror filled her, deepening even more as she thought of how the sight must have tortured her beloved husband. “Oh, Ian,” she murmured sympathetically.

But he seemed not to hear her. “I went a little insane. I launched myself at his back. We…fought, but he was no match for a hotheaded lad of nineteen, nearly twenty years younger than he. I soon had him on the floor and was pummeling his face over and over…My fury was so feverish it blotted out everything but a lust for his blood.”

He dragged in a long breath. “And when my aunt came up behind me and grabbed my arm to stop me before I killed him, I shook her off with such strength that she…she…” He broke off, nearly losing his voice. Then he squared his shoulders, his tortured gaze returning to her. “She lost her balance and fell back against the stone mantel. She…hit her head. The doctor said she died instantly.”

“Good Lord,” she whispered, “your poor aunt.” But it wasn't his poor aunt her heart broke for. It was him, her sweet husband. Who'd held all this blackness inside him for so long in silence. She wished she'd known sooner.

“Yes, my poor aunt.” The words were heavy with self-reproach. “Caught between two violent creatures like me and my uncle, she had no chance for life or happiness.”

He buried his face in his hands. Desperate to comfort
him, she leaned forward and laid her hand on his back. For a long moment, there was no sound inside the carriage save its creaking, the pounding hooves of the horses, and Ian's tortured breathing. When she could bear it no longer, she said, “I understand your suffering, my love, but it wasn't your fault—”

“Not my fault?” he cried as his head snapped up. “How was it not my fault? I stepped in where I had no business being! I let my temper so possess me that I shoved a tiny woman hard enough to make her fall and kill herself!”

Frantically, she searched for words that would assuage his guilt. “She could have fallen on a cushion instead. That she didn't was tragic, I agree, yet you can't blame yourself for bad circumstances. Besides, your uncle might have killed her anyway if you hadn't stepped in.”

His eyes blazed into hers. “But he didn't, don't you understand?
I
did!”

“You were trying to protect her! No one could reasonably fault you for that!”

“My family did!”

A chill struck her heart. “Your uncle—”

“Not my uncle.” His expression hardened into stone. “I mean, he blamed me—he still blames me—but there's not much he can do about it. He's no fool. He knew even then that if he accused me outright of murder, I'd accuse him outright of wife-beating. He had no desire to drag the truth out before the world. Nor did he wish to reveal his true character to my father.”

“So the two of you didn't tell your father what really happened?”

He sat up, away from the reach of her hand. Shifting restlessly, he tightened and untightened his fists. “By the time Father was summoned and found me holding her body and raging at myself, Uncle Edgar had regained his composure enough to present his own version of what happened. It didn't include any mention of wife-beating, I
assure you. He told Father he'd…caught me seducing Aunt Cynthia, and in the struggle between us she'd tried to stop us from fighting and had fallen.”

“The bastard!” she said, even more furious at Ian's uncle than before. How dare the man blacken Ian before his father when the old viscount had already been so distrustful of his son? “Well, at least your damned uncle is consistent in his lies. That's a variation on the tale he told me.” She added dryly, “He didn't mention wife-beating to me either. Though I'm surprised he didn't just accuse you of killing his wife.”

“I think he's always feared that if he did, I would simply lie and accuse
him
of murder. It would be more plausible to most hearers. I was nineteen and fairly young; he was a grown man. The woman was his wife. I have evidence of his wife-beating—Miss Greenaway would be only too happy to testify to it, for she witnessed it once herself.”

Which explained Ian's continued interest in the woman. As usual, he'd been strategizing, keeping Miss Greenaway on his side until he might need her. And Felicity had assumed the worst. No wonder he'd been so angry at her.

“No,” he went on, “I'm sure my uncle thought that telling you I'd seduced, even raped, his wife was far less risky. It fed into the tales circulating about me and made me look like the evil seducer while he played the betrayed husband, a role more to his liking. Even so, he never circulated his story about me generally. He must have known that if I realized what he'd told the women I courted, I might take stronger measures against him. And I would have, if I hadn't married in time to produce an heir.”

“What I don't understand is why your father wrote such an abominable will. You did tell him what really happened that day, didn't you?”

“I told him,” he said hollowly. “He simply chose not to believe me.”

“His own son?” The enormity of it cut her to the heart.
“He believed his brother over
you
? What kind of father would do that?” Oh, her poor love, enduring so much torment and guilt at the hands of his own family! She squeezed his leg, wondering how much more it must hurt him, if it made her hurt so badly for him.

Ian shrugged, as if it hardly mattered, but she knew it mattered a great deal. “Father already blamed me for Mother's death. He thought me a rash and intemperate young man, which I suppose I was. It took little to convince him I'd seduced my aunt. I'd been fairly obvious in my adoration of her.”

She sat there speechless. What possible comfort could one offer to remedy the pain of such a terrible betrayal? It was a good thing Ian's father was dead. Otherwise, she'd be tempted to kill him herself.

“I left that night for the Continent,” Ian continued, “left them to deal with the questions and the rumors and the mess. If I'd known then what I learned later—that Miss Greenaway and most of Uncle Edgar's staff knew of his frequent beatings of my aunt—I would have stayed and tried to convince my father. But I didn't know, and I couldn't go on living there, seeing my uncle every day, enduring my father's disapproval, hiding the nasty secret.” His voice broke. “And I
had
killed her. All I wanted was escape.”

Moving to sit beside him, she took his hand in hers. He squeezed it so tightly she was sure she'd bear the imprint of his fingers later.

“Of course, Father took my flight as ample demonstration of my guilt,” he went on. “It was a stupid thing to do, but then I was only nineteen. I hadn't yet learned to think before acting. If I had, she'd still be alive today.”

She couldn't stand it any longer. “You must stop blaming yourself for it, my love. Your actions were perfectly understandable.”

His bleakly staring eyes told her that her words had
changed nothing for him. “Understandable or not, I deprived two children of their mother. I daresay my poor cousins don't much care how it happened.” He released her hand and stared out the opposite window. “As far as they're concerned, I murdered her as surely as if I'd put a gun to her head.”

She started to protest, then realized that wasn't how to reach him. “You're saying that an accidental death is the same as a murder.”

“The result is the same, isn't it?” he ground out.

“Well then, you have even more crimes on your conscience.”

“What do you mean?”

“You raped me, didn't you?”

“What!” He swung his head around to glare at her. “You said yourself you wanted—”

“It doesn't matter if I wanted it or not. ‘The result is the same.' Isn't that what you said? I'm no longer a virgin, so it follows that you raped me, because rape and seduction and mutual lovemaking all have the same results, do they not?”

He was silent a long moment, the muscles of his face so taut that she feared they might snap. “I see what you're trying to do, but it won't work. You can't banish my guilt with rhetoric.”

“I'm not trying to banish it. Soften it perhaps, but not banish it. If I could banish it with only a few words, your character would be faulty indeed.” She laid her hand on his knee again. “I'm only asking that you let me share it, help you learn to live with it.”

A shudder passed through him. “I have no right to expect that of you,” he said hoarsely. “When you married me, you didn't know what darkness lay inside me. By not telling you about it, I gave you no chance to refuse it. No one would fault you for leaving me now that you know the truth.”

“Why would I wish to leave the man I love?”

“Damn it, the man you said you loved isn't the man you're married to!” He shoved her hand off his knee. “I may not be the philanderer you thought, but I
am
unprincipled and unscrupulous. I don't deserve you or any decent woman!”

He stared blindly out of the carriage. “I should never have married. If I hadn't been so certain that Uncle Edgar would destroy Chesterley, I would never have sought a wife. That's why I tried to choose a woman who'd marry me for other considerations, so she wouldn't be devastated when she learned of my true character.” An anguished sound escaped him. “Then you came along, and I was so tempted by you…I justified my actions by telling myself that you had no future—”

“Which was the truth!” she broke in.

“No. I could have helped you without marrying you. And there was that damned Masefield—”

“He would never have married me, and you know it. I certainly didn't want to marry
him
. Not when I could have you.” She tucked her hand beneath his bent arm. “And can't you see how all your care in choosing a wife proves your goodness? An unscrupulous man would have taken any wife who served his purpose. But you did your duty while also trying to protect the women you courted.”

“The way I protected you? My God, look at how I've treated you. I manipulated you, lied to you, forced you to marry me—”

“If we compare mistreatments, my darling, I fear I'll fare as poorly as you.” A lump caught in her throat. “You had this terrible secret inside, and I did everything to bring it to light. My actions were motivated by emotions as reckless and thoughtless as yours, except that I don't have the excuse of youth or attenuating circumstances to soothe my guilt. Yet I can still ask for your forgiveness and go on. Why can't you?”