Harold cleared his throat. “No need to get niggledy with me, cousin, this isn’t my fault either. I’m just trying to talk some sense into you. This girl is completely unsuitable and if you marry her it won’t just be your life that is affected. We will all suffer the consequences. Besides, how could you possibly support a wife without help from the family? You can’t have it both ways you know, Max; you can’t cast yourself off from the family without a backward glance, only to then turn around and beg for an allowance.”
“I don’t want an allowance.” Max was furious, and although he tried to moderate his tone, Harold’s eyes widened in mock-alarm.
“Now old chap—”
“I don’t want anything from any of you. Can’t you understand that? My life is no longer your business, Harold, and I won’t have you interfering!”
Harold stood up and his mouth was pinched, as it always was when he was upset. “Very well then, if that’s what you want, cousin. I am leaving now because you obviously can’t think straight. This girl has turned your brain. God knows what else she’s done to you—I don’t want to know—but I think you will be very, very sorry. Of course I will have to tell the duke.”
Max stared at him in amazement. Was he a child, that his cousin should treat him thus? “Harold,” he said quietly, “haven’t you realized yet that I don’t give a damn who you talk to? Make a speech in Parliament. Take out an advertisement in the Times. Please, Harold, be my guest!”
Harold gave him one last glare, and left the room.
Max sank back into his chair, feeling as if he had been wrung dry. Surely his family never used to be so concerned with his private affairs? He could remember several times being involved with women who were clearly unsuitable as permanent mates, and nothing was said.
That’s because you never intended to marry them.
Of course not!
Because you weren’t in love with them.
No, I wasn’t.
But you are in love with Marietta Greentree. Aren’t you?
That was when Max knew it to be true. And it was almost a relief; it explained the way he had been feeling lately. He was in love with Marietta Greentree. His life would be barren without her. And yet how to convince her of that?
He supposed he couldn’t blame her for refusing to marry him and go to Cornwall. What had he to offer after all? He was a disinherited pauper, at least compared to what he had been. Marietta was probably better off without him…
His eyes flared and he clenched his fists. Damn it, no! He wouldn’t give in, he would fight for her. She must realize that they were meant for each other. She must!
Outside in Bedford Square, Harold settled his wife into their carriage, fussing about her until she told him to stop.
“Max has upset you,” Susannah said quietly. “You are very fond of him, aren’t you, Harold?”
“As you are, my dear.” Harold sighed and sank back in his seat as they began to move off. “I feel as if I have failed him in some way, as if there was something I should have said or done to resolve this mess.”
“Papa was very angry and we cannot blame him for that.”
“No, but I thought…” He sighed again, and smiled at his wife. “I thought he would have come around by now and realized that even if Max isn’t his son he still loves him like a son. Max doesn’t deserve to be treated like this, Susannah.”
“Life is cruel,” she murmured, staring back at him with big, dark eyes. “Often there are no happy endings. God doesn’t give us justice, we have to find if for ourselves.”
“But the duke will come around,” Harold insisted. “I know he will. I just hope that when he does it won’t be too late to save Max from himself.”
“Yes, we can only hope it will not be too late.”
Amy Greentree stroked Marietta’s hair, her long fingers gentle and soothing. She had her foot propped up on a stool and was seated in an armchair in her bedroom, ostensibly resting but in reality enjoying a peaceful moment with her second daughter.
“You have not had an easy time recently, Marietta, I know that. I wish you had never met that dreadful man.”
Marietta glanced upwards at her mother. “Man?” she murmured, thinking, Max, she knows about Max!
“That Jones creature. I loathed him the first time I saw him, with his smirk and his bowing and scraping. So false, my dear. But you could not see it, you were blinded by your infatuation.” She sighed. “Of course, he was very handsome, and I behaved very stupidly in forbidding you to see him. Vivianna wrote and told me that I should allow him to visit us often, so that you would come to realize what a beast he was. She said that if I forbade you to see him then you would think him all the more fascinating.”
Marietta smiled wryly. “I did think he was fascinating. He seemed such a man of the world to me, so clever and witty, and when he stole kisses in the garden I thought him daring.”
“And then he was impertinent enough to ask for your hand!” Amy’s gray eyes snapped with remembered anger. “I sent him off immediately and told you that you were never to see him again.”