Ashlyn Macnamara (30 page)

“You’ve an odd way of showing it. What on earth was I supposed to think?”

“You’ll think whatever you like, of course. I thought we’d moved past this matter of you mistrusting me.” He gave a harsh laugh. “Isn’t that rich? Turns out you were
right, in any case. I can’t be trusted when it comes to you.”

She pulled a long draught of air in through her nose while she tried to make sense of his ravings. Somehow while she’d dozed away the effects of his lovemaking, he’d managed to go mad. The only experience she’d had with madmen was her Uncle Erasmus, but he usually reacted well to a calm voice and a stiff shot of spirits.

She laid a hand on George’s arm. “Why can’t we talk about this?”

He shook his head. “I don’t want to. Not here, where there’s nothing to drink.” He rubbed his forearm across his brow. “God, I need a brandy.”

Wonderful. Now he’d all but accused her of driving him to drink. If they had a bottle of brandy, she’d be tempted to break it over his head. “It’s nearly daybreak. You can’t drink brandy for breakfast.”

His shoulders drooped, and she took that for relenting, but then he rolled to his back, one arm cast over his eyes.

Isabelle bit her lip. What on earth was she to make of his behavior? She was still trying to work out what to say when he scrubbed a hand down his chin and caught her eye. Held it. “You realize I must make you an offer of marriage.”

She gaped for the space of several blinks. “You hardly have to go to such lengths,” she said weakly. “I’m not some young miss you’ve just ruined.”

“No, but you are of good family.”

“Not anymore.”

He held up a hand, and she bit back the rest of her protest. “You may live under diminished circumstances, but it has not always been that way. Your breeding shows, whether or not you realize it. The way you lift a teacup. The way you sit in a chair so properly, back straight. The way you lean forward and attend whoever’s talking, even
if they’re boring you with the details of their fourth-cousin-twice-removed’s fascination with hieroglyphics. My own mother doesn’t carry herself so well.”

Heat crept up the back of her neck, and she grasped handfuls of the sheets. “No matter my origins, sir, I could hardly expect an offer of marriage from you. What’s transpired between us does not signify.”

“And if you find yourself with child again?” His eyes never left hers.

She rubbed her palms against her thighs. “That is the risk we took.”

Or she’d taken. She’d gone to his bed, wholly prepared to face the consequences, even if it did result in another child. Oh, God, not just any child but
his
child. She closed her eyes against the image of a bright-eyed boy with an impish grin. George’s son would get into twice as much trouble as Jack.

“I didn’t mean to take such a chance. Not with you. I … I lost control. I did not intend to …” He shifted on the sheets and cleared his throat. “At any rate, I ought to do right by you.”

She pulled in a breath. She ought to be flattered at his offer. It was far more than she’d ever gotten from Jack’s father.

But something was missing. He’d said all the right words, but they lacked the force of conviction. His offer was made out of duty and perhaps a desire to compensate for her current circumstances. Whether or not he’d had anything to do with them. And that wasn’t enough—certainly not for Isabelle Marshall.

Diminished as she was, it wasn’t enough for Isabelle Mears, either. She’d managed just fine on her own. She would continue to do so.

Without George Upperton.

“You do not have to do this. I am far beneath you. What would your family say?”

He bolted off the bed, still naked and oh, so distracting. “To hell with my family. They have no say in this matter.”

She shook her head, even as she wrapped the sheets about her and sat. “Forgive me, but it is quite naïve of you to think so.”

He threw back his head and let out a shout of laughter. “Naïve? Oh, isn’t that rich? I don’t think anyone’s referred to me as naïve since my first year at Eton. Come to think of it, they didn’t even call me naïve then.”

“You may think yourself quite worldly in most areas, but this is one where I believe I have a little more experience.”

He crossed to her and seized her by the shoulders. “Do you really think so? Perhaps we should do a comparison. What your family expected of you and what mine expects of me. And we’ll see which of us outdoes the other.”

Men always had to turn the most inane topic into a competition. Well, she wouldn’t have it. If she refused to play his game, perhaps he would stop this madness.

“Come now. Let’s have a go.” His fingers bit into her upper arms. “Let’s start with you. I can guess easily enough. They wanted you to make a brilliant match that would enhance their social connections.”

Only an heir to a dukedom. The memory of the Duke of Amherst’s oldest son sent a shudder through her. If she’d gone through with her expected role and married him, she’d have doomed herself to an endless succession of parties, calls, routs, all of it expected. All of it predictable. Comfortable, luxurious, socially acceptable, but ultimately sterile.

Her lips stretched, but she feared the expression was only a poor semblance of a smile. “It hardly takes any kind of thought to work that out. The same can be said for any daughter of the
ton
. At any rate, I believe you’ll agree I failed spectacularly.”

“Would you consider telling me how that came about?”

Once again, the strangeness of his mood struck her. He flitted from one topic to the next and dashed if she could follow his thinking. “Do you really want the sordid details? And after you’ve made me an offer, no less?”

He started, as if someone had just pierced him through. “Not the sordid details, no. I only wonder how such a thing came about when clearly …” He grabbed a fistful of forelock and pulled on it. “It’s just … In the eyes of society, you’re of the highest breeding.”

“That’s what my family liked to think.”

“But … but you don’t believe that to be true.”

“I know that not to be true. I
lived
it. Perhaps I didn’t wish to live that way the rest of my life.” She rolled to her back and contemplated the canopy. Heavy blue velvet, draped just so, comprised the hangings. “I hardly know anymore, but perhaps that was why I let myself be taken in. He was quite persuasive, you know, and not in the way you’re thinking. He had a way of expressing himself. I think he fancied he could talk himself into and out of any situation. That’s how he managed an introduction in the first place when my family would never have countenanced me consorting with him. That’s how …”

“That’s how he talked himself under your skirts.”

“He did.” She let the admission float in the air, stark in its simplicity. “And now I’ve let that happen again.”

He grasped her shoulder, forcing her to turn and look him in the eye. “How can you say such a thing when I’ve just made you an offer?”

“It was hardly a serious offer.” She waved a hand to shoo the idea away and at the same time convince him to release her—and cover himself.

The gesture didn’t work. If anything, his grip tightened. “I was in complete earnest.”

“All right.” She sighed. “Let’s suppose for a moment you were. My family would hardly consider it a brilliant match. I regret to inform you they would consider you beneath me. Or they would have. Then.”

“I know that much,” he muttered. “A mere mister wasn’t good enough?”

“My family? They’d have settled for no less than a title, preferably a duke or a marquess. I’m afraid I ended up a great disappointment to them.”

He looked away for a long moment. “Disappointment,” he said under his breath. “Yes, let’s talk about disappointment.”

“If you bring me before your family, I’m sure you’ll do the job quite nicely.” She backed out of his grasp, as a new thought occurred to her. A disturbing, even disillusioning thought. “And that’s what your offer is about, isn’t it? Your family has put pressure on you to marry.”

“My mother had been threatening me with young chits and introductions enough to drive me mad, yes, but …” He shook his head as if to clear it. “That isn’t why I made you an offer.”

“Well, it certainly wasn’t because you ruined me.” Her voice wobbled on the final word. Blast it, she’d been doing so well keeping control of her emotions. Why must she slip now when she needed to set him down? “Haven’t I had enough men use me already?”

“Use you?” His arm slashed in a gesture toward the mattress. “Is that what you think happened between us? I don’t recall having to coerce you in the slightest.”

A soft knock at the door saved Isabelle from having to reply. A good thing, too, for her throat had suddenly constricted past the point where words would emerge. Once again, she was about to be caught.

*  *  *

“W
HOEVER
it is, I’ll get rid of him,” George muttered. “We’re not through discussing this matter.” Of all the damnable sense of timing.

He waited until Isabelle had recovered her clothes and retreated into a far corner, before reaching into the wardrobe for his banyan. He crossed to the door and cracked it open.

His sister stood in the corridor, already dressed for the day. “There you are. Nobody’s seen you since yesterday.”

Only Revelstoke when he’d gone to gather information, but he wasn’t about to tell Henrietta that. “If Mama’s sent you to remind me of my social duty, it’s really not a good time.”

Henrietta stepped forward, as if expecting him to invite her in.

Remembering Mrs. Cox yesterday, he planted his feet firmly on the threshold. “I’ll come down to breakfast if my presence is required.”

“That isn’t the problem.” Her eyes, suspiciously red-rimmed, narrowed. “Do you have somebody in there?”

“That is none of your affair. And you oughtn’t know of such things.”

She turned her gaze skyward. Come to think of it, her nose was rather puffy as well. “I am five and twenty, and I’ve listened to enough gossip. Really, George. You’d better not have lured one of the younger ladies in there.”

“And give Mama a chance to thrust me in front of a parson? The very idea.” He nearly caught himself wincing at the idea of Isabelle overhearing this conversation, given what they’d been arguing about. “Now who’s been putting such ideas into your head? If it’s that Leach character, I’ll be talking to Revelstoke about acting as my second.”

Her face went oddly blank. “No one’s seen Leach in
two days. I thought perhaps you knew something. If he’s been helping in the effort to find that boy, for example, I might feel a bit better.”

He reached out hesitantly and patted her shoulder. “There, there. The man’s clearly an idiot. You can do far better. Unless—” He broke off as a new thought clicked into place. “Good God, did you say he’s been missing for two days?”

“Yes, and what of it? You’ve been nowhere to be found for about the same time.”

Two days. The timing was too damned convenient. Jack, Biggles, and now Leach. “That’s not true. You’ve found me. Leach is still conspicuously absent.”

She let out a puff of air too anemic to be termed a sigh.

“Chin up. I thought you’d decided not to marry.”

“I have. This only decides the matter. Still, a girl likes to know a man might find her fanciable.”

“Worry about that when you’ve found someone worthy of you.” Leach in no way fit that particular bill. Not if George’s growing suspicions amounted to anything. Although what a grinning idiot like Leach might have to do with a young boy’s disappearance was anybody’s guess.

Henrietta squared her shoulders. “Make sure you turn up at breakfast. If you’ve got someone spirited away in there, you don’t want Mama coming up here next.”

George drummed his fingers against the side of the door until the pink flounce of Henrietta’s day dress disappeared round the corner. He forced himself to turn the latch carefully before he faced Isabelle. She still stood in the far corner, dressed now and half hidden by the bed’s hangings. “How much of that did you overhear?”

“I don’t make a habit of eavesdropping.” So stiff and polite she was. He could almost imagine the young lady she’d been before her downfall, clad in a white ball
gown like any other chit who had just made her bow, but more regal.

“I should have asked you this days ago. I’m an idiot for not thinking of it sooner.” He strode about the end of the bed to stand before her.

“What?” She eyed him warily, as if she already knew she wouldn’t like the answer to her question.

“Who were you meeting that night in the garden?”

The color drained from her already pale cheeks. “I … I don’t even know. I received a note, but it was unsigned, and I did not recognize the handwriting.”

George rubbed his stubbled chin. “What are the odds?” he muttered to himself.

“The odds of what?”

“According to my sister, there’s been another disappearance. You wouldn’t happen to know a chap by the name of Reginald Leach, would you?”

Isabelle shook her head. “No, definitely not.”

“Jack gone, Biggles missing”—he counted the names out on his fingers—“and now Leach. And a man accosted you in the road that night.”

Only the ape George had confronted was a lot bigger than Leach. Poorly dressed, as well. In fact, the man’s size and dress reminded him of someone—the man who had pounded him in Lucy’s bedroom. Her brother—supposedly. Which made no sense. What did the one have to do with the other?

On the other hand, Isabelle did receive a note, and George still had Leach’s marker. It was worth a try.

He crossed to her and placed his hands on her shoulders. “You wouldn’t still happen to have that message, would you?”

“No, I burned it.”

“All right.” He ran his hands down her arms in what he hoped was a soothing manner. Pity it was doing
nothing for him. “All right. We’ll just have to hope another clue will turn up.”

Footsteps echoed in the corridor, gradually getting louder and then fading. The household was wakening. At any moment, a maid might beg entrance to see to his fire. He had to get Isabelle out of here before then. It wouldn’t do to expose her to another bout of female shrieking over scandal and ruin and lack of morals.