Regency Vows: A Gentleman 'Til Midnight / The Trouble with Honour / An Improper Arrangement / A Wedding By Dawn / The Devil Takes a Bride / A Promise by Daylight

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

NEARLY AN HOUR after James left, Katherine was on her way downstairs when someone called at the door. It would be Honoria and Phil, of course, returning to learn every last detail.

Instead, Bates admitted the Duke of Winston.

“May I offer my congratulations,” he said as Katherine descended the stairs. “It would seem London’s most ravishing pirate has finally been captured.”

She surveyed his rakish black hair, his burgundy coat embroidered with a gold-and-black geometric pattern, and the sword that hung at his side. “I prefer to think of myself as having made a strategic defensive move,” she told him.

He glanced at her hip as she joined him in the entrance hall. “At least reassure me you are unarmed this evening?”

She raised her brows and curved her lips a little.

“Very well.” He grinned. “I shall be on my best behavior.”

“And instead of your congratulations,” she added meaningfully, “I would prefer your apologies.”

He laughed. “Very well. You may have those, as well. And if there is ever a way I can make it up to you, you have only to name it. I confess to being on the blackguard side of things when it comes to beautiful women—and you are spectacularly beautiful, Lady Dunscore.” His eyes flashed wickedly. “Forgive me. Lady Croston. Would seem Croston’s a bit on the blackguard side of things, too. Should have suspected he fancied you for himself, for all he kept trying to fob you off on everyone else.”

Fob her off?

“Never would have suited with any of them, I daresay. Although, if you should ever grow tired of Croston and care to, shall we say, expand your horizons...”

“I shall certainly keep you in mind,” she said.

“Excellent. I need a few words with Croston. Is he at home?”

“No. He’s gone out.”

“And left you here alone? The man must have lost his mind.” Wicked thoughts sparkled like dark jewels in his eyes.

“Either that, or he wishes to make sure the committee is in no doubt as to our marriage.”

His brows flicked downward, but he smiled. “Rest assured, the committee was quite adamant in its decision. And for the record, I voted in your favor.”

Voted? In her favor? Her mind scrambled to make sense of what he said. “I am flattered, Your Grace,” she managed. “The committee has made a decision already?”

He cocked his head. “Surely you knew.”

Her blood ran cold. “News is sometimes slow in traveling to Dunscore, and I was only there a few days.” Her mind reeled. “You’re saying the committee reported in my favor.”

Something like alarm lit his eyes. “I would hate to rob Croston of the pleasure of telling you himself,” the duke said smoothly.

“When was the decision made?” she demanded.

He held up a hand. “Please—Croston will have my head if I discuss this with you further.”

“When was the decision made?”

“If you’ll excuse me, that light in your eye makes me damned nervous.” He bowed hastily. “Good evening—a pleasure, as always.”

* * *

LONG AFTER SHE and Miss Bunsby had put Anne to bed, Katherine waited in the library at James’s desk. She sat in near darkness in the giant leather armchair that had been crafted for comfortable arrogance. The only light came from a fire that had burned low but still cracked and flickered. She smoothed her hands across an expanse of mahogany that screamed of power. Command.

Her own power and command lay buried beneath a heart that ached so badly she could hardly breathe.

That night on the ramparts, she’d told him things she’d never thought she would tell anyone. Things she hadn’t even told William because he, with the brutal captivity he had suffered, would not understand.

James did not understand, either. She’d been thinking perhaps that was all right. That perhaps it had been unfair of her to ask him to try.

No, not unfair.

Unfair was James lying to her. Taking advantage of her ignorance after she’d given herself to him so completely.

A footman carrying a note to her solicitor had quickly confirmed the date of the committee’s decision. Bates had claimed not to remember when James had left for Dunscore, but one of the stable boys had proved less forgetful.

James had known. He’d bloody known what it meant to her, and he’d still tricked her into marriage.

She brought her hand down hard on the desk, relishing the sting. James may have thought himself powerful, but starting tonight the power in this marriage belonged to her. What she had given James of herself she would take back.

An hour passed—perhaps more—before she heard him talking to Bates in the entry. She tensed. Her throat constricted so tightly only the thinnest ribbon of air could pass. Her heart pounded so hard she could feel its beat in her legs.

When he came through the library door, he didn’t see her at first because he was reading something in his hand. The urge to go to him rose up, but she squashed it. He was almost to the desk when he glanced up. When he saw her, he stopped.

She leaned back in the chair with her palms flat on the desk. “Good evening, Captain.”

“Likewise.” He paused. “Captain.” The look in his eyes changed from pleasure at the sight of her to the guarded calculation that had marked the first weeks of their acquaintance.

A ferocious urge to forget everything welled up inside her. Whatever he might have done, they were still married. She could let it go.

Except he’d taken her independence, her birthright, and now she could not get them back.

“How were your visits?” she asked. “Is everything finished?”

He tossed the sheaf of papers in his hand onto the desk and stood opposite her. “I suppose you could say that.”

She stared at him silently across the mahogany expanse, partly to see what else he would offer without her prompting, and partly because her throat was too tight to speak.

“Katherine—”

“I suppose I could say that, couldn’t I,” she interrupted, suddenly not wanting to give him an opportunity for more lies. “Especially given that the committee had already decided not to attaint me when you left for Dunscore.”

There was a barely perceptible change in his eyes, and her belly dropped. “I see Honoria and Phil returned, after all,” he said darkly.

I didn’t know. I hadn’t heard. That was what he was supposed to say. Heaven help her, she wished it were true so badly she would almost be willing to accept a lie. Thank God—thank God—she hadn’t told him she loved him.

She stood up suddenly. “Bastard,” she spat. Damn him— No I’m sorry, no Let me explain. Just I see Honoria and Phil returned, after all. “This was why you sent them away. And then you made love to me in order to cover up your lie.”

He leveled those green eyes at her. “That isn’t true.”

“I should kill you right here.” She came around the desk and drew her cutlass, so enraged that her vision hazed over.

He didn’t move.

“Draw, damn you!”

“I won’t draw on you, Katherine.”

“Why not?” she demanded, and saw the truth in his eyes. “You do pity me. Even now.” It wasn’t to be borne. “Draw!”

He just stood there, watching her.

She raised her blade to his neck. “I should slit your throat for what you’ve done.”

“When I left London for Dunscore, I had every intention of telling you about the vote.”

She stared at him and wondered how her heart could keep beating when it hurt so much.

“I’d planned to tell you, Katherine. But when I saw you—”

“I don’t want to hear any more of your lies.”

“I don’t expect you to believe me.”

“After all this talk of helping me, of winning over the committee— God. After all that talk of guilt—”

“Do not tell me how I feel.” He pointed at her, heedless of the blade.

“Dunscore could have been mine. It was mine. And you stole it!”

“The trusts we woke Deal’s solicitor in the middle of the night to draft say otherwise. Dunscore remains in your name.”

“You betrayed me!”

“Would you have agreed to marry me under any other circumstance?”

“Yes!” The answer shot from her lips on its own, stunning them both into silence.

He blanched, and his mouth thinned. “If we would have married, anyway, then I fail to see why it matters now what ultimately brought us together.”

He may as well have stabbed her through the heart. She forced her mouth into a curve. “No. Nor would I expect you to.” Finally she sheathed her blade.

“Katherine...” He came toward her, but she backed away, ready to draw again. He held his hands up, but his eyes blazed. “I would do it again,” he said harshly. “If it was the only way to have you, I would do it again.”

Katherine could think of only one reason for him to say such a thing. “God, I’m a fool. Croston is in debt, isn’t it? I should have known.”

“Croston is not in debt.” Anger raged across his face. “Enough of this. We’re leaving for Croston in the morning, and I haven’t had time to prepare.”

“You may go to Croston,” she told him stonily. “Anne and I shall stay here. In a few days, after she’s recovered from the journey, we will return to Dunscore.”

“You will do nothing of the kind.”

“I make my own decisions, Captain. I am the countess of Dunscore.”

He jabbed his finger at her. “You are my wife.”

The words struck like blows. “Yes,” she said. “And you managed it with deceit as your grappling hook and lies as your cannon fire.” The pressure in her chest and belly ached so badly she nearly doubled over with it. It hurt to look at him. “I’ve been taken captive before, Captain. I may not be able to escape, but this time I will have my captivity on my own terms.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

“MOVE OUT!” PHIL exclaimed the next morning, as Katherine’s coach trundled toward Madame Bouchard’s. The sunshine had burned off the mist, and its rays glared through the windowpanes. “You’ll be responsible for sore tongues all across London.”

“Let them talk till their tongues fall out, for all I care.” Katherine shook out the old coat Dodd had found in the attic—Grandfather’s, most likely—and held it up. “It won’t stop me from attending the masquerade, which you said yourself is the most important event of the Season. I’m envisioning a pair of breeches in beige silk. Nude beige.”

“Katherine...”

“And something very scanty on the top.” Phil didn’t respond. She would go to the masquerade alone, and why not? Let James see what their marriage meant to her now that she’d learned of his betrayal—and his lack of remorse.

“The swine,” Phil muttered, as if reading Katherine’s mind.

“Thank you.”

“I can’t believe he didn’t tell you.”

“Nor can I.” And her heart felt like a rag in a scullery maid’s hands, but she’d be damned before she ever let him find out.

James had hoisted his flag on her mast, and all of society knew he had conquered her. Now he was her captor. Her liege lord. The past days’ delight was gone, as there was no delight in being someone’s spoils. She may as well have been a cask of Italian wine or a bolt of Ottoman silk.

She would show all of London she was nobody’s captive. Not anymore.

“The blackguard. Not—” Phil pointed her finger at Katherine “—that I think you should move out, because I absolutely do not. But that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t deserve it if you did. No—you must punish him some other way. Something that will bring him crawling on his knees to declare his undying love.”

“He has no undying love to declare,” Katherine said shortly, even as her imagination played out the scene Phil described, and she found herself wanting very badly to hear such a declaration.

“Breaking your heart with his deception—”

“He has not broken my heart.”

“Darling,” Phil said in that you-can’t-hide-anything-from-me tone, “do you think I can’t see?”

“Lust. William said so.”

“Ha! And what would our dear scoundrel William possibly know about matters of the heart? Tell me you didn’t listen to him. I assure you, lust does not cause the heartache I see in your eyes right now.”

“Whatever I may have felt for Captain Warre died the moment I learned of his betrayal,” Katherine said, and wished to God it was true.

Phil rolled her eyes as the carriage slowed to a stop on the busy street in front of Madame Bouchard’s shop. “You love him, and there’s no sense denying it.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Katherine made herself laugh even as invisible hands wrung another drop of pain from her heart. “I can be grateful I never succumbed to that frippery, at least.”

“Now who’s being ridiculous?” Phil laughed, and then added, “You aren’t really going to move out.”

“I am. Just as soon as I’ve shown him the consequences of his lies.” It would break Anne’s heart. Katherine’s fingers tightened into the coat, and she wadded it in her lap. During the journey from Dunscore, Anne had already begun calling James “Papa.” It would be cruel to drag her away from James now.

But it would be more cruel to keep her with a man who viewed the two of them as little more than chattel.

* * *

HALFWAY THROUGH THE fitting at Madame Bouchard’s, Katherine got an idea. It was a perfect, vengeful idea that made her heart race, then ache with satisfaction, then grow strangely numb. James thought he could control her? She would show him he could not.

The moment she parted company with Phil and returned home—flush with success at having arranged a costume that would have everyone from London to Venice talking—she put her plan into action.

“You mentioned that if there was ever a way you could right your wrongs against me, I had only to ask,” she told the Duke of Winston a short time later, seated in the entirely red first floor drawing room of his town house. “I require your assistance.”

One dark brow ticked downward. “A matter with which Croston is unable to assist?”

“Very much unable.”

“You have only to name it, Lady Croston.”

She smiled past the hurt. James and all of London would see exactly how she took to captivity. “I want you to pretend to have an affair with me.”

The duke barked a laugh. “You’re trying to get me killed. My apology wasn’t enough? You hope to lure me in so Croston will cut me down?”

She smiled. “Not at all. If you’ll recall, you did offer to expand my horizons.”

“Then perhaps Croston has done something unforgivable, and I am to be your revenge on him.”

Precisely. Making her point to James by flirting her way outrageously through London might have been ideal, but the chance was too great that someone would take her attentions seriously. As ridiculous as it was, Winston was the only one she could trust. And his reputation made him the perfect partner in revenge.

“So many questions, Your Grace.” She laughed. “I would not have expected you to be so scrupulous.”

“Strictly self-preservation. I’m no match for Croston with a sword. And much as it pains me to say it, I doubt I’m a match for you, either.” He assessed her through those devil eyes. “So you propose what? Dances together in public, walks in the park, carriage rides—”

“No carriage rides.” God save her, carriage rides were the last thing she wanted to think of.

He smiled wickedly. “Must I reassure you that my carriage is very...comfortable? But I believe I’ve conveyed that fact to you already.”

“I’m not interested in the comfort of your carriage. Dances, yes. Walks in the park, certainly. And I suppose you could linger in my box at the theater.”

Now he laughed. “A sham affair, indeed. And my answer, dear Lady Croston, is no.”

“No?” The word shot out with all the sharpness of an on-deck command.

He only smiled. “No,” he repeated.

“Not so much on the blackguard side of things, after all,” she said angrily.

“Not so much on the suicidal side of things. Tell me...” He closed the distance between them and took her chin in his fingers. “What has that arrogant bastard done?”

She chose not to turn her face from his grasp. If James were here now and saw Winston touching her like this, blood would spill.

She smiled. “That, Your Grace, is none of your concern.”

“If you’re asking me to take part in this sham, I daresay it is. Bloody fool hasn’t taken a mistress already, has he?”

“No.”

He lowered his voice. “Is he demanding...eccentricities?”

“No!” Not that she knew precisely what he meant, but—good God.

And then, “The vote.” His eyes narrowed, and she could see he’d finally guessed. “When I came to your house the other night, it was the first you’d heard of the committee’s conclusion.”

Anger flared fresh. “You extricated yourself quite neatly.”

“I’m normally quite adept at escaping conflict,” he said. “He didn’t bother to tell you.”

Stonily she looked a him.

The duke cursed and let his hand fall. “Where is he now?”

“At Croston.”

His lips thinned, but he looked at her askance. “Are you determined that it would be entirely a sham?”

“Entirely and completely.” Her heart beat a little faster. He was about to change his mind. Her thoughts raced ahead to the theater, the park, the Pollards’ grand masquerade. James would get wind of her dalliance through the grapevine, and when he did, it would cut him to the bone—just as he had cut her.

“I’ll do it, then,” he said, with a mix of resignation and relish. “If only to teach Croston a lesson about leaving his property unattended.”