A Rogue of One's Own

by Evie Dunmore

  Tristan was leaning over his desk, his hands braced on the tabletop, studying a paper spread.

  Her knees went weak with sudden relief, and she greedily drank in the sight of him. He looked handsome and beloved, as usual in only his shirtsleeves, and his cravat was untied and hung on either side of his neck. Her hopes to find him here had been fragile. During the train ride to London, she had resolved that she would apologize, but she had not dared to think any further. She only knew she needed to apologize. And if he no longer cared for her, she would certainly survive.

  He looked up, and his neutral expression made her breathless with dread. Mere survival was a low standard—she could have been happy with this man.

  There was a flicker of something in his eyes when she turned the key in the lock.

  “May I come in?”

  This gained her an ironic glance. “By all means.”

  Her legs were uncooperative, as if made from lead, when she approached his desk.

  Tristan’s gaze swept from her stiff gray collar to her booted feet, lingering briefly on her hands clutching in her skirts, and the corner of his mouth twitched. “You don’t look too wholesome, my lady. A rough night?”

  “Dreadful,” she blurted. “And yours?”

  “Terrible,” he said at once.

  Her fingers gripped the edge of his desk, to prevent herself from crawling over said desk to burrow into his arms.

  “You’re wearing your earring again,” she said instead.

  He made to touch the sparkling stud, then dropped his hand and shrugged.

  “Your mother is at Wycliffe Hall,” she told him. “I assisted in her disappearance this morning.”

  He nodded. “I received a cable on behalf of my lady mother a few hours ago, informing me that she is well and planning to abscond to the Continent—I’m glad to hear it confirmed.”

  She shook her head. “It sounds as though they have had us both.”

  “Mothers,” he said. “Terribly secretive creatures.”

  “Women become so, given the circumstances.”

  He inclined his head. “Without doubt. But something tells me our mothers’ shenanigans are not the sole reason for your visit.”

  Her heart leapt against her ribs. She supposed it was courteous of him, giving her a prod. She took a deep breath to begin her piece when she caught the header of one of the papers on the desk.

  Her mind blanked.

  He was suspiciously quiet while she comprehended what she was seeing.

  “This is our data,” she said slowly. “The data for our report.”

  She glanced back at him, still confused, and he nodded. “It is.”

  She picked up one of the sheets. “Who gave you these?”

  “A Mrs. Millicent Fawcett.”

  “Millicent Fawcett.”

  “Yes. You mentioned her once or twice.”

  How droll. She must have mentioned Millicent dozens of times. . . .

  “I assumed she would have the same insights you have,” Tristan continued. “In a fit of romantic ambition, I had meant to surprise you with a publishing opportunity—then a Shakespearean drama of my own making unfolded at Wycliffe Hall.”

  On the left side of his desk, he had arranged typewritten paragraphs, headlines, and report figures in the layout of a newspaper page.

  She struggled for a calm tone. “I heard people from the Manchester Guardian were here?”

  “The editor, yes.”

  The editor, who was also the owner of the paper, as she well knew.

  “Why?” she said softly. “Why did he visit?”

  His smile was an enigma. “I had made him an offer he could not resist.”

  Her heart sank. “Please do not tell me you forced the hand of a newspaper editor, a suffrage-friendly one at that.”

  “No.” Amusement brightened his eyes. “On the contrary. I used to have a habit of, let us call it, collecting incriminating information about fellow gentlemen. It used to serve me well in case my funds ran low—they usually did. However, such a source needs to be tapped wisely and in moderation—”

  “By source, you mean blackmail.”

  “Yes.” He was not abashed in the slightest. “However, as I said, it may only be used in moderation, and it is also impractical when you reside abroad. Therefore, I had a potential wealth of secrets and debts owed left. I traded them.”

  Oh, her heart. “You have given your intelligence to the owner of the Manchester Guardian in exchange for him running our report?”

  He nodded. “I believe headlines in a national newspaper will serve you even better than using the periodicals as Trojan horses. It has a wider reach; meanwhile, you can keep your periodicals.”

  Her pulse was spiking now. “Why did you? Why did you do this?”

  “Because I could,” he said. “My ledger contains a number of potential clues for troubling some high and mighty fellows, and they are worth their weight in gold for investigative journalists of liberal newspapers.”

  She must have been in a shock; she felt quite frozen. “I should be jumping up and down with joy,” she said slowly, “and then again, I should feel put out, that it took you to masterfully solve our conundrum.”

  “Me—a man, you mean.”

  “Yes.”

  He chuckled. “You would have such reservations. But be assured, the ledger was yours the moment you stormed into Wycliffe’s library like Joan of Arc on a quest to rescue me, as I would have used it up in some fashion when winding my way out of that trap.”

  She had a good idea what this must have cost him to let go of his potential income source, after everything she now knew about his situation, of his life lived striving for freedom from a tyrant’s purse strings. Granted, their publisher was well on course to make them very comfortable in their own right, but old habits died hard. Old fears ran deep. And didn’t she know it.

  “I cannot believe you have given away all your leverage to the Guardian—for the Cause.” She sounded amazed to her own ears.

  “Most of it, I should have specified.” He sounded vaguely apologetic.

  Of course, he would not give away all his aces. Tristan would probably always have a last card up his sleeve. Part of her found it very reassuring.

  “The report will make headlines—will they name me?”

  He shook his head. “They will not name any names.”

  She had to lean against the desk for support. The truth would be out. And she needn’t choose between a coup and a reform by stealth. And yet. The storm of exaltation did not come. Her chest was still as tight, her pulse as erratic, as when she had entered his office. Today, work was not her priority.

  She met Tristan’s gaze directly. “No more secrets.”

  His features sharpened with alertness. “Between you and me? I agree. My secrecy was unforgivable.”

  “Well,” she said. “Not unforgivable under the circumstances—not entirely.”

  His eyes were reading her intently. “You have had a change of mind, then.”

  “I know about Boudicca.”

  He tensed as though he had been caught in the act entirely unexpected. Like a boy with his hand deep in the jar of sweets. Like a rakehell who had just been exposed as having a loyal heart beating away beneath his crimson waistcoat.

  “Ah,” he said, very low.

  How she longed to touch him.

  “You could have chosen any kitten,” she said. “But you chose one from my mother’s cat’s litter—why?”

  He considered it. “I suppose I felt your parents owed you some comfort after casting you out.”

  A lump formed in her throat. “She has been a tremendous comfort to me.”

  “I’m pleased to hear it.”

  “Why did you never tell me that you thought fondly of me?”

 
; He laughed softly. “Fondly was not how I felt about you, Lucie. Frankly, I was too inexperienced to understand much of my feelings, then. I did know that I was eighteen years old and wholly under my father’s thumb. I had nothing to offer a woman; certainly not a woman like you—my father would have never approved, as you can imagine.”

  She could imagine it all too well.

  “I said a few ghastly things to you at Ashdown,” she said. “And I apologize. I am awfully sorry. I was . . . afraid.”

  He inclined his head. “I know.”

  “You do?”

  “Yes. You hiss and scratch when you are scared.” He shrugged. “Cat behavior.”

  She had done more than scratch him. She had made a serious attempt at slicing his heart to ribbons, in the misplaced effort of protecting her own.

  And yet. . . . Her gaze shifted back to the papers on his desk. “You are helping us publish our study. In the Manchester Guardian.”

  Tristan gave her a suspiciously sympathetic look. “Yes.”

  “Thank you,” she said, and, on a shaky breath, “I think I love you.”

  He held himself very still then. As though he would shatter like cracked glass if touched.

  “You think?” His voice was gravelly, and the light of a lifetime of riotous emotions shone in his eyes.

  She could only nod. It had taken great courage to say the three words, and she hoped he knew this about her, too.

  Gradually, a smile spread over his face. He pushed away from the desk and sauntered toward her. “I’m glad to hear it. Because I was going to come for you.”

  She swallowed. “You were?”

  His eyes shimmered in mesmerizing shades of gold. He cradled her face in his hands, his palms warm against her clammy skin. He had held her like this the first time he had kissed her. She understood now that the first time his lips had touched hers had marked the beginning of the end of her old world. And she would never be able to go back to it. The only way was forward, into vaguely chartered territory where kissing Tristan was necessary and good. And where her own place was largely a white patch on the map.

  “You have not really thought I would simply leave it at that.” He was studying her with mild reproach edging his lips.

  She had. Before she had known about the cat.

  “Silly,” he said. “I would have tracked and found you. To grovel,” he added hastily, “for keeping secrets, and for proposing to you with the grace of a wildebeest.”

  “Oh.”

  His head lowered, and her lips already parted in response. A wicked gleam kindled in his eyes. “I was going to kiss you.” His mouth brushed against hers, the velvet of his lips light like a whisper. “And then,” he said, “I would have shown you a list.”

  She drew back. “A list.”

  “I know you like a good list.” His fingers slid into the chest pocket of his waistcoat and extracted a slip of paper. “Voilà.”

  The list contained names:

  Mary Wollstonecraft

  Mary Shelley

  Ada Lovelace

  Mary Somerville

  Harriet Taylor Mill

  Elizabeth Garrett Anderson

  Millicent Fawcett

  Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, Millicent’s sister and the first woman to obtain a medical degree in London. Ada Lovelace, known for her excellent mathematical work on a difference engine. All women who were pioneers or outstanding contributors to a particular field. But if that was the criterion, the list was hardly exhaustive, and so her mind scrambled, trying to find the common denominator linking the names. . . .

  “Women who advanced worthy causes outside the home,” said Tristan, “despite being burdened with a husband, protocol, and oftentimes, children. Mary Somerville had six, I think. I am sure there are many more, it is my knowledge about them which is limited.”

  Her gaze locked with his. Heat ignited in her belly, her cheeks were hot. He had listened. During their argument at Wycliffe Hall, at the height of his own emotions, he had listened. And he was addressing her worries, rather than judging her bitterly, as was the common, if not only, reaction when a woman questioned her ordained role as mother and wife.

  She was rather certain she loved him then.

  “I knew of these women,” she said hoarsely.

  “I assumed as much,” he said. “I wondered why you chose not to remember them.”

  She blew out a breath, crumpling the list in her fist. “What if I am not like them?”

  His brows pulled together. “No one could deny that you are equal to them in terms of determination.”

  As observed from the outside, perhaps. Her fist holding the list was shaking. “I’m not good at doing things half-measure.”

  “I never guessed.” He noticed the shaking, and his hand closed protectively over her fist. “What is it?”

  She held his gaze with some difficulty. “What if I love you too much,” she said. “What then?”

  “Love me . . . too much?”

  “Yes. And what if our connection resulted in a child, and what if I loved the child too much. And it made me stop fighting for the Cause with all that I have.” Her mouth was trembling, too. “You saw what happened, how I began to neglect my duties—missing appointments, lacking attention. The truth is, I hardly felt sorry for it, in the moment. What if I stop fighting because I stop caring, whether I want to or not?”

  His features gentled with dawning understanding. “I see,” he said. “It is not only the constraints and loss of credibility you fear.”

  She gave a helpless little shrug. “Being at the front line is exhausting.”

  “Oh, I know.”

  “I do not need an excuse not to do battle, day after day. What if having people to love makes me weak.”

  “My sweet.” He raised her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss against her fluttering pulse. “Is it possible you were simply caught in the whirlwind of something unfamiliar and exhilarating when you took up with me?”

  “Well,” she murmured. “Perhaps, yes.”

  “Also, do not confuse weakness and vulnerability. The two are hardly the same.”

  “They are not?” She sounded weepy.

  His smile was infinitely tender. “No. I was vulnerable at the front line. Never weak.”

  “I suppose. I suppose there is indeed a difference.”

  “Then consider, perhaps, that you needn’t have to choose,” he said carefully. “What if love makes you want to fight harder? What if you look at your daughters and see the best reason to keep campaigning for women’s liberty? Or, think of the sons who might raise hell in Parliament as long as women cannot.”

  What a picture he painted. Fierce red-haired daughters by her side. Lanky sons towering over her. Unfamiliar scenes she had rarely allowed herself to imagine, but well, she supposed she could consider it.

  She gave a shake. “You are too good with words.”

  “I am.” His fingertip swiped an indecisive tear from the corner of her eye. “Furthermore, I spent half my life ambitiously disregarding protocol. We shall make our own rules, always.”

  “But we would, wouldn’t we? Alas, you would still own me!”

  “How fortunate then, that I have not asked for your hand in marriage again.”

  Her mind blanked so utterly, she failed to surmise a reply.

  Tristan grinned. “I was, however, going to go down on one knee and ask you to live in sin with me until the Married Property Act is amended.”

  And before her rounding eyes, he was, slowly, going down on one knee.

  “I must be frank,” he said, his upturned face deeply serious, “I loathe offering the woman I love less than my name. But given your objections, I understand. An official engagement, however, no matter how long, would defuse any scandal
that might be about to descend upon us, while still allowing you to retain your money and independence.”

  She stared down at him, feeling dizzy, her heart racing.

  Uncertainty flickered in his eyes at her silence, and she wanted to throw her arms around his neck.

  “What about heirs,” she managed. “You need an heir—and the Act might never be amended.”

  “I have an heir,” he said. “Cousin Winterbourne. He is welcome to brick and mortar after I die. What I want is a life with you, Lucie.”

  She sank to the floor before him, her skirts against his knee. “Why?” she whispered.

  “Why?” He sounded nonplussed.

  She closed her eyes. “Why do you love me?” He had said it so easily: the woman I love.

  “Why does one love?” There was a frown in his voice. “Why, one just loves, Lucie.”

  Perhaps I have always liked you, Lucie, . . . I had wanted you half my bloody life.

  A part of her, still fledgling, tentatively unfolding, understood. And she had an inkling it was her own lack of trust that compelled her to doubt. And yet . . . “Reasons would help.”

  Because there was also a vast, hardened part of her upon which all the reasons why she was not lovable at all stood engraved. Clearly stated, measurable, numerous reasons: too demanding, too direct, too angular, too impatient. Too much, too little, too unnatural. But one by one, those faults could have been modified. Controlled. The diffuse magic of romantic love, however, seemed prone to slipping through her fingers like wafts of fog, beyond reason, beyond control. One just loves. She never wanted to lose him.

  “Well,” Tristan said. “For one, I have a favorable influence on you. You laugh more and you work less when I am with you.”

  Her eyes opened. “These things give me happiness.”

  He shrugged. “I discovered it is one and the same to me. There is great pleasure in pleasing a woman knowing she does not depend on my attention. You allowed me into your life because you desired me, not because you needed me. Very flattering. I consider you thoroughly seduced.”

  But she did need him. Love, she was learning, was needing someone even when he offered nothing but himself.

  “It takes a brave man to want a woman who wants rather than needs him,” she said instead.