A Touch of Passion (27 page)

“Do you know where she went? Do you know anything about her that could help me locate her?”

Angelo lay back, lounging like an emperor, seemingly more relaxed, understanding he had the power and control in this situation.

“I have two questions. Why do you want to find DePalma, and why should I help you?”

Grayson shot a look at Hadley, and they held a silent conversation about how much to tell and how much to pay. He decided to keep the Libertine Scholars out of the conversation.

Grayson cleared his throat. “I have some personal business with DePalma, and I’m prepared to pay handsomely for any information that aids in locating her.”

Angelo’s eyes narrowed, and a shrewd smile settled on his sculpted lips. “And here I thought it was the Libertine Scholars who were searching for DePalma, all six of you.”

Grayson struggled to keep his temper under control. This Angelo knew more than was comfortable. Was he in league with their villainess? “It appears I’m not the only one to be well informed. I wonder why you’ve taken such an interest.”

“When I hear someone is asking questions about me, I tend to want to know why.”

“Again, I reiterate, I have no interest in you, your business, or your life. I simply want to find DePalma.”

Angelo considered Hadley and Grayson for a few moments before asking, “Why should I help you?”

Hadley finally spoke up. “We can pay you, and pay you well.”

“You insult me. Do I look as if I need money?”

Grayson tried to smooth things over. “You and I both know that every man wants something he doesn’t have. If there is something you want, name it.”

Angelo took a drink from a glass and studied the pair, his eyes roaming from one to the other several times. “Libertine Scholars. In my debt. My, the night has so many possibilities. I shall need to think on this.”

Grayson had a sick feeling in his stomach. He approached Angelo and handed him his card. “We have taken up enough of your time tonight. When you have decided to help us, send word.”

Angelo fingered the card as if it were a nugget of gold, and Grayson’s sick feeling intensified. “You do realize that DePalma will know you’ve been to see me,” he said. “She will have you followed. That puts me in danger. So, regardless of what I may tell you, you owe me.”

“I don’t believe you need protection. A man in your profession must have good security.”

“True. But look what DePalma has managed to do to the mighty Libertine Scholars.”

Hadley spoke, his contempt clear. “That was when we had no idea what was afoot. She’ll have a much harder job targeting us now.”

Angelo simply turned to Grayson with a raised eyebrow. “I wouldn’t be so sure.” He clapped his hands, and the door to the harem-style room opened. Angelo spoke to the butler. “Escort the gentleman from the premises.” He turned to Grayson. “I’ll send word when I have information worth sharing. Until then …” He paused and ran his eyes over Grayson, lingering on his chest before trailing down to his groin. “I’ll have very pleasant dreams about my upcoming payment.”

As the men left the club Grayson’s mind whirled. Hadley put into words what Grayson did not wish to face.

“It’s not money he’s going to want in payment. Perhaps we should continue to look for another source of information.”

Grayson could only nod, the bitterness of being so close but still so far flooding his soul.

Grayson was not in a good mood when he returned to his townhouse. He’d had such hopes of being well ahead in their hunt for DePalma. He dismissed his valet, and as he tore off his cravat he reflected that he knew only too well what Angelo would want for information, and from whom. He didn’t think he had the stomach for it, but if it helped keep Portia and the rest of the Libertine Scholars and their wives safe, what else could he do?

He sat on the end of his bed removing his boots and going over different scenarios. The one he eventually grasped, like a drowning sailor grabbing a lifebuoy, was to kidnap Angelo and force him to reveal what he knew.

As he stood to rid himself of the rest of his clothes, he spied two notes propped on his pillow. Jeeves, his butler, must have left them there, as Grayson had been ignoring the pile of correspondence building up in his study—mainly because he didn’t want to hear from or think too much about Portia. Jeeves must have thought these notes were important.

He bent and picked the first note up but didn’t recognize the childish handwriting. The other handwriting he knew well—Portia’s.

He opened Portia’s missive as if tearing a bandage from a bloody wound. His mouth went dry, and he briefly closed his eyes and counted to ten. He was expecting her to be angry at the callous note he’d sent. He wished he could take it back and write one from his heart, telling her all he truly felt. He began to read.

Dearest Grayson,

I wish you had been here when I awoke from my coma, and I’m not saying that to make you feel guilty, I’m saying it because it’s the truth. I love you. I have since I was sixteen and I likely always will.

I’m saying I wanted you here with me because it would have meant you had faced your fears and your love for me was strong enough to weather any trials or tribulations our marriage might have to face in the future.

However, your absence means only one thing—that you don’t love me enough. That’s the only conclusion I can draw. I hope one day you meet a woman you love enough so that you can face your fears. But you will never be able to do that if you are married to me.

So, my love, as I am not with child, I’m letting you go. I release you from any promises made and refuse to let you sacrifice yourself in the name of honor. Don’t bristle—a lady has honor too, and I’m far too honorable to make you marry a woman you do not love. It would destroy us both in the end. Besides, I won’t allow rules to hem me in. You only get one turn at life, and I want to make sure my turn goes around and around and around until I’m dizzy with it.

In case you care, I’m not marrying anyone else, as that would not be fair to me. As I’ve always said, I want a husband who loves me. Therefore I’m marrying no one.

I’ve talked this over with Lord and Lady Markham and my mother. My brothers are likely to be harder to convince, but convince them I will.

I intend to go away for a year to let the scandal settle—or, as will likely happen, be eclipsed when a new disgrace involving new players surfaces. I’m financially secure enough not to need approval for my actions from anyone.

To save my business from suffering through all of this, Christian is going to help me by buying it and agreeing to run the company. Further down the track, when my lapse has been forgotten, I will buy it back from him for the same price.

No one is hurt, and life, as we both know it, can go on as before.

Don’t worry. I shall stay at Henslowe Court safely guarded until our villainess has been apprehended.

I wish you all the best in your life. I hope you find peace. Robert would be proud of the way you came to my rescue and are dedicating your efforts to his cause, and I hope I may continue to call you a friend.

Yours always,
Lady Portia Flagstaff

An intense pain suddenly stabbed at the back of his eyes, and he had to seek the bedpost for support. This was what he wanted, wasn’t it? He would never suffer the pain of losing her.

He noticed he was rubbing his chest.

But wasn’t that what he was suffering now, a gut-wrenching, heartbreaking pain that would last the rest of his life? Without him noticing, the worst had happened—he’d lost her in every sense of the word.

And she’d asked to be friends. After their mind-blowing lovemaking and intimacy, she was fooling herself that they could ever be friends. One day she would marry, and Grayson knew with certainty that he would never be able to shake the hand of the man who had the privilege of sharing her life, her home, and her bed.

The pain of loss blinded him, and Grayson went to his knees, the hard floor jarring his body. Tears slid down his cheeks, and his tongue darted across his lips, tasting the saltiness. He usually cried when someone close to him died. But he cried now for lost chances. He cried for being such a fool, and he cried for having hurt such a magnificent woman.

He wrapped his arms around himself, squeezing his eyes shut. All that did was allow him to see Portia’s beautiful smiling face, but she was no longer smiling at him, or for him.

She would marry someone else, have a family with someone else, and he would … what? Shit, marry a woman he’d probably grow tired of, whom he’d hate going home to, and who would lie unresponsive in his bed doing her duty.

All these years he’d thought he didn’t want love. He’d thought he was so smart for protecting his heart. Now his gut churned with nausea, and with every breath his chest contracted painfully. He’d been fooling no one but himself.

He
loved
her.

And he’d stamped on her heart as if it were a bug beneath his boot.

Grayson considered his father’s limited presence in his early childhood, and realized how little time they had spent together. Grayson also couldn’t remember a time he heard his father laugh. Lord Cumberland had laughed plenty. Grayson’s father might have appeared to be content, but was he happy?

Grayson sank back onto the bed, hands behind his head, trying to be honest with himself for a change. He didn’t want to spend the rest of his life merely being content. He thought about those he’d lost. And he realized that they would be looking down at him, yelling at him not to waste his life but to live it to the fullest. He still struggled to know how to do that, to give himself over to achieving his greatest desires. But he did realize that he’d just lost the woman who completed him.

Portia was very beautiful, true, but more important was that she challenged him, made him remember how wonderful it felt to be alive. She was beautiful and spirited, but she had such capacity to love, and she was filled with compassion for others—the orphans’ school she worked hard to support being a case in point. She hadn’t built her business to prove she could make a lot of money; she’d done it for fun, to test herself, for the pure enjoyment of it, and then used her success to help those less fortunate than herself.

Suddenly he felt tired. Tired of running from his feelings. But the pain he was feeling made him realize that he could never outrun pain. People came and went in one’s life. Death was inevitable. He couldn’t stop death any more than he could stop himself from aging.

But here he was, about to lose the one woman who could show him how to live, and it wasn’t to death. It was to his own cowardice.

Reading Portia’s letter, learning she was walking away from him, he felt bereft, as if he’d lost a part of himself. He closed his eyes and breathed deep. He could remember her scent. He marveled at the paleness of her perfect, unblemished skin and the lyrical lightness of her voice. The sun must envy him for being able to touch parts of her body it had never seen. He loved to stroke her feminine softness, yet all her limbs were lean and firm—and his mouth almost watered as he remembered her pert bosom. But it was her smile he missed the most. Her eyes lit up whenever she saw him, as if he were the most important person in the world to her. He doubted they’d light up at all now.

He gulped down his sorrow and made a vow that he’d prove himself worthy. He’d win back her love, find the villainess, and keep Portia and his friends safe.

He bolted upright, and despite his state of undress, he began packing. He’d go to Henslowe Court and prove to her that he loved her more than life itself. He would have to convince her that this wasn’t about his honor and duty; he wasn’t sure how he’d achieve this, but he would.

Hadley could stay here and wait for information from Angelo. He couldn’t think about the price Angelo would demand. He’d worry about that when it happened. All he had to focus on was earning Portia’s love and trust.

Just then the door to his room opened and Timmins, his valet, entered.

“I’m sorry to disturb you, my lord, but I heard the noise and thought you may have need of me after all.”

“Thank you, Timmins. I have decided to leave for Henslowe Court, Lord Markham’s estate in Dorset, immediately.”

The look on his valet’s face was full of unanswered questions, but Grayson merely stared at him until Timmins said, “How can I help?”

“You can pack a couple of shirts and pants into a saddlebag while I dash off a note for Jeeves to deliver to Hadley in the morning. I don’t wish to wake him now. Then tomorrow you could trunk up enough clothes for a prolonged stay at Henslowe Court and accompany it down to Dorset in my best coach.”

“How long will we be there, and what sorts of entertainments will you be attending?”

Grayson rubbed his forehead. “I don’t think there will be anything grand. We are still targets of our villainess”—Grayson had informed his staff of the situation upon his arrival back in London, so that they would be on alert—“and of course Lady Markham is nearing term.” He wouldn’t assume a wedding; he had to win Portia back first.

He sat at the small writing table in his room while Timmins packed his bags, then slipped out to wake one of the grooms to saddle his chestnut stallion, Helios. He wrote a note to Hadley informing him of Grayson’s decision to go directly to Henslowe Court and asking him to stay in London until word was received from Angelo. Only then did he remember that there had been a second note left on his pillow. He picked it up, but in his wish to leave immediately he decided to read it later and folded it into his jacket pocket. He didn’t send a note to Christian; he didn’t want Portia forewarned in case it sent her fleeing from the safe haven of Christian’s estate. He’d surprise them.

Once mounted on Helios, Grayson made his way through the London streets as dawn approached. He had a long ride ahead of him, but it would give him time to contemplate exactly how he’d win Portia back.

A little niggle kept telling him it might be too late. But surely, if she really loved him, she could forgive him, could she not? He knew in that instant that he’d forgive her anything. He’d been so worried that with her modern ways she’d bring disgrace upon his family name, and yet he was the one who had disgraced the Blackwood name through his cowardice. There was no scandal or societal boundary she could cross that would make him think less of her. He was such a fool to think anyone else’s opinion mattered.