A Proper Scandal (26 page)

Elisabeth shook her head and drifted to the settee, settling on the end. “Mr. Eads said he fled Wiltshire after you were born. He could not bear to stay. He assumes Lady Rainsleigh conceived Beau within the bounds of her marriage to the viscount. Mr. Eads said he was living in Berkshire by then. When he fled Wiltshire, he found work as an apprentice to the owner of a malting in Berkshire. The owner had no sons; when the man died, he willed the operation to Mr. Eads. It was a stroke of good fortune, but only a hardworking man of intellect and steadfastness could make a go of it. Which he, in every way, appears to have done.” She paused, watching him. “Whether you like it or not, Mr. Raymond Eads seems to be diligent and honest and everything one would expect from someone who started with nothing and worked hard to earn success.” She reached out and touched Bryson's face. He squeezed his eyes shut, resenting the contact—resenting the whole bloody story and especially her obvious favor of it—but he could not pull away. He leaned into the coolness of her palm.

“
Just like you
, Bryson,” she finished in a whisper. “In manner, in integrity, certainly in appearance, he is, in many ways,
like you.”
She nudged closer to him. “I would not bring it to you here, now—not like this—if I did not suspect that there is truth in what he claims.”

“
He. Lies
,” Bryson rasped. “He lies, and I resent that you would be so easily fooled.” He turned to glare at her, but the expression on her face brought him up short. He blinked. She was lit with compassion—beautiful, damnable compassion. He looked away.

“Insulting me may feel satisfying in this moment,” she said gently, “but this is something you cannot buy or bully or marry to make it go away. It's also something that could change the course of the rest of our lives. Possibly for the better. Just think, Bryson—the man you despise so much, the man you thought of as your flesh and blood, might be no part of you after all.”

He laughed bitterly, jerking away. “Careful what you say,
my lady
. Do you hear yourself? I cannot imagine the reality has been lost, even on you. If what your
Mr. Eads
says is true, if I am not the son of Franklin Courtland, sixth Viscount Rainsleigh, then I am not, in fact,
seventh
Viscount Rainsleigh. I am not a viscount at all; I am a bastard. And you are not a viscountess. You are married to a man with no name.”

Elisabeth dropped her hand and sat back on her haunches. “How can you think I care about that? Bryson? Please tell me that you do not.”

“Well, you should care!” He shoved off the settee. “It's no small thing to accuse a man of being a bastard. To threaten to strip him of his title, to single-handedly make him the son of an . . . an . . . unmarried blacksmith!”

“You're not listening.” She sighed. “Mr. Eads is not a blacksmith; his father was. He is a man of industry. And he wishes to accuse you of nothing. He proposes to tell no one but you. It was only because I drew the story out of him that he told me.”

“Drew the story out, did you?” He strode to her. “Are you deliberately trying to ruin me?”

“What I'm trying to do,” she said, standing, “is set you free.”

“From what? Respectability? The pride of a rich heritage, an ancient title? The simple decency of being a man of known parentage?”

“From
lies
, Bryson.”

“Well, this is a novel goal, coming from you.”

She gasped and stumbled back.

His arm shot out, and he grabbed her. “
No
, that's not what I meant. Elisabeth,
please
. . . ” He shut his eyes, straining to control the rioting emotions that threatened to overwhelm him. “Forgive me. You have been taken in by this man. It is not your fault. He is the liar—you cannot know the lengths to which these people will go to extort me. I lashed out, and that was a mistake. I'm sorry.” He gave her a gentle shake. “I have vowed to be unaffected by these sorts of ghosts, but this one has caught me unaware. I've never had anyone's claims strike so directly.”

He was afraid to open his eyes, to look down and see misunderstanding, fresh hurt, or, God forbid, disgust on her face. He drew breath to go on, but she shuffled under his grip and turned. He felt her move in. She placed her hand on his chest.

He opened his eyes.

“Your reaction,” she said softly, “is exactly what I would expect. You will have more anger and denial and resentment as we go. We must sink to the bottom of what this man says before we rise up. But we shall do it together. I am here to weather it with you, Bryson. I would not have presented it to you in this manner if I meant for you to go it alone.”

He opened his mouth to speak, closed it, and then opened it again. He said, “I think perhaps what I find the most astounding is how convinced you already are that he is telling the truth.” He stared at her. “You
believe
this stranger is my illegitimate father.” His voice had gone harsh again—even as he leached comfort and strength from the touch of her hands on his chest, even while he studied her upturned face, searching it as if it held every answer. He glared down, daring her to deny it—
demanding
that she deny it.

I
am Rainsleigh
.
My entire life has been about little else.

“It doesn't matter what I believe,” she said softly. “Because I know
you
. And I know that
you
will not dismiss it until you have discovered the absolute truth. Your honesty will see it through, whatever the answer may be. I simply want you to know that I am here. For you.” And then she leaned in, resting her head on his chest, sliding her hands around his waist, drawing him tightly against her.

“Elisabeth,” he managed to say, “please. Leave me. I will . . . ” He took a ragged breath. “We will start again in the morning. I will not take supper.”

She did not move, except to squeeze him harder, burrowing against his chest. He smelled her hair—sweet, full of sunshine—just below his chin, and he fought the urge to drop his face against it. He stood taut and still beneath her hold.

“I understand,” she finally said. “I expected this. And I will go. But please be aware that I will not sleep in the viscountess's suite.” She slid her hands from his back and stepped away, turning toward the door. “Ever again.”

H
e came to her in the middle of the night. She awakened to the sound of the door crashing against the wall. A heavy candelabra clonked unevenly on the tabletop. His boots hit the floor with a heavy, one-two-
thud
.

She was fully awake by the time he loomed over her. She lay still, eyes wide, heart hammering.

He slid the bed curtain to the end of the canopy and fumbled for the covers, flinging them back to reveal her curled beneath.

Her night rail was voluminous—a gift from her aunt—yards and yards of thin, white fabric, bunched up now, around her thighs. She blinked in the dim candlelight, watching him ravish her with his eyes.

He wore only his trousers and shirt, opened at the neck. His hair was wild, his eyes were heavy, half-lidded. She could smell the brandy from where she lay.

“I sent a messenger,” he said lowly, finally looking at her face. “To Spain. He'll take a boat from Portsmouth to Bilbao. I'll have some answer by next week from my mother.”

Elisabeth nodded. In her mind, she had no doubt. Her only uncertainty was Bryson's own journey to the truth. It could take years, she thought, regardless of what his mother said. There was always the chance that he would never accept it.

She rose to her elbows. “Right. Next week.”

“I felt compelled to include your description of this . . .
Raymond Eads
”—he could barely say the name—“in the very real possibility that she cannot remember one former lover from the next.”

“He was easy to describe,” she said, sitting up higher. “Because he looks very much like you.” Her hair fell around her shoulders, a nuisance; she had not bothered to braid it. Except, oh—

His gaze was fixed on it. The heat in his eyes flared, and he swayed. He widened his stance. He steadied himself on the headboard.

“And how is that?” he rasped.

“Well, he is tall, with broad shoulders, and although his hair has turned to white, a few strands of black remain. His jaw is rough with stubble, even though I'm sure his valet was fastidious about his shave.”

Bryson rubbed his own emerging beard, swaying again. “Careful. I shall think you prefer to be taken to bed by
Mr. Eads.
”

“Don't be stupid,” Elisabeth said softly, reaching out to him. The top of her gown fell from her shoulder, and his gaze locked on the exposed skin.

“Not stupid, my lady,” he said, swaying again. “Merely a bastard.”

She sighed and let her outstretched arm fall.

“My fathe—” He stopped again, squeezed his eyes shut. “
The viscount
looked nothing like me at all.”

“I'm not surprised.” After a pause, she said, “Bryson? Will you come to bed?”

“Elisabeth,” he began, addressing the bare skin of her shoulder, “you should go. I . . . I
want you
to go.”

“Go? Go where? My God, Bryson, it's the middle of the night.”

“Go,” he repeated. “Out of here. Back to your own bedchamber. Back to your aunt's house. You . . . you cannot stay.” He put one knee on the bed.

“I very well
can
stay, I am your wife, and I will stay. Come to bed.”

“Elisabeth,” he repeated, “our
rapport
in and out of bedrooms is . . .
was
something I intended to discuss. With you. In the library tonight.”

She narrowed her eyes. “This, now? Truly? ‘Our rapport?' ”

“Typically, a gentleman and his wife reside in different chambers. I designed this house with this arrangement in mind.” He looked around. “
Now
, of course . . . ”

“Oh, yes,
now, of course
, we will relocate to a one-room hovel in Wales, and if you wish to avoid me, you will have to stand in the garden.” She sat up and crossed her legs like a child. “Look, if sleeping in separate beds was to be part of my life as a viscountess, then I'm glad I may be one no more. I will embrace the hovel in Wales.”

“Our contract clearly stipulated that—”

“Our contract is null and void, as it should have been from the start.”

“Because I am no longer viscount?” he guessed bitterly.

“Because it was ridiculous.”

“Elisabeth,” he repeated, “I plan to pursue an annulment.”

She considered this, working to control her reaction. It was a test. Each statement was a test. He tossed it out and then waited, tense and watchful, for her to agree.

“On what grounds?” she asked casually, allowing the gown to fall down her arm.

He leaned more heavily on the mattress, thinking this over. “Fraud. When you married me, you believed me to be a viscount. You were to become Lady Rainsleigh, as far as you knew. Instead, you married the bastard son of a heartless woman and a blacksmith.” He lost his balance and tipped forward on the bed, scattering two pillows.

“When you meet Mr. Eads, Bryson, you will not think of him as a blacksmith—”

His head shot up. “He is not a viscount.”

“No, he is not. Although he is painfully aware that you are. His plan for meeting you, by the by, was that the reality of your birth remain a secret. The world at large need not know that you are not the son, strictly speaking, of the previous Lord Rainsleigh.”

“Beau is the rightful viscount now.” He growled, fumbling with the buttons on his shirt. “I will not take that from him.”

“You're so certain Beau wishes to be the viscount?”

“It doesn't matter what Beau wishes! I worked too hard, for too long, and made too much progress to
pretend
to be the viscount when I am not. It's why you must be sent away.”

She sighed in frustration and reached up to help him pull the shirt from his shoulders. He caught her wrists in his hands, holding her still. “Elisabeth,” he rasped, “I will not drag you through the scandal that this revelation will create. The ensuing humiliation will be diabolical. No lady of quality would remain bound to a man who was stripped of his title and his paternity.” He dropped her wrists.

“Perhaps I am not a lady of quality,” she mused, shifting to move behind him. She pulled his shirt away and rose up against his back. She rested her chin on his shoulder.

He turned his head, his mouth inches from her own. “But it was never a real marriage, was it?”

Another test.

“Wasn't it?” she breathed, pressing against him. She slid her palms up and down the muscled ropes of his arms, and she tucked her nose to his neck. He smelled like sweat, and brandy, and
him.
He growled and turned his head, seeking her mouth.

“We made inane agreements after we'd said horrible things,” she whispered against his skin. “Our pride would not allow any other way. But it was you . . . ” She lifted her head and gently bussed his cheek with her lips. His skin was warm. His whiskers prickled her mouth. She felt the muscles of his shoulders and neck go taut.

“
You
contrived the agreement that saw us married,” she went on, “that brought us
here
.”

She touched her lips to his beard again, relishing the prickle. “Here is precisely where I want to be. I don't care if you are Bryson Rainsleigh . . . ” Another pass of her lips—now more like a kiss.

He craned to her, stretching, reaching to catch her mouth.

“Or Thomas Coachman. I . . . I love you, Bryson.”

She paused and allowed that statement to settle in. He went very, very still. His breath seemed to stop. She kissed his mouth, and he returned it, light and cautious at first, a nibble.

She swiped his lip with her tongue.

He growled, descended, and overtook the kiss, devouring her mouth. She leaned in for another soft kiss, but he pivoted, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her into his lap. “I am drunk,” he said, falling back, taking her with him.

She stretched out her legs and settled on top of him, seeking the correct fit, his contours to her curves, his hardness to her soft. They were lost to the kiss. She came up to breathe, and he allowed it, although only just barely. He captured her mouth again, gathering up fistfuls of her gown, pulling it over her head. When she was naked, his hands roved her body retracing the curves he'd learned the night before with possessive ferocity.

She melted against him, loving the freedom she had to be above him, the solid hardness of him beneath her—loving, most of all, his hands massaging her body to life. He cupped her bottom, scooting her to just the right place, and her legs fell on either side of him.

He groaned, releasing her long enough to fumble with his trousers. When he'd kicked them free, he grabbed her by the hips, lifted her, and settled her with a precision that took her breath away. She sank onto him with a sigh. He groaned again, wrapping his arms around her, fusing them, and she lost herself to his taste, and his scent, and his body.

B
ryson could not remember the last time he'd awakened to the desolate after-effects of excessive drink. He opened his eyes and then shut them. The punishing light of morning pierced his skull. Slowly, he shoved up in bed, and the room swam. He reached out, and his hand collided with a soft, warm body.

“Move slowly, I think,” she mumbled, her lips brushing his bare arm, “in your condition.”

“Elisabeth . . . ” he began gruffly, harshly—a warning.

“At the very least, please tell me you can recall last night,” she whispered, stretching beneath the covers.

No amount of drunkenness could make me forget last night
. “Yes. I remember.”

He glanced at her, a snug, bean-shaped form under the sheet, a jumble of red curls lay on the pillow. “It was the last time.”

She made a punishing sound of frustration and flopped onto her back, staring at the ceiling. “Oh
no
,” she threatened. “You wouldn't.”

“I am struggling, Elisabeth,” he rasped. “Please do not make it more difficult than it is.”

“I will be difficult, because you've gone stark, raving mad. I knew you were cagey,” she said with irritation, “but I did not know you were destructive. We have married. You
forced us
to marry, and now you would . . . you would—what, exactly, would you have us do?”

“I am releasing you from the ‘forced marriage.' ”

“Well, I reject your release.”

“Oh, God. My head aches too violently to quarrel about it.”

“Pity, because it's no small thing to reject your wife, especially if said wife is me. And we will quarrel about it. Quarreling, in fact, is a very generous term for what we will do. Did you think I would simply say,
Yes, my lord,
and toddle off as if we'd never met?”

“Ha!” he said bitterly. “I thought you would utter a prayer of thanks and sprint.”

“But why?”

“Why?
Why
?” he growled, fishing in the covers for his shirt and shoving his arms inside, “Because I am in no condition to be a decent husband to you! I am . . . adrift.” He laughed bitterly. “Adrift does not begin to describe what I am.” He glanced down at her, and she glared back.

He shook his head at the ceiling. “Everything I ever knew; everything I believed and worked for, everything on which I staked my very identity is now gone. And not simply gone, but stripped from me and strewn in the gutter for everyone to see. The precise spectacle for which they've waited all along. Worthless Rainsleigh. Like father, like son. It was only a matter of time.”

“But that's just it. He was—”

“It makes no difference that Franklin Courtland was not my actual father! I am a bastard now, which is more of the same. Scandal and shame follows this family around like a stench that can never be washed away, no matter how relentlessly I have tried. There's no surprise that it's now attached to me. I could only stay ahead of it for so long.” Another bitter laugh.

“You would refuse, entirely, the plan of keeping Mr. Eads's introduction a private matter, known only to you? If you approach it this way, you may carry on as viscount, and no one else will be the wiser. You are fair, and temperate, and compassionate. You are successful and generous. You are more
noble
than most gentlemen will ever be. Only a few trusted people need to know what happened, all those years ago.”

“
I
know,” he said, “and I can barely live with myself for the knowledge. This . . .
this
is what I now reckon with. How can I reckon with you too?”

“I require no reckoning, Bryson,” she said softly, calmly, “I simply
am
.”

He rolled away, reaching for his trousers.

“Now who sprints?” she said softly.

“Bloody well better believe I'm sprinting. Look, Elisabeth, after the first night, it became clear that I . . . I wanted you too much. The intensity of my desire for you concerned me enough, but now . . . ” He broke off, moving to the edge of the bed to drag his trousers on. When he spoke again, he forced himself to mimic her calmness. “You needn't martyr yourself to me after three days as my wife. My identity is vague, at best. I cannot say what I will do, who I will tell, or how it will resonate. I feel broken. It is not your job to put me back together. This is not to be the life for which you signed on when we married.”

“So
ironic
,” she said, dazed. She sounded as if she was talking to herself. She went on. “Because the life for which I signed—and I mean that quite literally; I
signed a document—
was really not my preference at all. Together in public, separate in private? No. I would be together with you always.
Even
when you are adrift. Even when you are broken—especially when you are broken.” She turned to stare at him. “Tell me, what kind of a woman would I be if I deserted you now? When you are reeling from the biggest shock of your life?”