The Reddington Scandal (8 page)

She shivered under his hands. “Please let me go,” she whispered, her eyes bright with tears.

He released her. “Phoebe,” he entreated, but she had already whirled to make her escape, slipping through the door and closing it before he could speak again.

The crushing in his chest grew even heavier, like an enormous stone lay upon it, and he cast his eyes about the room, as if the answer to this mystery might lie in one of his books or papers. The little box with her pen lay on the settee where she left it. He picked it up and twirled it in his fingers.

Did she not love him? Or was she afraid of making love? Or was it the deeper issue of fidelity?

Hell, who was he to promise her faithfulness, when the longest he’d ever been with the same woman was five-and-a-half months? And yet, he’d never felt this way about a woman before. He was utterly captivated by her. She was all he could think about—not a moment of his day passed when he wasn’t remembering something she’d said, the way she looked when she was at ease, or a line of her poetry. For once in his life, the attraction was not purely physical. In fact, though he’d spent many years swearing an opposition to virgins, he cared not at all about her acrobatics in bed—not that he wasn’t burning with dark desire for her.

Though he could not be sure, he thought with Phoebe, it might be different. He might not be fated to re-create the same miserable marriage his father had. And yet… what if he was wrong? What if he broke the heart of the one woman he’d ever… loved? It was true—he did love her. He loved her all her incongruences—the sweetness and the fury, the passion and the temperance. He loved the intelligence, the depth of her personality. He loved having her in his home, having her at his side. He wanted to possess her fully—mind, body, and soul.

Yet, what did it matter? She was not willing to share any of them, anyway. It seemed he could not win her trust. Perhaps because he was not trustworthy.

Miserable, he took the pen with him to his room and asked his valet to pass it to Phoebe’s maid as soon as possible. The sensation of a stone on his chest did not leave. He spent the next few weeks in a fog, as his sister and Phoebe prepared for the reception ball, and he hid in the gambling hall.

But the arrival of his mother forced him to put on a good face. He found her in the sitting room with Wynn and Phoebe when he arrived home and he spread his arms wide, a broad grin on his face. “Mother, my mama!”

She stood up, laughing. “Listen to you—‘Mama’—you ridiculous boy!”

He kissed both her cheeks after sweeping her into a grand embrace. “Yes, of course I’m still your ridiculous boy. Sit back down, you must be exhausted.” He settled her back into her chair and crouched beside her, holding her hand in his. “Did Crandall take good care of you on the drive?”

“Yes, yes, you know he did. Pull up a chair, Teddy.”

He pulled her hand to his lips and kissed the back of it, then stood and planted a kiss on both Wynn and Phoebe’s cheeks as well. “I see you have met my charming wife?”

His mother was peering at him intently. “I did,” she said. “And she is quite charming.”

He hesitated, wondering whether the ladies had told her the truth yet. Better now than later, he supposed. “Have they told you how I tricked her into becoming my wife?” he asked lightly.

“No, I haven’t heard the story yet. Do sit down and tell me.”

He glanced at Wynn, who gave a tiny shrug. He drew a chair closer to his mother’s and settled in it, taking her hand into his lap. “Well, as it turns out, when she’s not being a lady of considerable accomplishments, she takes on the duties of knight in shining armor.”

He saw Phoebe roll her eyes and grin and he gave her a wink.

“And so it happens I was cuckolding her sister’s husband, when said husband arrived home, and the lovely Phoebe claimed me as her own lover. So you see, having ruined her reputation to save me from the pistol pointed in my face, she had no choice but to take the title of Lady Fenton and make the best of it.”

“Oh, Teddy,” his mother said. He could hear the disappointment in her voice and it hurt as much as he’d known it would.

“I know, Mama. I know.” He looked across the room and caught Phoebe’s eyes, the beautiful cornflower blue set off by the deep blue dress she wore. For a moment, a message ran between them, his regret, and perhaps on her part, forgiveness. She gave a faint smile and he lost all track of his thoughts, caught only in desire to hold her in his arms again, to claim her as his wife—his real wife. Except she didn’t want that.

“Phoebe has requested a marriage in name only. In which we’re each afforded certain… freedoms.”

The sadness on his mother’s face was more than he could bear. He stood up abruptly and paced the room. When no one spoke, he turned back to the ladies. “I’ll just go freshen up before dinner. I’ll see you at the table,” he said with a bow.

* * *

Maud and Reddington would be at the reception. She didn’t care a bit about the rest of the guests, but seeing her former family had her stomach in knots. Maud had not called on her once since the day she wed. Not once. She had sent a few notes with the suggestion that Phoebe come to call on her, but Phoebe could not bear to return to that house. She had replied politely, ignoring Maud’s suggestions and making it plain she was welcome to call upon her. Of course, she never had.

Now, as she peered into the looking glass while her maid pinned her hair into the seed-pearl tiara the dowager countess had brought, it was all she could think about. She wore a dress of lavender silk. The neckline was open all the way to the shoulders, with huge poufy sleeves that narrowed just below her elbow where they met her gloves. Teddy had bought her new white gloves, and she wore white calfskin boots beneath the full gown. Ribbons in the same lavender adorned the dress in bows at the sleeves and at her low back. The center of the gown dipped into a low ‘V,’ showing off her corseted waist.

Living in the easy comfort of Lord Fenton’s house made the life she’d left stand out in sharp contrast. Here, her every wish was granted—she was the lady of the house, after all, not that she’d truly stepped into the role. Still, she did not have to defend her desire to have a bath brought up, or ask permission to drink chocolate. She and Wynn had the use of their very own carriage to make calls or go shopping, and Fenton had opened accounts for her at the stores on Bond Street. But it was not the wealth that stood out. Reddington had money too; it was just that he was loath to share it. Or perhaps it was that he relished the control he wielded over her life by not allowing her any.

She didn’t want to see him again. How would he act? What would he say to her? Would he be polite and pretend nothing had happened? Would he leer at her as he used to?

Teddy waited for her on the landing, looking dapper as always in a finely tailored black suit with a white cravat. He’d looked troubled since she had told him she wished to return to their first arrangement, and since the arrival of his mother, he had looked positively haunted. The dowager countess’s disappointment in the marriage had been palpable, though it was not directed toward Phoebe, but rather, Teddy.

His devotion to his mother was heartwarming—the way he knelt beside her chair and held her hand, his attention to her every need. It was the same affection that had moved her when she’d seen him comforting his sister at the Reddingtons’. Again, such a capacity for tender relationships seemed at odds with his philandering. Clearly there was much love in their family, but there was a sense of shared tragedy as well. It had been as if Teddy and Wynn wished to protect their mother from his marriage, yet she had not seemed scandalized by it in the least. If anything, she seemed to have expected this sort of outcome for Teddy. She wasn’t sure what to make of it.

“For you,” he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a strand of seed pearls that matched the hairpiece she wore. She rather liked that he’d not presented them in a box as a grand gesture, because it made the quill pen he’d given her all the more special. “Will you allow me?” he asked, his manners perfect and formal. She turned around and offered her neck, feeling the brush of his sleeve as he deftly fastened the clasp. She froze when she felt his lips at the nape of her neck delivering a light kiss. It produced a shiver of pleasure and heat pooled between her legs as she straightened her back to hide her reaction. She exhaled, turning to take his arm.

“You look lovely,” he said, his voice rich and low, reverberating in the very center of her being. “That dress brings out the violet in your eyes.”

She lowered her lashes, feeling suddenly shy. His appreciation should not mean so much to her, but it did. For a moment, she pretended he was a suitor coming to call on her, and allowed herself to experience the giddy pleasure of his attention, breathing in his masculine scent, stealing glances at the handsome angles of his face. For just a moment she pretended they were courting, rather than a married couple who kept separate beds.

They went downstairs and she took her place beside him, meeting their guests, doing her best to remember names with faces and to put all her finishing school manners to use. Maud and Reddington arrived, and she stiffened, but Teddy handled it with the same aplomb he managed everything, welcoming and effectively dismissing them all in one breath.

“Ah, my new sister and brother-in-law,” he said, bowing. “Welcome. We’re so glad you could join us. The band is about to begin if you’d care to dance.”

When the majority of the guests had arrived, Teddy led her out for a waltz, holding her close as he gracefully led her in the three-step dance. His body felt powerful against hers, the heat of his hand on her back nearly melting her. She was sorry when it was over, because it was the first time that evening she left his side and she felt momentarily lost.

Feeling a need to escape the crowd, she slipped up to her room to have her maid replace a few pins that had fallen out of her hair. When she stepped out of her bedroom, she stopped short. Reddington stood there, an imposing threat written on his face. She drew back with a gasp, but not wanting her maid to overhear, shut the door and stood facing him.

“Does he know?” he asked softly.

She tried to regain control of her breathing, lest she swoon in her tight corset. “Know what?” she managed.

“About us.”

Her mind spun around on itself. Did he imagine they’d been
lovers
? Had he twisted what he’d done to her into some sort of
relationship
?
More important, how should she answer? She did not want to encourage any bizarre notion he had about the nature of their past, nor did she want him to reveal it to Teddy. Realizing the latter was more important to her, she breathed. “No. He doesn’t. And I’m not going to tell him.”

“How could you have—” Reddington began, but stopped short at the sound of a throat being cleared.

She glanced up and her heart stopped. Teddy stood at the top of the stairs, his face pale in contrast to his dark eyes as he took them in. Dear God—what had he heard?

“Teddy!” she exclaimed, rushing forward. “I was just looking for you.”

* * *

“Were you?” Teddy asked mechanically, but he allowed her to grasp his arm so he could lead her back downstairs. He could scarcely breathe. Never before had he made such a misjudgment in his life.

Phoebe and Reddington.

He should have known it, but he had not seen. No wonder Reddington had been so angry with her the night he found Teddy at his house. She must love Reddington deeply—too much to continue living under the same roof whilst he was married to her sister. She’d done the right thing seizing an opportunity to get out, but God, he’d been had for a fool! And it was no wonder she didn’t want to consummate their marriage when her heart belonged to someone else!

When they reached the refreshment table, he handed her a glass of champagne before downing one himself. Her hands trembled so badly, she sloshed the liquid down the front of her dress trying to bring it to her lips. When she met his eyes, there were tears in them.

Though he felt as if a giant fissure had severed him in two, he could not fault her. She’d never pretended to love him, though she had fooled him into marriage. She’d been living in a painful situation and she used him as a means to get out of it. But it didn’t change the fact that she had pulled him out of a tricky spot. So they each owed each other. Or perhaps they were even now.

“It’s all right, little dove. Here,” he said, taking out his handkerchief and dabbing at the liquid on her dress. “It will be all right.”

She searched his eyes, as if trying to ascertain if he meant the dress or their sham of a marriage. She opened her lips as if to say something, but then closed them again. “Thank you,” she murmured miserably, taking the handkerchief from him and dropping her eyes to her dress where she studiously applied her attention.

He could forgive her, he could have compassion for her, but he could not stand there with her any longer with the pain in his chest only growing by the minute. “Will you excuse me?”

She looked up, worry clouding her face, but she answered immediately, “Yes, of course.”

He walked in the direction of his study, inviting Maury Stanley, his childhood friend and Kitty’s brother, to join him.

“Why did you do it, my friend? I thought you always swore you weren’t cut out for marriage. You look positively miserable.”

“Do I?” He poured two snifters of brandy and handed one to Maury, swirling his own. “It’s just a sham marriage, that’s all.”

“Ah. I see. Care to tell the story?”

He gave Maury the bare details, leaving out the part about seeing her with Reddington that evening. Airing his own scandals was one thing, but he would never reveal hers.

“Well, it sounds like you’re both prepared to make the best of it. And considering she’s offered you complete freedom, I cannot see you have much to complain about.”

“No, you’re quite right,” he agreed glumly.

He did his duty as the host for the rest of the evening, charming the crowd as was his gift, but it was a relief when they all left. He stood outside, leaning on the lamppost, watching as the servants extinguished the candles.