The Ruin Of A Rogue (5 page)

“The others perhaps, but not me. We have too much history between us. My dear Miss Brotherton, believe me when I say I’d do anything to mend the rift.”

“I shall write to Caro on your behalf.”

Marcus, who had been standing over her with folded arms, ventured to sit beside her. “Your sympathy means so much to me.” He took her hand and stroked the smooth white skin, skin never marred by a minute of work, and bestowed a light kiss on the knuckles. “Thank you for listening and giving me the benefit of the doubt, which I fear I do not deserve.”

Her cheeks grew pinker and she didn’t pull away. Raising her eyes to his, she looked like a woman waiting to be kissed and he wanted to oblige her. He wanted to taste those lips much more than was sensible for an adventurer with a scheme. As Lewis Lithgow had instructed him from an early age, genuine desire or even liking for a mark was a weakness that led to carelessness and exposure. Summoning his resolution, he let her go. Side by side on the bench, each looked straight ahead. He wished he knew what she was thinking.

She recovered first. “I honor your ambition to find a new occupation and I know it’s difficult for a man without fortune or connections. What would you wish to do, if you had the choice?”

“Don’t laugh, but I think I would enjoy being a land steward. A brief time I spent at Castleton was a pleasure. I wished I could live in the country and was all the sadder when my father and I were ejected. I also visited a great-uncle’s house in Wiltshire and loved it there.” Which was sort of true. He hadn’t hated it. “But I have no experience. I’ve been reading a few books on the subject of estate management.”

She shook her head as though bewildered by the problems of such an unconnected man.

“Enough about my vain ambitions. I’d much sooner talk about you than me. Tell me about Anne Brotherton. What has she been doing all her life?”

She looked doubtful. “I’ve led a very dull existence compared to you.”

“Perhaps, yet I envy you that dullness. There’s much to be said for having an established position in a family and society.”

“I am lucky, I suppose.” She shook her head and continued slowly. “But I confess I don’t always feel that way. My good fortune is an accident of birth and nothing to do with me. I’ve always felt”—she paused—“like an empty vessel, the unwitting repository of the Brotherton future. My father and mother both died when I was an infant. I lived at Camber with my grandfather and my governesses and later my companion. Nothing much happened, except when Caro came to visit.”

“Livened things up, did she?”

“What do you think?”

“It’s impossible to be bored when she’s about. Robert was a lucky man, and so is Castleton. The loss of her friendship is one of the great regrets of my life.” He’d never spoken with more sincerity.

“She’ll come round.” A light touch on his arm squeezed at his heart, though never was sympathy less deserved.

“I hope so. Now go on. Did you have friends? And admirers. I’m sure you always had the latter.”

She wrinkled her nose. “My grandfather’s health was poor so we neither visited nor received many people. Felix was with us a good deal of the time, my second cousin, the heir to the earldom.”

“Was he your playmate?”

“Hardly, since he was a decade elder, but he was always kind to me, even when I was a little girl. He didn’t seem to mind too much when he proposed to me.”

Although he knew all about her former engagement to Felix Brotherton, Marcus feigned surprise. “A lady should expect a stronger sentiment from a husband than mere tolerance. I should hope you sent him about his business with a flea in his ear!”

She gave a little giggle, more animation than he’d yet seen in her. “Of course not! I always knew we would marry. We were betrothed when I was seventeen.”

Poor little heiress
. In some ways she had even less choice in life than Lewis Lithgow’s son. He at least had traveled the world and made his own luck. He beat down pity and with it compunction.

“What happened?” he asked, well aware of the answer. “I hope you came to your senses and sent him to the right about.”

“I accepted him. He died of a lung fever less than a year later.”

He gathered her hands in a light clasp. “I’m sorry. Did you love him?”

“We were comfortable. We knew what to expect of each other.”

“Did he ever kiss you?”

“No.” The answer was more a breath than a word.

Her eyes grew large and lovely and her lips parted, just enough to emit a breath. Gently he cupped her cheek, warm and smooth as an Italian apricot under his palm. He lowered his head and brought his mouth to hers, soft as a whisper, frightened she might melt away. He found her as pliant yet firm as he’d suspected, and every bit as sweet. Instinct told him to surge in and take possession, and only years of practiced control held him back. His reward, after a second that lasted an age, was a perceptible movement. In her inexperienced way she kissed him back.

It wasn’t much of a kiss, little more than a mingling of breath, and he wanted more. His fingers found the wild pulse at her temple, threaded into the hair she wore firmly coiled about her head. It was soft and fine. Closing his eyes, he let her scent and taste and the texture of her lips wash over him. She felt clean and pure, and that very fact lent a faint erotic charge to their contact. He wanted to pull her into his arms, to discover the body hidden by ill-fitting layers of wool, and most of all to kiss her properly, until she was gasping and crying out for more.

Her innocent enthusiasm touched him, and shamed him too. A man like Marcus Lithgow had no business with this artless girl.

Too bad. He needed her and he couldn’t afford scruples.

He opened his eyes and hardened his resolution, gauging her reaction as though she were a hand of cards. He knew the moment when the crescendo of pleasure halted. Her mouth lost its pliancy and her entire body stilled. Before she could succumb to panic he ended the kiss himself, inching his face away and letting his hands drop to her shoulders. She gaped at him, then averted her eyes.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” he said. “I do beg your pardon, but the temptation was more than I could resist.” He smiled his most ingenuous smile, a little humorous with only a hint of ardor. “For a rogue like me, there’s only one thing to be done with a pretty girl in a garden.”

Half expecting to have his face slapped, he gave her credit for poise. Wrinkling her nose, she made no effort to pull away. “Well,” she said. “I’ve never been kissed before and it had to happen sometime.”

“I am honored.” He meant it. “I hope the experience met your expectations, otherwise I truly would be a villain.”

She now shook off his touch, but not sharply. “What do you want of me?”

“Anne—Miss Brotherton, I’m not in a position to want anything. I know how disparate our positions are. You will make a great marriage, sooner or later, and there’s no place in your life for a man like me. I will settle for liking.”

She regarded him, clear-eyed, for some moments while he maintained the sincerity of his expression. There wasn’t a gamester in Europe who could read what he was really thinking. He wasn’t even sure himself. When he expressed regrets at his lack of eligibility, he had an uneasy feeling that he meant them. He’d kissed Anne Brotherton to render her flustered and yearning for more. He couldn’t tell how he’d succeeded with her, but he’d certainly managed to confuse himself.

“I hope we can be friends. That is all,” he said, pulling himself together. “You needn’t fear that I will ask for more. I will never do such a thing again.”

“I would like that,” she said with a nod. “Friends. We all need friends.”

Chapter 5

A
nne thought about kissing.

She thought about kissing her dinner partner, Lord Algernon Tiverton. To distract herself from what was coming out of his mouth, she concentrated on the shape of it. Quite pleasant, she concluded. Neither too plump nor too thin, a healthy color, and a nice little dip in the middle of the upper lip. She’d never paid much attention to mouths before, but now found she noticed nothing else. About gentlemen, that was. And more specifically she considered what those mouths would feel like on her own.

She wondered how Lord Algernon would taste. Then he drew breath to insert a forkful of cabbage and she shuddered. She hated cabbage. Trying to be fair, she acknowledged he wouldn’t always be eating cabbage. Even Marcus Lithgow’s kisses would be less than ideal if he’d been eating cabbage. Or fish.

Lord Algernon swallowed a morsel of haddock.

The past two days had been spent trying not to think about kissing Lord Lithgow. Since that proved impossible, she compromised by thinking of kissing in general and assessing the possibilities of other men. The dinner party at Lady Ashfield’s had come as a welcome opportunity to extend her investigations beyond footmen and shopkeepers. Unfortunately, her hostess seemed to have selected her guests with the aim of making Tiverton, her nephew, appear attractive in comparison. Poor Cynthia’s expression was one of barely concealed horror as she listened to an elderly general with giant gray whiskers.

“Are you staying long in London, my lord?” Anne asked.

Tiverton took her polite inquiry as encouragement. “As long as necessary, Miss Brotherton. I look forward to pursuing your acquaintance. I expect we shall meet often at such assemblies as are planned, despite the dearth of people in town.”

“I hardly find London empty. I cannot set foot outside without entering a crowd. I read in the
Morning Post
recently that the population exceeds a million.”

“I see you are a young lady who values precision,” he replied. “An excellent quality. I should have made myself clear that I refer to a scarcity of people worthy of notice. But you are quite correct in stating the capital holds an abundance of the lower orders that is impossible to avoid. In the country it is different. At Locksley, my Derbyshire place, I go weeks without encountering a soul beyond those neighbors of a proper rank.”

“Really? How uncomfortable it must be to live without servants.” Anne tried to avoid Cynthia’s eye lest she burst out laughing.

“A jest, Miss Brotherton,” he said. “Most amusing.”

No, the conversation of Lord Algernon Tiverton was not enough to keep Anne from thinking about Marcus Lithgow and
his
kiss. Especially since he required nothing from her but an occasional word of agreement as he droned on—though
droned
was the wrong word for his clipped and slightly high-pitched voice—about his own interests, which interested Anne not a whit. The branches of Lord Algernon’s family tree were extensive, ancient, and unpolluted by scandal. A murderer or pirate would have enlivened the tale.

Or a gamester.

That got her thinking about kissing again. Her new gown was of whisper-soft silk with an overdress of gauze that caressed her shoulders and arms. She’d let Cynthia persuade her to buy new undergarments of linen so fine as to be almost transparent. The touch of the delicate material gave her a new awareness of her own skin. All over. These thrilling and not altogether comfortable sensations seemed to be connected to the kissing business. But not Lord Algernon.

“What do you think, Miss Brotherton?” He was actually asking her opinion? “Do you think I should quarter my personal escutcheon with that of my mother’s family? I would also, of course, be willing to do the same with my wife’s.”

He had his beady eyes on the Brotherton coat of arms.

“I know little of heraldry.”

“I shall be happy to instruct you.” And off he went again, leaving her sure that she would never, under any circumstances, wish to kiss him. She’d rather listen to Marcus Lithgow talk about laundry than endure another hour of Tiverton’s company.

After three interminable courses, Lady Ashfield led the ladies out and invited Anne to her boudoir to tidy herself. Since none of the others received this privileged invitation, Anne expected the ensuing tête-à-tête.

“Lord Algernon admires you very much,” the countess said.

Anne sat at the dressing table and pretended to tweak her neat plaits, arranged so tightly by her maid that not a hair was out of place. “I don’t know what to say.” Not without being impolite to the gentleman’s cousin.

“I have written to dear Lord Morrissey and I am happy to say he favors Algernon’s suit.”

“A younger son?” she replied, not letting a twinge of panic show. This was unwelcome news, suggesting that her guardian was becoming serious about finding her a match. If she wasn’t careful her days of freedom would soon be over. The thought caught her by surprise. She hadn’t previously seen her unmarried state in that way. Rather the opposite, since she couldn’t conceive of a husband who would be
more
autocratic than her late grandfather or her current guardian.

“Lord Algernon is no fortune hunter,” Lady Ashfield said. “He has a very easy competence of his own and no need to seek a rich wife. Besides, he has far too much principle.”

“My guardian has always wished me to look higher.”

“There’s nothing wrong with Algernon’s birth and connections. His position makes him an ideal custodian of the Camber estates because he won’t be distracted by his own responsibilities.”

Anne bit back the retort that he was more likely to be distracted by his own conceit.

“He’s even willing to add the Brotherton name to his.”

“Do you mean to say that if I married him I would be Lady Algernon Brotherton-Tiverton?”

“A trivial matter. I know half a dozen people with sillier names. I daresay Morrissey will exert his influence with the king to have the earldom of Camber revived for him.”

For
him
. For a pompous creature who cared nothing for her person or her interests. Anne wished quite desperately that she had not been born an heiress. Then there would have been some chance she could be an individual. Her heritage and her duty to marry oppressed her.

And then there was the matter of kissing. That marriage involved kissing—and a good deal more—could no longer be ignored. She had a lowering suspicion that the least eligible men were the most kissable.

“There’s another thing I must mention,” Lady Ashfield said. Anne wished she wouldn’t. As a close friend of her guardian, the countess felt she had the right to favor Anne with her trenchantly expressed opinions on every subject. “Lithgow.”

“What?”

“I heard a report that you walked from Berkeley Square to Piccadilly on his arm. It will not do.”

“My maid was with me.” Until their unplanned excursion into Soho.

“I don’t care if you were followed by an army of footmen and the Prince of Wales himself. Marcus Lithgow may have somehow fallen into the peerage but he never was and never will be suitable company for any young woman of reputation. Do you have any idea who his father was?”

“He didn’t choose his own father.”

“None of us chose our fathers, yet our course in life is determined by our birth. A man like that must do much to atone for the faults in his ancestry and upbringing, and nothing I’ve seen or heard of Marcus Lithgow suggests that he’s done anything at all. Quite the opposite.”

“I find Lord Lithgow pleasant and well-informed.”

“Very likely, but he’s not the kind of man you marry.”

“It’s a wide leap from conversation to marriage. I wasn’t thinking of wedding him.”

“I should think not! Neither should you be seen with him, now. Later he may be an agreeable companion for a married woman, as long as you are discreet about it.”

Could Lady Ashfield possibly mean what Anne thought she meant? Anne had at first been shocked by the looser morals that pertained among Caro’s friends, but many of them were artists. She hadn’t expected a friend of her guardian’s to advocate postmarital flirtation. Such hypocrisy!

“It would be rude to cut the acquaintance. He’s one of my cousin the Duchess of Castleton’s oldest friends.”

The feathers adorning Lady Ashfield’s gray curls quivered and she waved a dismissive hand. “Duchess or not, Caroline Townsend is a flibbertigibbet and always was. I don’t recommend you take her advice when it comes to the ways of the world. After her first marriage she moved in a fast set, and association with Robert Townsend’s friends will do you no good. I don’t even like to see you living with Lady Windermere. She is not good
ton
.”

“I don’t quite understand you, Lady Ashfield. Is a chance encounter with Lord Lithgow at the circulating library, after which he kindly lent me company to a bookshop, enough to damage my reputation? I had not thought it so fragile.”

“Come, come, my dear,” she replied, taking Anne’s hand. “You suffer the lack of a mother, or a responsible older lady to guide you. I know you mean no harm. Anyone can see you are painfully innocent and naïve. Now you have been warned, you will know to keep Lithgow and his ilk at a distance. I repeat, such company will do you no good.”

“You mean it will render me unmarriageable?”

“Nothing,” Her Ladyship said with an indulgent laugh, “can render so great an heiress as yourself unmarriageable. That doesn’t mean all matches are equal. With the right husband you can become a leader of the
ton
, influential in fashion or in politics should you so choose. But the freedom to pursue your own desires comes only when you wed a man of substance, and that depends on your own reputation as much as your fortune. There will always be men who will overlook any blot on your name if it means laying hands on the latter. But men of principle will think twice, and Algernon would dismiss the match out of hand. I assured you he is not a fortune hunter and that proves it. Not all the Brotherton wealth would make him ignore the whiff of scandal. It is of the greatest importance now that you behave impeccably.”

Anne smiled. “Thank you, Lady Ashfield. You have given me much to think about. And thank you for this delightful occasion. I appreciate the chance to know Lord Algernon Tiverton as he really is.”

B
ecome a Brotherton-Tiverton? Never!

When Morrissey had proposed she marry the Duke of Castleton, Anne had been willing enough. He seemed a decent man, and so what if they had little in common? They would have their duties and their children to hold them together and pursue their own interests when they had time. She didn’t feel the same way about Lord Algernon Tiverton.

She needed to find a way to thwart her guardian’s plans, and she doubted her powers of resistance once Morrissey returned to England and brought his forceful personality to bear. He’d summon the authority of her late grandfather, remind her of her duty to the Brotherton lands and name, and she’d give in.

Her views of marriage had changed. She wanted more than a manager for her fortune. Her guardian had been wise to keep her immured in the country. Exposure to the greater world had made her question her destiny.

Cynthia sat quietly beside her in the jolting carriage, a married woman but not a happy one. Anne counted her a friend and they’d shared a house for months, but she knew little of what went on behind Cynthia’s pretty, smiling face. Bred to reserve, it had never occurred to Anne to inquire or even to wonder.

“What do you think makes a good marriage?” she asked.

In the light of the swinging carriage lamp, anguish disturbed Cynthia’s serene features. She rarely spoke of her husband, who had gone abroad a month after their marriage. “My dear Anne, I’m the last person you should ask. What do I know of marital bliss?”

“Why did you marry Windermere?” she asked.

“The match was arranged by my uncle.”

“Were you willing?”

“My alternatives were worse. What do I have to complain about? I am rich and healthy and live in a fine house in the best part of London without the inconvenience of a spouse.”

Anne’s heart bled for her bitterness. “Were you always so cynical?”

“Only because my husband has taught me by his actions. I used to be as innocent and stupid as a newborn lamb.”

Anne took her friend’s hand. “You deserve better.”

“We all deserve better, but when do we get what we deserve?”

“Morrissey wants me to accept Lord Algernon.”

“Don’t do it, Anne. Don’t give in. Without a penny of my own I had no option but to obey my uncle. With your wealth you can make your own choice. You come of age in two months.”

“But not into my fortune. If I marry without permission I could be penniless. Morrissey has complete discretion over when to turn over the estates to me or my husband.”

“Truly?”

“Unless I keep my pin money. I have seven hundred and fifty a year according to my grandfather’s settlement.”

“There was a time when I would have been ecstatic at such an income.”

Anne shrugged. Though to most people her wealth was her defining characteristic, she rarely thought about money. “I think I keep it were I to marry without permission, but since I never considered doing so, I never asked. To tell you the truth I don’t even know if I spend my allowance. I just send my bills to Thompson and they are paid. No one has ever objected to my expenditures.”