Never Trust a Rake

‘B-but you have done nothing you need feel guilty about.’

He gave a bitter laugh. ‘Oh, haven’t I? Do you not understand what I have done to you yet? I have robbed you of all choice. You have to marry me now, or for ever be condemned as a jilt. And do you know what is worse? Nobody will reproach me. Nobody. I can behave as badly as I wish and still be accepted everywhere. But if you make a bid for freedom you will be ostracised. You will have to spend the rest of your life hiding out in the depths of the countryside and even there you will not completely escape the repercussions of this night’s work.’

She laid a hand on his arm when he would have run his fingers through his hair again.

‘None of that will happen, if that is what is worrying you, because I am going to marry you. I will not back down.’

‘No. You are not the sort to back down from a challenge. That is just the trouble.’

The cab juddered to a halt and Lord Deben flung the door open.

‘I gambled on you doing just that. It was unforgivable,’ he growled, stalking away from her without a backwards glance.

She clambered out, unaided, and followed him up the front steps of the imposing mansion into which he’d just disappeared.

‘Oi,’ cried the jarvey as he saw both his passengers vanish without a backwards glance. ‘Wot about my fare?’

From inside, she heard Lord Deben order someone, in far-from-polite terms, to see to it.

As she stepped into a massive hall, a footman scurried past her and out into the night. Another stood gaping at her. She supposed she was quite a sight, draped in a man’s coat over her evening dress, but worst of all, unchaperoned and clearly the cause of his lordship’s ill humour.

She clutched the coat to her throat, wondering what to do next.

A door to her right flew open and Lord Deben emerged from it. ‘This is Miss Gibson,’ he told the perplexed footman. ‘Soon to be Lady Deben, unless she can come up with some way to overturn the damn-fool proposal I made her tonight.’ With that, he retreated into the room from which he’d briefly emerged, slamming the door behind him.

The footman blinked just once upon reception of that astonishing news, but then recovered his professional demeanour and asked if he could relieve her of her coat.

She shook her head, steeled herself to face up to whatever lay behind that door and went in pursuit of Lord Deben.

He had gone into a room that looked as though it was kept in readiness for when he returned in the evening. A fire was blazing in the grate. And Lord Deben was standing on the hearthrug with his back to it, already in possession of a drink.

Glaring at her.

‘If you wanted me to have some means of escaping our betrothal,’ she pointed out tartly, ‘then you should not have physically carried me out of the Twinings’ house, into the cab and brought me to your home.’

‘I know,’ he said grimly. Then he laughed harshly. ‘Even when I decide to reform, the best I can do is make my mouth say the right words. I am incapable, it seems, of preventing myself from behaving in a completely and utterly selfish manner.’

‘Are you telling me,’ she said, reaching behind her to close the door, ‘that you feel as though you ought to release me from this betrothal, but find yourself incapable of doing anything so...chivalrous?’

‘Yes, dammit.’ He tossed back the entire contents of the glass he’d been holding, then dashed the empty vessel into the fireplace. ‘I have taken ruthless advantage of the opportunity that idiot handed me to bind you to me irrevocably. Letting him run to his length, silently urging him to goad you into accepting my proposal has to be the lowest, meanest thing I’ve ever done. Just when I’d been congratulating myself these past few weeks for drawing the line at forcing you into marriage by taking your virginity, I went and did something just as underhanded. Just as manipulative.’

‘Wh...?’ She shook her head, thoroughly confused. ‘Underhanded? Manipulative? You sound as though you truly want to marry me, my lord.’

‘Of course I do, you little idiot! I’ve been besotted with you practically since the moment you erupted out from behind those plant pots with your hair all over dead leaves and your nose running, to rescue me from making the biggest mistake of my life...’