An Offer from a Gentleman with 2nd Epilogue (15 page)

“That's the most condescending, patronizing—”

“I'm sure you're right,” he allowed, “but nonetheless, in this particular case, at this particular moment, I know what's best for you, and you clearly don't, so—
don't
hit me again,” he warned.

Sophie looked down at her fist, which she hadn't even realized was pulled back and ready to fly. He was turning her into a monster. There was no other explanation. She didn't think she'd ever hit anyone in her life, and here she was ready to do it for the second time that day.

Eyes never leaving her hand, she slowly unclenched her fist, stretching her fingers out like a starfish and holding them there for the count of three. “How,” she said in a very low voice, “do you intend to stop me from going my way?”

“Does it really matter?” he asked, shrugging nonchalantly. “I'm sure I'll think of something.”

Her mouth fell open. “Are you saying you'd tie me up and—”

“
I
didn't say anything of the sort,” he cut in with a wicked grin. “But the idea certainly has its charms.”

“You are despicable,” she spat.

“And you sound like the heroine of a very poorly written novel,” he replied. “What did you say you were reading this morning?”

Sophie felt the muscles working frenetically in her cheek, felt her jaw clenching to the point where she was certain her teeth would shatter. How Benedict managed to be the most
wonderful and the most awful man in the world at the very same time, she would never understand. Right now, though, the awful side seemed to be winning, and she was quite certain—logic aside—that if she remained in his company one more second, her head would explode.

“I'm leaving!” she said, with, in her opinion, great drama and resolve.

But he just answered her with a sly half smile, and said, “I'm following.”

And the bloody man remained two strides behind her the entire way home.

B
enedict didn't often go out of his way to annoy people (with the notable exception of his siblings), but Sophie Beckett clearly brought out the devil in him. He stood in the doorway to her room as she packed, casually lounging against the doorframe. His arms were crossed in a manner that he somehow knew would vex her, and his right leg was slightly bent, the toe of his boot stubbed up against the floor.

“Don't forget your dress,” he said helpfully.

She glared at him.

“The ugly one,” he added, as if clarification were necessary.

“They're both ugly,” she spat out.

Ah, a reaction. “I know.”

She went back to shoving her belongings into her satchel.

He waved an arm expansively. “Feel free to take a souvenir.”

She straightened, her hands planted angrily on her hips. “Does that include the silver tea service? Because I could live for several years on what that would fetch.”

“You may certainly take the tea service,” he replied genially, “as you will not be out of my company.”

“I will not be your mistress,” she hissed. “I told you, I won't do it. I
can't
do it.”

Something about her use of the word “can't” struck him
as significant. He mulled that over for a few moments while she gathered up the last of her belongings and cinched shut the drawstring to her satchel.

“That's it,” he murmured.

She ignored him, instead marching toward the door and giving him a pointed look.

He knew she wanted him to get out of the way so she could depart. He didn't move a muscle, save for one finger that thoughtfully stroked the side of his jaw. “You're illegitimate,” he said.

The blood drained from her face.

“You are,” he said, more to himself than to her. Strangely, he felt rather relieved by the revelation. It explained her rejection of him, made it into something that had nothing to do with him and everything to do with her.

It took the sting out.

“I don't care if you're illegitimate,” he said, trying not to smile. It was a serious moment, but by God, he wanted to break out in a grin because now she'd come to London with him and be his mistress. There were no more obstacles, and—

“You don't understand anything,” she said, shaking her head. “It's not about whether I'm good enough to be your mistress.”

“I would care for any children we might have,” he said solemnly, pushing himself away from the doorframe.

Her stance grew even more rigid, if that were possible. “And what about your wife?”

“I don't have a wife.”

“Ever?”

He froze. A vision of the masquerade lady danced through his mind. He'd pictured her many ways. Sometimes she wore her silver ballgown, sometimes nothing at all.

Sometimes she wore a wedding dress.

Sophie's eyes narrowed as she watched his face, then she snorted derisively as she stalked past him.

He followed. “That's not a fair question, Sophie,” he said, dogging her heels.

She moved down the hall, not even pausing when she reached the stairs. “I think it's more than fair.”

He raced down the stairs until he was below her, halting her progress. “I have to marry someday.”

Sophie stopped. She had to; he was blocking her path. “Yes, you do,” she said. “But I don't have to be anyone's mistress.”

“Who was your father, Sophie?”

“I don't know,” she lied.

“Who was your mother?”

“She died at my birth.”

“I thought you said she was a housekeeper.”

“Clearly I misrepresented the truth,” she said, past the point of caring that she'd been caught in a lie.

“Where did you grow up?”

“It's of no interest,” she said, trying to squirm her way past him.

One of his hands wrapped itself around her upper arm, holding her firmly in place. “I find it very interesting.”

“Let me go!”

Her cry pierced the silence of the hall, loud enough so that the Crabtrees would certainly come running to save her. Except that Mrs. Crabtree had gone to the village, and Mr. Crabtree was outside, out of earshot. There was no one to help her, and she was at his mercy.

“I can't let you go,” he whispered. “You're not cut out for a life of servitude. It will kill you.”

“If it were going to kill me,” she returned, “it would have done so years ago.”

“But you don't have to do this any longer,” he persisted.

“Don't you dare try to make this about me,” she said, nearly shaking with emotion. “You're not doing this out of concern for my welfare. You just don't like being thwarted.”

“That is true,” he admitted, “but I also won't see you cast adrift.”

“I have been adrift all my life,” she whispered, and she felt the traitorous sting of tears prick her eyes. God above, she didn't want to cry in front of this man. Not now, not when she felt so off-balance and weak.

He touched her chin. “Let me be your anchor.”

Sophie closed her eyes. His touch was painfully sweet, and a not very small part of her was aching to accept his offer, to leave the life she'd been forced to live and cast her lot with him, this marvelous, wonderful, infuriating man who had haunted her dreams for years.

But the pain of her childhood was still too fresh. And the stigma of her illegitimacy felt like a brand on her soul.

She would not do this to another child.

“I can't,” she whispered. “I wish—”

“What do you wish?” he asked urgently.

She shook her head. She'd been about to tell him that she wished that she could, but she knew that such words would be unwise. He would only latch on to them, and press his cause anew.

And that would make it all the harder to say no.

“You leave me no choice, then,” he stated grimly.

Her eyes met his.

“Either you come with me to London, and—” He held up a silencing hand when she tried to protest. “And I will find you a position in my mother's household,” he added pointedly.

“Or?” she asked, her voice sullen.

“Or I will have to inform the magistrate that you have stolen from me.”

Her mouth abruptly tasted like acid. “You wouldn't,” she whispered.

“I certainly don't want to.”

“But you would.”

He nodded. “I would.”

“They'd hang me,” she said. “Or send me to Australia.”

“Not if I requested otherwise.”

“And what would you request?”

His brown eyes looked strangely flat, and she suddenly realized that he wasn't enjoying the conversation any more than she was.

“I would request,” he said, “that you be released into my custody.”

“That would be very convenient for you.”

His fingers, which had been touching her chin all the while, slid down to her shoulder. “I'm only trying to save you from yourself.”

Sophie walked to a nearby window and looked out, surprised that he hadn't tried to stop her. “You're making me hate you, you know,” she said.

“I can live with that.”

She gave him a curt nod. “I will wait for you in the library, then. I would like to leave today.”

Benedict watched her walk away, stood utterly still as the door to the library closed behind her. He knew she would not flee. She was not the sort to go back on her word.

He couldn't let this one go.
She
had left—the great and mysterious “she,” he thought with a bitter smile—the one woman who had touched his heart.

The same woman who had not even given him her name.

But now there was Sophie, and she
did
things to him. Things he hadn't felt since
her
. He was sick of pining for a woman who practically didn't exist. Sophie was here, and Sophie would be his.

And, he thought with grim determination, Sophie was
not
going to leave him.

“I can live with you hating me,” he said to the closed door. “I just can't live without
you
.”

It was previously reported in this column that This Author predicted a possible match between Miss Rosamund Reiling and Mr. Phillip Cavender. This Author can now say that this is not likely to occur. Lady Penwood (Miss Reiling's mother) has been heard to say that she will not settle for a mere mister, even though Miss Reiling's father, while certainly wellborn, was not a member of the aristocracy.

Not to mention, of course, that Mr. Cavender has begun to show a decided interest in Miss Cressida Cowper.

L
ADY
W
HISTLEDOWN'S
S
OCIETY
P
APERS
, 9 M
AY
1817

S
ophie started feeling ill the minute the carriage departed My Cottage. By the time they stopped for the night at an inn in Oxfordshire, she was downright queasy. And when they reached the outskirts of London . . . Well, she was quite convinced she would throw up.

Somehow she managed to keep the contents of her stomach where they belonged, but as their carriage wended farther into the tangled streets of London, she was filled with an intense sense of apprehension.

No, not apprehension. Doom.

It was May, which meant that the season was in full
swing. Which meant that Araminta was in residence.

Which meant that Sophie's arrival was a bad, bad idea.

“Very bad,” she muttered.

Benedict looked up. “Did you say something?”

She crossed her arms mutinously. “Just that you're a very bad man.”

He chuckled. She'd known he would chuckle, and it still irritated her.

He pulled the curtain away from the window and looked out. “We're nearly there,” he said.

He'd said that he was taking her directly to his mother's residence. Sophie remembered the grand house in Grosvenor Square as if she'd been there the night before. The ballroom was huge, with hundreds of sconces on the walls, each adorned by a perfect beeswax candle. The smaller rooms had been decorated in the Adam style, with exquisitely scalloped ceilings and pale, pastel walls.

It had been Sophie's dream house, quite literally. In all her dreams of Benedict and their fictional future together, she'd always seen herself in that house. It was silly, she knew, since he was a second son and thus not in line to inherit the property, but still, it was the most beautiful home she'd ever beheld, and dreams weren't meant to be about reality, anyway. If Sophie had wanted to dream her way right into Kensington Palace, that was her prerogative.

Of course, she thought with a wry smile, she wasn't likely ever to see the interior of Kensington Palace.

“What are you smiling about?” Benedict demanded.

She didn't bother to glance up as she replied, “I'm plotting your demise.”

He grinned—not that she was looking at him, but it was one of those smiles she could hear in the way he breathed.

She hated that she was that sensitive to his every nuance. Especially since she had a sneaking suspicion that he was the same way about her.

“At least it sounds entertaining,” he said.

“What does?” she asked, finally moving her eyes from the lower hem of the curtain, which she'd been staring at for what seemed like hours.

“My demise,” he said, his smile crooked and amused. “If you're going to kill me, you might as well enjoy yourself while you're at it, because Lord knows, I won't.”

Her jaw dropped a good inch. “You're mad,” she said.

“Probably.” He shrugged rather casually before settling back in his seat and propping his feet up on the bench across from him. “I've all but kidnapped you, after all. I should think that would qualify as the maddest thing I've ever done.”

“You could let me go now,” she said, even though she knew he never would.

“Here in London? Where you could be attacked by footpads at any moment? That would be most irresponsible of me, don't you think?”

“It hardly compares to abducting me against my will!”

“I didn't abduct you,” he said, idly examining his fingernails. “I blackmailed you. There's a world of difference.”

Sophie was saved from having to reply by the jolt of the carriage as it ground to a halt.

Benedict flipped back the curtains one last time, then let them fall into place. “Ah. Here we are.”

Sophie waited while he disembarked, then moved to the doorway. She briefly considered ignoring his outstretched hand and jumping down herself, but the carriage was quite high off the ground, and she really didn't wish to make a fool of herself by tripping and landing in the gutter.

It would be nice to insult him, but not at the cost of a sprained ankle.

With a sigh, she took his hand.

“Very smart of you,” Benedict murmured.

Sophie looked at him sharply. How did he know what she'd been thinking?

“I almost always know what you're thinking,” he said.

She tripped.

“Whoa!” he called out, catching her expertly before she landed in the gutter.

He held her just a moment longer than was necessary before depositing her on the pavement. Sophie would have said something, except that her teeth were ground together far too tightly for words.

“Doesn't the irony just kill you?” Benedict asked, smiling wickedly.

She pried open her jaw. “No, but it may very well kill
you
.”

He laughed, the blasted man. “Come along,” he said. “I'll introduce you to my mother. I'm sure she'll find some position or another for you.”

“She may not have any openings,” Sophie pointed out. He shrugged.

“She loves me. She'll make an opening.”

Sophie held her ground, refusing to take a single step alongside him until she'd made her point. “I'm not going to be your mistress.”

His expression was remarkably bland as he murmured, “Yes, you've said as much.”

“No, I mean, your plan isn't going to work.”

He was all innocence. “I have a plan?”

“Oh, please,” she scoffed. “You're going to try to wear me down in hopes that eventually I'll give in.”

“I would never dream of it.”

“I'm sure you dream of quite a bit more,” she muttered.

He must have heard her, because he chuckled. Sophie crossed her arms mutinously, not caring that she looked most undignified in such a position, standing right there on the pavement in full view of the world. No one would pay her half a mind, anyway, dressed as she was in the coarse woolens of a servant. She supposed she ought to adopt a brighter outlook and approach her new position with a more optimistic attitude, but drat it all, she
wanted
to be sullen just then.

Frankly, she thought she'd earned it. If anyone had a right to be sullen and disgruntled, it was she.

“We
could
stand here on the pavement all day,” Benedict said, his voice lightly laced with sarcasm.

She started to shoot him an angry glare, but that was when she noticed where they were standing. They weren't in Grosvenor Square. Sophie wasn't even certain where they were. Mayfair, to be sure, but the house before them definitely wasn't the house at which she'd attended the masquerade.

“Er, is this Bridgerton House?” she asked.

He quirked a brow. “How did you know my home is called Bridgerton House?”

“You've mentioned it.” Which was, thankfully, true. He'd talked about both Bridgerton House, and the Bridgertons' country residence, Aubrey Hall, several times during their conversations.

“Oh.” He seemed to accept that. “Well, no, actually, it's not. My mother moved out of Bridgerton House nearly two years ago. She hosted one last ball—it was a masquerade, actually—and then turned the residence over to my brother and his wife. She'd always said she would leave just as soon as he married and started a family of his own. I believe his first child was born a mere month after she left.”

“Was it a boy or a girl?” she asked, even though she knew the answer. Lady Whistledown always reported such things.

“A boy. Edmund. They had another son, Miles, earlier this year.”

“How nice for them,” Sophie murmured, even though it felt like her heart were strangling. She wasn't likely to have children of her own, and that was one of the saddest realizations she'd ever reached. Children required a husband, and marriage seemed a pipe dream. She hadn't been raised to be a servant, and thus she had very little in common with most of the men she met in her daily life. Not that the other servants weren't good and honorable people, but it was difficult
to imagine sharing her life with someone who, for example, couldn't read.

Sophie didn't need to marry someone of particularly high birth, but even the middle class was out of her reach. No self-respecting man in trade would marry a housemaid.

Benedict motioned for her to follow him, and she did, until they reached the front steps.

Sophie shook her head. “I'll use the side entrance.”

His lips thinned. “You'll use the front entrance.”

“I'll use the side entrance,” she said firmly. “No woman of breeding will hire a maid who enters through the front.”

“You're with me,” he ground out. “You'll use the front entrance.”

A bubble of mirth escaped her lips. “Benedict, just yesterday you wanted me to become your mistress. Would you dare bring your mistress to meet your mother through the front door?”

She'd confounded him with that. Sophie grinned as she watched his face twist with frustration.

She felt better than she had in days.

“Would you,” she continued, mostly just to torture him further, “bring your mistress to meet her at all?”

“You're not my mistress,” he bit off.

“Indeed.”

His chin jutted out, and his eyes bored into hers with barely leashed fury. “You're a bloody little housemaid,” he said, his voice low, “because you've insisted upon being a housemaid. And as a housemaid, you are, if somewhat low on the social scale, still utterly respectable. Certainly respectable enough for my mother.”

Sophie's smile faltered. She might have pushed him too far.

“Good,” Benedict grunted, once it was clear that she was not going to argue the point any further. “Come with me.”

Sophie followed him up the steps. This might actually
work to her advantage. Benedict's mother surely would not hire a maid who had the effrontery to use the front door. And since she had steadfastly refused to be Benedict's mistress, he would have to accept defeat and allow her to return to the country.

Benedict pushed open the front door, holding it until Sophie entered before him. The butler arrived within seconds.

“Wickham,” Benedict said, “kindly inform my mother that I am here.”

“I will indeed, Mr. Bridgerton,” Wickham replied. “And might I take the liberty of informing you that she has been rather curious as to your whereabouts this past week?”

“I would be shocked if she hadn't been,” Benedict replied.

Wickham nodded toward Sophie with an expression that hovered somewhere between curiosity and disdain. “Might I inform her of your guest's arrival?”

“Please do.”

“Might I inform her of your guest's identity?”

Sophie looked over at Benedict with great interest, wondering what he'd say.

“Her name is Miss Beckett,” Benedict replied. “She is here to seek employment.”

One of Wickham's brows rose. Sophie was surprised. She didn't think that butlers were supposed to show any expression whatsoever.

“As a maid?” Wickham inquired.

“As whatever,” Benedict said, his tone beginning to show the first traces of impatience.

“Very good, Mr. Bridgerton,” Wickham said, and then he disappeared up the staircase.

“I don't think he thought it was very good at all,” Sophie whispered to Benedict, careful to hide her smile.

“Wickham is not in charge here.”

Sophie let out a little whatever-you-say sort of sigh. “I imagine Wickham would disagree.”

He looked at her with disbelief. “He's the butler.”

“And I'm a housemaid. I know all about butlers. More, I daresay, than you do.”

His eyes narrowed. “You act less like a housemaid than any woman of my acquaintance.”

She shrugged and pretended to inspect a still life painting on the wall. “You bring out the worst in me, Mr. Bridgerton.”

“Benedict,” he hissed. “You've called me by my given name before. Use it now.”

“Your mother is about to descend the stairs,” she reminded him, “and you are insisting that she hire me as a housemaid. Do many of your servants call you by your given name?”

He glared at her, and she knew he knew she was right. “You can't have it both ways, Mr. Bridgerton,” she said, allowing herself a tiny smile.

“I only wanted it
one
way,” he growled.

“Benedict!”

Sophie looked up to see an elegant, petite woman descending the stairs. Her coloring was fairer than Benedict's, but her features marked her clearly as his mother.

“Mother,” he said, striding to meet her at the bottom of the stairs. “It is good to see you.”

“It would be better to see you,” she said pertly, “had I known where you were this past week. The last I'd heard you'd gone off to the Cavender party, and then everyone returned without you.”

“I left the party early,” he replied, “then went off to My Cottage.”

His mother sighed. “I suppose I can't expect you to notify me of your every movement now that you're thirty years of age.”

Benedict gave her an indulgent smile.

She turned to Sophie. “This must be your Miss Beckett.”

“Indeed,” Benedict replied. “She saved my life while I was at My Cottage.”

Sophie started. “I didn't—”