Time After Time (135 page)

He’d been unable to tear his gaze from her during their uncomfortable drive back from Hyde Park with Olivia and the damnable Blakewood, who’d been utterly oblivious to the havoc that had been wrought that afternoon. He watched the last sparkle languish in Penelope’s eyes as she stared out of the window of Blakewood’s coach, and he didn’t appreciate the stab of guilt that pierced through him at the sight of her looking quietly dignified and still, despite the mud-splattered emerald gown she’d been wearing.

He’d spent most of the evening in his club, trying to drown the memory of her heartbroken gaze with the finest brandy Brooks’s had to offer. He was on his second bottle when the unpleasant feeling of indignation settled in his chest.

Why was he feeling so guilty about doing his duty? It was not his fault Penelope nurtured illusions of love where there was none. She had no right to feel betrayed, for she had brought it all on herself. He’d never lied to her about his feelings. And yet here he was, pacing a track on the Oriental rug in his bedchamber, waiting for her.

He whirled around when he heard her approach, unable to squelch the surge of relief that coursed through him at the sight of her.

Penelope strode deeper into the darkened room. With her almost transparent nightgown and bare feet, she looked exactly like a nymph who should have been tramping about in the woods. And despite the severity of the moment, his body tightened in response to her nearness. She stopped in front of him, just out of his reach.

“You win,” Penelope said in a small, tired voice.

Her words confused him. What did she mean, he’d
won?

She must have seen the question in his face, for she lifted her hand in a helpless gesture and then let it drop to her side before clarifying her statement. “I never should have fought for your affections. I should have realized there was nothing there to fight for.” She let out a deep sigh. “You win.”

He closed the space between them, searching her face for signs of what she was feeling, but for the first time since he’d known her, he couldn’t find any emotion in her expression. “I never meant to hurt you,” he stated, keeping the guilt slashing through him from his voice.

“Because you didn’t think you could,” she finished the statement for him in a resigned tone. She shook her head. “But you did hurt me, and the most galling thing about it is I understand why you did it.” Her voice broke. “You had to keep what was rightfully yours, and you did what you had to do. You’ve always been willing to sacrifice your own needs to fulfill your duty.”

He couldn’t argue with her logic, so he admitted something else. “It was not such a great sacrifice,” he rasped out.

His words spurned her into action. “Oh my God, Lucas, would you please stop with the lies!” She stepped back as if she couldn’t bear to be near him any longer. “I am tired of being thought of as nothing more than useful, and I am bone-weary of lying to myself so I can be used.” Without looking at him, she raised her arm to point accusingly in his direction. “I waited a
lifetime
for you, and you never would have come if it weren’t for your father’s will. So don’t stand there and tell me you didn’t think you were sacrificing yourself when you wed me to do your duty.”

He was saying one wrong thing after another. He took a step toward her but stopped when she recoiled from him. “Listen to me. Stop moving away and just listen to me, nymph.”

“Don’t call me that!”

“Fine!” he shot back. He raked a hand through his hair as he tried to think of a way to reach her. “I wasn’t lying when I said it wasn’t a sacrifice. Dammit, Penelope, just because I can’t love you back doesn’t mean I don’t want to be married to you.” He drew a deep breath before confessing something he’d never told anyone. “It has nothing to do with you. I just can’t love anyone, sweetheart. Whatever part of me that could have died with my father.”

“Your father didn’t love anyone either,” she burst out.

He uttered a harsh laugh. “You’re wrong, nymph. He loved my mother so much that when she died, his entire being went with her. You’ve only ever seen the good side of love, but I know how it can destroy a person and everyone around him. I swore long ago I would never let that happen to me.”

Her head lifted and she finally turned to face him. “It seems to me your father loved only himself. If he truly loved your mother, he would have stayed to take care of his children, because you were the part of Vivian that was still with him.” She gave him a look of pity. “Love makes a person endure, Lucas. It’s the absence of it that destroys.”

The words were so absurd they staggered him. “If you are expecting me to spout ridiculous promises of love, then you are more naive than I thought.” He hadn’t meant to be so blunt, but he couldn’t bring himself to lie to her anymore either. “I desire you, Penelope. I have always desired you, more than anyone I have ever known and more than I have ever thought possible. But don’t think I can offer you more than physical satisfaction, because that is all I have left in me to give.”

She gave him an incredulous look. “Rubbish! Don’t try to make me feel better by telling me you can’t love anyone.” She walked over to him. “I’ve seen the way you care for your sister, and the love you have for your servants. The only one you can’t seem to love is me.”

Her gaze slid to the crackling flames in the fireplace. “So I release you from our bargain,” she said quietly. “You are free to find a mistress, Lucas.”

He felt as if he’d been kicked in the stomach. “You no longer love me now that you know I can’t return your feelings?” The words tasted like acid on his tongue.

A short laugh that was both bitter and hysterical escaped her. “I will always love you, Lucas. But I deserve more than a husband who stays with me only out of duty, and you deserve more than a wife whom you married because you had no other choice.”

The finality that rang in her voice chilled him. She was breaking ties with him, and he didn’t know what to say to convince her to not. “I don’t want a mistress,” he insisted. “Look, Penelope, I’m sorry I hurt you.” He held her hand against his chest. “I never meant to hurt you, but don’t do this, sweetheart. This isn’t what I want.”

She snatched her hand away. “Lucas, did you or did you not come to fetch me from Bouth only because of your father’s will?”

“Dammit, Penelope — ”

“And did you or did you not marry me to secure your inheritance?”

Christ
. “Yes!”

“Then ‘this’ is where we are, my lord.” She gave him scathing glance. “I let you make me feel like an unwanted fiancée for more than two decades.” She poked him in the chest. “And I let you manipulate me into becoming your wife.” She poked him again. “But I will be damned if I let you talk me into becoming your
whore
!”

And then she left his bedchamber, slamming the connecting door and leaving him to sleep alone for the first time since their wedding.

His jaw clenched as he watched her leave, fighting the urge to follow her into her bedchamber and show her just how badly he wanted her, to prove to her how badly she wanted him. He closed his eyes shut and balled his hands into fists at his sides as he forced himself to remain still. Frustration welled in him. If he went to her now, she would probably make him beg to spend the night with her. He gritted his teeth. He was not going to beg her to let him bed her. Bloody hell, he was not going to beg
anyone
for
anything
!

He shucked his dark silk dressing gown and flung himself onto the huge, empty bed, determined to make his fully aroused body submit to his will. He forced his mind to think of mundane matters such as the state of the crops in his estates and the profits to be made in the latest shipping venture he’d invested in. But as the dawn broke and the rising sun’s rays flitted in through the gap in the silk curtains that hung by the window, Lucas finally accepted the fact that profits no longer gave him the satisfaction they once did. His last thought as exhaustion finally claimed him was a disturbing one.

He missed her.

His hand reached out to feel her side of the bed, and a surge of deep disappointment filled him when he found nothing but cold sheets waiting for his touch.

Chapter Twenty-One

“Of all the damnable, annoying, bloody nerve!”

Lucas threw the documents he’d been trying to read for the fifth time on top of the disorganized pile on his desk in disgust as he muttered aloud to himself in his study. “‘This is where we are,’” he mocked. “I have a good mind to remind her precisely where the hell we bloody are!”

He threw his arm in an angry, sweeping gesture that encompassed the cluttered room where he’d ensconced himself for the past couple of weeks since his confrontation with Penelope. There were ledgers from his various estates piled on the chairs, and an overturned glass of brandy threatened to fall off the sideboard. The floor was littered with heaps of missives and bills. “We are in
my
house!”

Nelson emitted a loud yawn from the far corner of the room.

Lucas glared at the insolent dog. “That goes for you as well. If you don’t like the way I do things, then you can bloody well sleep somewhere else!”

In answer, Nelson got up, turned around three times and curled back into sleep. He felt more than a tiny amount of satisfaction that the dog apparently wanted to be where Lucas was, which was more than he could say for the dog’s equally exasperating owner.

Since their confrontation, Penelope had proceeded not only to banish him from her bed, but her entire life. She made no more amusingly sweet attempts to woo him or boss him around. Her laughter no longer rang out in the hall. There were no more of the teasing comments, moments of silent companionship, or the shattering declarations of love he’d become used to hearing.

He rubbed his face with his hands to wipe out the memories, the regret. His wife never did anything by halves. Penelope was now as determined to shut him out as she’d been steadfast in her devotion before that fateful day two weeks ago.

Two of the longest, most miserable weeks of his life.

Penelope immersed herself in meetings with Colonel Martin and his group, danced at balls as if she had no care in the world, and had reduced him to alternately hovering in his study or lurking in the halls, hoping to catch a glimpse of her. Not that she was home all that much these days. He’d tried twice more to talk to her to no avail.

Whenever he found an opportunity to get her alone, Olivia or his increasingly impertinent butler, Finchley, interrupted them with news of some terrible household emergency.

Everyone was conspiring to keep Penelope from him.

As of this morning, he was done trying to talk to her. He would do something better with his time by burying himself with work, instead of torturing himself with memories of Penelope splayed enticingly across his desk.

I will be damned if I let you talk me into becoming your whore.

Bloody hell, if she ever talked about herself like that again, he would gleefully wash her pretty mouth with vinegar.

Lucas picked up the documents on his desk, intending to attempt to finish reading at least two lines this time. Work would remind him of his duty. This was what he’d wanted — a wife who didn’t bother him with expectations of any promises of spurious emotions so he could get on with his work and with his life.

He’d better get to it, then.

Many of his peers found work to be tedious and beneath them, but the truth was he loved this part of his responsibilities. He loved checking the details and knowing how his estates were doing. He loved knowing what his tenants needed and making plans of what to do next. Besides, contracts like the one he held in his hands in that very moment did not sign themselves.

The only one you can’t seem to love is me.

His gaze jerked to the space next to the silver inkpot at the corner of his desk. First, he would need a pen. There must be at least a dozen of the bloody things in the cluttered room, yet not a single one was to hand. The last thing he wanted was to waste precious time searching out the damned pens.

I let you make me feel like an unwanted fiancée for more than two decades.

With grim determination, he strode to the door and yanked it open to find Olivia, Westville and Finchley in the hall huddled together in what appeared to be a riveting conversation conducted entirely in whispers.

“I find myself in need of a pen,” he announced.

The three jumped guiltily at the sound of his voice, then proceeded to gawk openly at the sight of his nightclothes. They wore matching looks of confusion, as if Lucas had spoken in a language they failed to comprehend.

He leveled each of them a quelling glance, daring them to comment, before speaking once more. “A pen. To write with. There is none to be found in my study. I need one.” His gaze swerved to his butler. “Now.”

Finchley snapped out of his daze. “I shall fetch you a pen immediately, my lord.” He paused to give Lucas a sidelong glance. “Er, to write with.”

“Thank you.” He watched Finchley scurry to the end of the hall, turn his head first in one direction and then the other, before heading straight into the kitchens. He sighed in frustration and turned on his heels to return to his desk, vaguely aware of Westville and Olivia following him into the study.

“Good heavens,” Olivia said as she swept a crumpled piece of paper gingerly with her toe. “This is worse than we imagined.”

He shuffled some documents and tapped them on the desk surface. “I’m working.”

“On what?” Westville asked. “The revolution?”

Lucas dropped the documents, creating another jumbled pile on his desk, before glowering at his friend. “What the bloody hell are you doing here, Anthony?”

Westville grinned, undaunted. “I wondered if you would be interested in accompanying me and some friends to Tattersall’s for the auction.” His gaze lingered on the overturned brandy glass on the sideboard. “But it appears you are busy.”

He decided to ignore his friend’s mocking stare. “I have no need for new horses at the moment. There are other things that need my attention.”