The Secrets of a Lady (19 page)

He frowned, motioning for her to enter his office and sit beside his dying fire. “Were you not happy elsewhere?”

She sat down in one of the leather seats beside him and shrugged one shoulder. “At times I was very happy. And at others I wasn’t. As I got older I realized what my mother expected of me, and that I could never fulfill those expectations.”

Griffin’s heart ached at the small quiver in her voice. Though her face was calm and free from any indication that the subject was a painful one, her eyes and tone told a different story.

“Noah has told me a bit of what you experienced in your second season in London.” He narrowed his eyes. What would be her reaction to his prying?

She stiffened, turning her face toward the fire so he could only see her in profile. “Did he?”

“Yes, but I’d like to know more about it. Noah said there were rumors…”

“Rumors,” she interrupted, her voice suddenly shrill as she gripped the armrest with a steel fist. “Yes, there were some rumors. You know how people can get, especially in London. They want a story and when they cannot find a real one, they create one.”

“It was more than that, Audrey.” He ran his fingertips across her white knuckles. Immediately she relaxed her hand, and sent him a quick glance. “I know Luci started those rumors.”

A little strangled cry escaped her throat as surged to her feet and rushed across the room to the fireplace. For a long time she didn’t move or speak, just stared into the flames, her trembling back toward him. More than anything he wanted to rise and go to her, to hold her and tell her how sorry he was for anything she’d gone through by his late wife’s hand. Instead, he stayed where he was. He feared touching her would only make her feel worse.

“I wish Noah hadn’t told you that,” she finally murmured, her voice breathless.

Griffin squeezed his eyes shut. He understood that sentiment perfectly. He had always tried to keep his pains and embarrassments private, as well.

“Audrey?” He moved toward her to take her shoulders and forced her to face him. At the tears glimmering on her cheeks, he frowned. “What more is there?”

Taking care to move slowly, Griffin drew her against his chest and held her there, reveling in the way she fit so perfectly in his embrace. “I need to know.”

There was only silence for a moment as the woman in his arms struggled with the words. Griffin could tell she fought against revealing the truth. She wanted to protect him, didn’t want him to feel guilty for Luci’s ruinous slander. As if he couldn’t. If only he hadn’t been so obsessed with Audrey, or if Luci hadn’t been so hateful, perhaps he could have prevented Audrey’s pain.

“Luci… she arranged to have a man attack me. He caught me on a balcony and kissed me. He hurt me. But the way he held me, it looked like I was kissing him, pinning
him
against the veranda wall.” Her low whisper forced him to strain to hear her words. “When my mother and Luci came outside and found us there, Luci said it proved what a wanton I was.”

Griffin closed his eyes as white-hot hatred raced through his veins. He longed to break something, to wrap his hands around Luci’s lily-white neck and squeeze.

“Go on,” he choked out with as much control as he could muster. He didn’t want Audrey to think his anger or disgust was aimed at her.

“Luci told my mother that if she took me home immediately and never brought me back for another Season that the story wouldn’t get out. What was Mama to do? Your wife held all the cards. So, my mother agreed and we went home.”

A small sob escaped her lips as her fists came around his back and she held him closer to her.

Closing his eyes, Griffin held back a snarl of displeasure. “I never knew Lucinda would go so far.”

“I did.” Pushing back from his chest, she wiped her eyes. “I knew from the moment she told me she would have her revenge that she wouldn’t rest until I was destroyed. Even though I had no chance to be with you, she refused to see me happy. So she took away any chance I had to marry well and sent me home in disgrace.”

“Damn her.” He turned away so she wouldn’t see his furious face. One by one, he clenched his fingers back into a fist. “Damn her to hell for all the pain she caused.”

Audrey shook her head as she spun on her heel to face him. Her face was free of any of the malice he, himself, felt.

“No, don’t say that. My troubles with her shouldn’t color your memories. You shared five years with her, and the baby who died with her would have been a gift. Don’t damn her now, try to remember how happy you were with her then.”

Shutting his eyes, Griffin tried to do as she asked and remember a happier time with Luci. To his surprise, he couldn’t. Not even their wedding day, when his focus had shifted to Audrey’s kiss.

His courtship with Luci had been swift and proper, and now it seemed like a dream. No, his memories of Lucinda were only of the grief she’d caused him.

He remembered his wife’s laughter when he’d discovered her infidelity. Her wickedly phrased threats and promises to ruin his reputation and his family name. Her smile when she told him she was pregnant with another man’s baby, and that there was nothing he could do about it.

“I’ll tell you,” he promised. He took the hand she held out to him to raise it to his lips. Her presence calmed his rage. “But not tonight. Tonight I want you to tell me why you ran away from the marriage your parents arranged for you
after
my wife spoiled your chances in London.”

Her face fell. “My brother
has
been talking.”

Leading her back to her chair, he sat down beside her. “Does that bother you? Does it bother you that I know so much about your past?”

“No,” she said with a shake of her head. “It troubles me that I know so little about yours, especially when there are so many innuendos. But if you say you’ll tell me another night, I trust you.”

A thrill passed through Griffin at those words. Audrey trusted him. Despite everything Luci had done to her and despite his own barbarian ways of protecting her.

Her sigh brought his focus back to her face. She stared at the floor as she plucked at the hem of her sleeve. Her voice was almost a whisper when she said, “When we returned to the country, my mother was very upset. She was determined to marry me off before my problems could hurt my sister Ginny and her chances to wed well. She and my father made an arrangement with Squire Jonas Teetle.”

“Jonas Teetle?” Griffin repeated, trying to put a face to the name Audrey had said. When he did, he winced. “Wait, Tepid Teetle?”

“The very one.” She sighed again. “Pale as snow, weak as lukewarm tea, Jonas Teetle. He needed a wife, preferably one with a fortune and a prestigious bloodline. According to my parents,
I
needed a husband without a hint of scandal… or personality… to him. In their eyes, we were the perfect match.”

She smiled. “By that time, Noah had returned from an assignment with a mild injury. He could see how miserable I was. To keep my mind off my troubles, he asked me to help him. It started off with my filing papers, then more. By the time he’d healed and was ready to return to fieldwork, I was aching to escape with him. So I did.”

She finished her story with a little shrug, as if she’d said something perfectly commonplace.

“You know, you didn’t take up gardening, Audrey,” Griffin said with a shake of his head. “You behave as if this is normal.”

“To me it’s become normal,” she explained. “My mother was furious at first, but then Ginny came out with great success and she began to see that losing me was really for the best.”

Again, Griffin winced at the pain in her voice. “Have you spoken to her since you left?”

She was quiet for a long, charged moment. “No. We have exchanged a few letters, but I never see her.”

Her tone left no opening for questions and Griffin took her hint and didn’t ask. She’d already given him a hefty glance into her past, more than he ever would have asked for.

Though it wasn’t a smooth request, that didn’t change the fact that it was what he wanted more than anything. He watched as Audrey’s face paled a shade, then colored to a deep red.

He tilted his head to examine her expression more closely. From the embarrassment in Audrey’s eyes, he had no doubt Hannah more than suspected something had happened. She knew.

“Don’t worry,” she reassured him with a light touch on his upper arm. “She won’t breathe a word. I already have her promise.”

Griffin let out a sigh of relief at her reassurance. The last thing he wanted was for Noah to confront him about his indiscretion. His relationship with the other man was already strained of late. Of course, that didn’t stop Griffin from asking Audrey to come to his bed. Somehow his desire to have her with him was stronger than his need to protect his lifelong friendship with her brother.

He couldn’t believe he was practically begging her to come to his bed, but didn’t stop. He needed her, now more than ever. Just one taste wasn’t enough to satisfy him. He wanted more.

Her face darkened a shade and Griffin felt as if she had erected a wall between them. Why? Why would she shut him out now?

She turned away. “Tomorrow evening Wellington will be presented to Queen Charlotte. We’ll all be at the ball until late.”

“Then come to my room after everyone has retired for the evening.” He took a step closer in the hopes she’d open herself to him again. “Please, Audrey.”

Her eyes lifted to his face at the plea, softening in the dim light of the fire. He could see how much she wanted to acquiesce, but something stopped her.

Her eyes met his in an intense stare. “Perhaps you won’t want me tomorrow. So much can change within a few hours.”

“What can change?” he asked, confused and a little hurt at her resistance. “The way you feel for me? Will you no longer want
me
tomorrow?”

She drew back as if the thought were a completely foreign one. “Griffin, I’ve wanted you for more than five years. For a lifetime, it seems. One more night will change nothing about how I feel for you. But circumstances…”

“If how I feel won’t change and how you feel won’t change, everything else is inconsequential,” he interrupted, reaching out to run his fingertip along her cheekbone.

She shut her eyes and shivered, but she didn’t answer. As the moments ticked by on the clock on the mantle, Griffin wondered if she
would
answer.

“Yes,” she finally breathed. “If you still want me after the celebration tomorrow, I
will
come to you.”

Leaning down, he felt his own hot breath reflected back from her smooth lips. “Good.”

She lifted her mouth to meet his kiss with no hesitation. As his lips claimed hers, he felt none of the desperation that had been present in the carriage. There he’d believed if he didn’t have her, he might never get another chance. Now he knew she would be his again. So he took his time exploring her lips. When she sighed and drooped against him in surrender, he pulled away. With a promise for tomorrow made, he didn’t want to risk pushing her too far tonight.

“Until tomorrow,” he whispered.

She blinked twice, then gave a shaky nod before leaving the room. He was pleased to note her step was much more unsteady than it had been when she entered.

“Tomorrow,” he repeated, this time with a smile he couldn’t suppress.