Love Is a Rogue

by Lenora Bell

  “You don’t. You don’t have to leave.”

  “My mother arrives in London in a matter of hours. My ship departs in a matter of days.”

  This was the most difficult thing he’d ever done in his life. His whole body and mind screamed for him to stay. Sweep her into his arms.

  He turned away from her stricken face and wounded eyes and shouldered his trunk. “Goodbye, Beatrice.”

  He walked downstairs quickly. He had just opened the door when a tall shape shoved past him and entered the room.

  Ford’s entire body stiffened. “A bit early for a call, isn’t it, Foxton?” He’d kick his grandfather out onto the street before he’d let him discover Beatrice in the house with him at this early hour.

  He had to force him to leave before any hint of Beatrice’s presence in the house was revealed. He prayed that she stayed upstairs.

  “I’ll own this property soon enough,” Foxton said.

  “I wouldn’t be too sure about that.”

  Coggins arrived finally, rubbing sleep from his eyes. “Should I throw him out, Mr. Wright?”

  “Go back to bed, Coggins. Mr. Foxton is leaving.”

  Coggins glared at Foxton before shuffling back the way he’d come.

  “Why so eager for me to leave?” Foxton asked. “Could it be because you have a certain highborn visitor who arrived on foot and climbed a ladder into your bedchamber?”

  Damn. She’d been wearing a cloak. She could have been anyone. “I ordered a fancy lady from Covent Garden. I left that ladder there for her.”

  “Distinctive color of hair, your ladybird.”

  “You may have dug up another heir, but Lady Beatrice has powerful friends in high places to contest the claim.”

  “I’m sure she does.”

  “You’re leaving.” He grabbed his grandfather by the collar and bodily moved him toward the door. “I’ve been meaning to have a talk with you. We’ll do it at a place of my choosing.”

  “Roughing up your own grandfather?”

  That stopped Ford cold. “You knew?”

  “You didn’t think I’d put it together? You have your father’s eyes . . . and his peasant hands.”

  “Ford?” Beatrice’s soft voice. She stood in the doorway. There were tear streaks on her cheeks. He’d done that. He hated himself.

  “My, what have we here?” Foxton chortled. “I’ve caught two birds with one stone.”

  “Ford—what did he mean about roughing up your grandfather?” Beatrice asked.

  “You haven’t told her?” Foxton exploded into nasty laughter.

  Ford wanted to strangle him.

  “That’s right, Lady Beatrice. He’s my grandson. Though I disinherited his mother long ago, and I don’t acknowledge her bastard.”

  “I’m not a bastard,” said Ford.

  “You were conceived out of wedlock. Your father seduced my innocent daughter. I would have sent her to the countryside to give birth and she could have adopted you out, but she had the ludicrous idea in her head that she was in love with her seducer. I couldn’t understand it—a girl who’d been given every opportunity, every privilege and still she rebelled.”

  “They loved each other.”

  “Stamford. How pathetic that Joyce named you after me. Such a transparent bid for reconciliation. She wanted my money, you see. Because your father couldn’t support her.”

  Beatrice advanced on Ford, eyes sparking with fire. “Is it true? Is he your grandfather?”

  “Yes, but I can explain everything.”

  “You lied to me. I thought you wanted to help me, to help the ladies. I thought you were helping me out of kindness, out of love for this house, love for . . . for me.” Her voice broke and he fought the impulse to throw his arms around her and kiss away her tears.

  “I did want to help . . . I do . . . If you’ll allow me to explain,” he said.

  “You think he loves you, Lady Beatrice?” Foxton gave a mirthless laugh. “Fortune hunters don’t fall in love. His father married my daughter thinking that I would allow her to keep her dowry. Like father, like son.”

  “That’s not true. Beatrice, you know me.”

  “Do I? Ford . . . do I know you?”

  “A lovers’ quarrel, how tragic,” said Foxton. “He didn’t tell you that he was helping you renovate the property because he wanted revenge on me?”

  “I didn’t want revenge before, but now I do,” Ford said bitterly. “I want you to know you can’t own everyone and everything. You won’t force her out of this house, the way you forced my mother out and cut her off mercilessly.”

  “But you see, I can own everything and everyone.” His smug voice made Ford want to smash something. “If you run home, Lady Beatrice, you’ll be there before your mother rises and all of this can be forgotten.”

  “If I sell you the property,” she said.

  “That’s right. Clever girl.”

  “You can’t control her,” Ford ground out. “You don’t even rule your daughters. Every year they meet in secret, defying your decrees, clinging to their love for one another in the face of your tyranny.”

  Foxton frowned. “They do?”

  Too late, Ford realized his mistake. He’d spilled his mother’s secret in the heat of anger, and his aunt would surely pay the price.

  “They haven’t met for years,” he lied.

  “You’re lying. You said they met every year. Is it soon?”

  His mother’s coach would be arriving in London in a matter of hours.

  “I don’t think you two quite realize what this means,” said Foxton. “Now I have further ammunition. It’s plain for anyone to see that you’re lovers. If you don’t sign this property over to me, Lady Beatrice, I’ll have Mr. Wright expelled from the navy.”

  “You couldn’t do that,” said Beatrice.

  “Try me. And if that threat isn’t enough, I’ll inform your mother of what I saw here. And I may inform the scandal sheets, as well. I don’t think your little knitting society would survive the taint of such a salacious scandal, do you?”

  “You won’t get away with this, Foxton,” Ford said.

  “I think I will. The choice is up to you, Lady Beatrice. Your reputation. His career. All I want is this property. I just don’t understand why that’s so difficult for you to comprehend. I’m building a factory here and there is nothing you can do to stop me. Nothing. Do you hear me? I’m willing to let this man sail away. I’m willing to let you continue being a debutante. I’ll keep your dirty little secrets.”

  He twisted free of Ford’s fist. “You have until noon today to make your decision, Lady Beatrice. I’ll return with the papers for you to sign.”

  He walked out the door with one last smug smile.

  Beatrice clutched the doorframe. “Ford, were you using me? Was this only about seeking revenge on your grandfather?”

  “You have to believe me when I say that I never wanted revenge. I honestly wanted to help you defeat him, because I could see that he was attempting to curtail your joy, in the same way that he stole my mother’s by cutting her out of the family.”

  He saw the doubt in her eyes and it nearly killed him.

  “How could you lie to me this whole time?” she asked. “You don’t care about me at all.”

  She refused to look at him. All the light had gone from her eyes.

  “That’s not true, but I don’t expect you to believe me. He has us over a barrel. I don’t care about my career, but your reputation.” He ground his teeth together. “I won’t allow you to be ruined.”

  “It’s not my reputation I care about, but he’s right. If word of my ruination spreads, the ladies league will be tainted by association. I need to think. And you need to leave.” She fled the room and ran upstairs.

  He slammed his fist against a chair back. He hated feeling helpless.

  Everything was broken. Would he ever regain her trust? All of this was because of him. Without him, Foxton would have no further leverage over h
er.

  He’d ruined everything.

  He had to explain himself to Beatrice. He ran up the stairs after her.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Beatrice lay facedown on her aunt’s bed when Ford entered the room.

  He approached warily. “Beatrice? May I say something?”

  She didn’t reply, but inched over to the right side of the bed. He sat down next to her on the bed, pulling a pillow into his arms.

  She’d rolled onto her side, facing the wall, not him.

  “My father’s name is Jonas Wright,” he began. “He was Foxton’s lead carpenter, supervising all of his new construction, earning a good salary in the process. And then disaster struck—the ill star rose. He fell in love with Foxton’s eldest daughter, Joyce, and she returned his affections.”

  She’d made no sign that she’d heard him use one of her etymology lessons. He forged ahead. “My parents eloped to Gretna Green without Foxton’s blessing and he ruthlessly cut my mother out of the family, transferring all of his hopes to his second born daughter, Phyllis, the aunt I’ve never met. Over the years he’s remained immovable, refusing to even acknowledge that his eldest daughter exists, with no regard for the lives he ruins and the pain he causes.”

  She flipped onto her back, staring at the ceiling.

  At least she hadn’t told him to leave yet.

  “My father is an honest, hardworking man who can fix anything, build anything. But he was never able to mend the hole inside my mother’s heart that formed when she lost her family, her inheritance, and her very identity. I told you about her misfortune but I wasn’t able to divulge that Foxton was my grandfather.”

  “Why couldn’t you tell me?”

  “I’ll come to that. My parents built a simple life together in Cornwall, but throughout my childhood I saw my mother smile through half-shed tears. Saw her forced to wear twice-turned gowns, and eat watery turnip soup for supper. Her hands became cracked and red from doing the washing, and her spirit lowered living in the shadow of the great house, when she should have had a fine residence of her own.”

  “Her experience must have had some bearing on your own rebellion against becoming one of the duke’s servants.”

  “Yes. I wanted more from life for myself . . . and for my mother. When I was eight years old, she brought me with her to London. We visited a stately house in Regent’s Park. We were admitted into a study and I saw an old man sitting behind a desk. He had the same light gray eyes as my mother. I wasn’t scared of him. I was curious. Why had my mother brought me here?”

  Beatrice turned onto her side and looked at him for the first time since he’d entered the room. “Go on.”

  “They had a conversation while I explored the study, spinning globes and opening cigar boxes. I caught words here and there. At one point they were talking about me so I listened more closely. My grandfather called me a bastard. Said he wanted nothing to do with me. My mother replied that I was his only grandson and asked how he could be so heartless as to extend his censure to me, an innocent child. She asked him to pay my way to boarding school. She said that it was a drought year, that there wasn’t enough to eat, and she had lost another baby. I didn’t understand everything they were saying, but I remember those words. Bastard. Heartless. Drought. Lost baby.”

  “Ford.” Her hand drifted onto his forearm. “What a terrible thing to overhear.”

  “The next thing I knew, this man behind the desk with the steel gray eyes was waving something at my mother, something he’d written. ‘Take the money, and leave London,’ he said. ‘Never contact me again.’ My mother pleaded with him. I remember I hated hearing the beseeching tone in her voice, one I’d never heard her use before. I rushed to her side and held her hand. I told my grandfather that we didn’t want his stupid old money. Then he turned those cold eyes on me and he told my mother to get the bastard out of his sight.”

  Beatrice pulled him down beside her on the bed until they lay side by side. She placed her hand over his heart. He didn’t allow himself to hope. He only had to finish telling her this story; he didn’t know what would happen next.

  “My mother took his money and promised never to contact him again, or even speak his name. She made me swear, after we left, that I would never tell anyone about their meeting and I was never to mention my grandfather, even though we shared a name. As I grew older, I understood the meeting better. I felt the shame of it more keenly. It was wrong to take his hush money. His blood money.”

  “She was only doing what she had to do for her family. For her child.”

  “I forgave her, but I never forgave him. He doesn’t deserve my compassion.”

  “No, he doesn’t.” Her finger traced the line of his jaw. “I understand why you kept silent, Ford. You swore not to reveal the connection.”

  “It was an oath I swore long ago but it’s been part of my life for so long I couldn’t . . . I couldn’t go against it.”

  She reached for his hand and wove her fingers into his. She stroked her thumb over the center of his palm. “You don’t have to run away. Stay here with me. Tell me more stories.”

  He relaxed against her, into the warmth of her body, the pulse of her wrist, the understanding in her eyes.

  “When your mother . . .” His throat constricted, remembering the awful conversation. The hatred in her mother’s eyes.

  The disheartenment and shame descended again, driving away the small shreds of blue sky beginning to appear through the clouds in his mind.

  “What did she do, Ford? Tell me what she did.”

  “After your brother claimed you for a dance, your mother brought me upstairs and she offered me twenty thousand pounds to leave London immediately and never contact you again.”

  Her nails bit into his palm. “She didn’t.”

  “She did. She told me that she knew my kind, that I was a common fortune hunter. She said a lot of other things, none of them good. I told her I’d never touch her money and I walked out. It was . . . it brought everything back to me. The day my mother brought me to see my grandfather. The hush money. Money meant to silence, to humiliate. To put me in my place.” His jaw locked so tightly he might never be able to open it again.

  “I’m so sorry, Ford. I can’t believe she would do something like that. It’s unconscionable.”

  He sighed. “She’s only trying to protect you, Beatrice. You have everything to lose. Your bookshop, your reputation, your fortune. Your mother. I refuse to be the author of all of that loss.”

  “What if I want to write my own story? What if I’m willing to risk everything?” She rolled toward him, pressing her cheek against his cheek. “I couldn’t even allow myself to acknowledge that I wanted to kiss you. I had to imagine myself as a fictitious heroine before I could even give myself permission to express my desire. I’ve been living at a remove from life, at a distance, living within my head instead of my heart. You make me feel, Ford. Feel everything—joy, pain, love, sorrow.”

  She kissed his cheek. “Pain and love go hand in hand. I struggled against loving you. I battled to keep myself removed from my emotions, but pain and risk are part of life. We can’t outrun suffering, or love. I love therefore I suffer. Because I could lose you. Because you could walk out this door and onto your ship and I would never see you again. Love brings struggle and strife, Ford, but it also brings joy and freedom and endless possibilities.”

  She was wiping something off his cheeks with her thumbs. He must be crying. But he never allowed himself to weep, to be vulnerable.

  There was a first time for everything.

  “You’ve changed me, Ford. When I showed my true self to the world at the ball, that was . . . because of you, because of the way you challenged me to live my own life. To discover myself, expose myself, my true self, without fear of rejection when the inevitable laughter arrived. It took courage. And what I’m doing right now, uncovering myself for you . . .”

  She sat up and slipped one sleeve of her blue gown o
ff her shoulder. “Exposing myself for you . . .” The other sleeve fell. Her hands moved to the top of her bodice and she slid it down her body.

  It was nearly unbearable, the tension of that last half inch, the fabric clinging to her nipples, ready to fall and show him everything he craved so badly. His cock hardened and his mouth went dry.

  She looked down at her exposed breasts, and then she looked at him and smiled. She was a highly intelligent woman. She didn’t make this offering easily or glibly.

  This was Beatrice at the height of her power and Ford was in awe of her—absolutely in awe of this woman.

  “Beatrice,” he moaned. He drew her into his embrace, sliding the gown off her small, perfect breasts and lowering his mouth, taking her nipple between his lips, tonguing it with swirling strokes.

  “This takes courage, Ford,” she said, curving her body to meet his tongue. “Are you brave enough to meet me halfway?”

  She was everything he desired.

  He could no longer picture leaving her, resuming the life he’d left behind when he agreed to renovate her bookshop.

  That life didn’t exist anymore. It didn’t fit anymore.

  When their bodies coupled, he knew that it would change him. This was a journey into the unknown.

  She smelled like fresh night air and apple blossoms.

  He rubbed her neck muscles, wanting to ease her tension.

  Why did she have to be so very beautiful? Hair like flame. Skin smooth as silk. Trusting eyes. He kissed the base of her neck and flicked his tongue over the pulse beating wildly there.

  She sighed, fitting herself more firmly against him.

  Too much fabric between them. Remove skirts and petticoats. She flung her spectacles onto the bedside table, eagerly returning to his embrace.

  Linger on the silken ribbons of her garters. Trail his fingers along her inner thighs and listen to her breath catch. Watch her eyes close as firelight flickered across her face.

  Touch her sex with the tip of his finger, gently opening her, reveling in her wet heat. Sinking his finger inside to the knuckle.

  He could deny her nothing. He would give her everything.