The Perfect Rake

by Anne Gracie

  She shook her head and turned away.

  He followed her. “Prue, speak to me. What is the matter?”

  She put up a shaking hand as if to keep him at bay. “You misunderstood. There is no child, not living. Grandp—I…I became ill and my—” She swallowed. “My baby was born dead before its time.”

  She added, “I can bear no more of this. Please leave. Phillip will be here any minute.” She moved toward the door.

  He said in a ragged voice, “I’ve never felt like this about any woman. I need you with me, Imp. More than I’ve ever needed anyone or anything in my life.” He reached for her again, but she backed away, shaking her head in frantic denial.

  It was too much. There was too much filling her mind; filling her heart. She felt torn. She needed some time alone, time in which to think.

  “I’m sorry, but I cannot!” She fled from the room.

  Gideon walked out of his aunt’s house like a sleepwalker. He was shattered. And more deeply in love than ever. A year ago he would not have believed that a woman like Prudence could exist.

  It was simply not in her to betray a vow. It didn’t matter that she’d made the promise to a man who abandoned her, nor that the witnesses to her vow were dead.

  He thought of all the women he’d known who’d broken vows. He thought of his own mother who made and broke promises so lightly, who cared not a snap of her fingers for the vows she had made to her husband, or the duty she owed to her son, never mind that the man she eloped with was her own sister’s husband.

  How could the son of a woman like that understand a woman like Prudence?

  He might not understand her, but oh, how he wanted her.

  He was a fribble, a rake, a man who had neither given nor kept a promise to a woman his entire adult life. He was shallow, selfish, and possibly even a little vain. He did not understand her. He did not deserve her.

  But he would not give her up! Not to a creature like Otterbury. Otterbury had been given his chance to make her happy and instead, he’d left her in the most dire situation a woman could face—and in the hands of a vicious bully. Otterbury deserved no consideration. Gideon could give her up to a more worthy man, perhaps.

  Or perhaps not, he thought darkly. Definitely not! He wasn’t giving her up to anyone!

  Prudence needed to be made happy. And Gideon needed to be the one who made her happy. He was the right man for the job. He was the only man for the job.

  And there and then, Gideon made his own vow, the first of his new adult life. It was private, without witnesses and not even voiced aloud. But he meant it with every fiber of his being: He would marry Prudence Merridew and spend his life trying to give her the promise she had made her sisters—sunshine and laughter and love and happiness.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Love never dies of starvation, but often of indigestion.”

  FRENCH PROVERB

  THE CLOCK IN THE HALL TICKED WITH AGONIZING SLOWNESS, THE hand inching toward the hour. Prudence paced back and forth on the landing above. Her head rang with echoes of the conversation with Lord Carradice. She had thought of almost nothing else since he left. Had he truly meant what she thought he had? “Come live with me and be my love.”

  It was a clear declaration. He did want her. Possibly even as much as she wanted him.

  Two o’clock chimed. She glanced at her reflection in the looking glass and smoothed back an unruly curl. She’d made herself as neat and tidy as she could, cultivating a serene exterior. She smoothed the fabric of her dress with damp hands. She could do this.

  As the last golden chime died away the doorbell jangled in the hall below her. Even as a boy, Phillip had valued punctuality. It was one of his virtues.

  The butler, Shoebridge, glided languidly toward the entrance, stopped to adjust a floral arrangement with maddening deliberation, then, as the bell jangled again, opened the door with a dignified sweep. Prudence peered over the rails; the entrance was out of her sight, but she could hear the low murmur of masculine voices, then footsteps on the polished parquet floor, and finally Phillip came into sight.

  He’d changed his clothes, she noticed, as Shoebridge took his high-crowned beaver hat, black-and-silver trimmed walking cane, and overcoat before conducting him to the front drawing room. His hair was elaborately curled and pomaded into the latest style. His boots were glossy, and small tassels swung from their sides. His coat fitted tightly, the shoulders wadded broad and the waist nipped in tight. Phillip had become a pink of the ton.

  She swallowed. The finale to a four-and-a-half-year prelude. She took a deep breath and slowly descended the stairs. She had been caught unawares in the street. She would do better this time.

  For years she had imagined Phillip’s return. Now, all she could think of was Gideon and the words that made her heart—belatedly—sing. Ironic that when Gideon was uttering those very words, all she could think about was the imminent interview with Phillip.

  She recalled his face when she had asked him to leave. Her anxiety had made her clumsy; still he could have, should have waited until she was free to come to him. Free to say yes to him. She would make it up to him.

  She hugged the gloriously romantic words to her heart.

  Come live with me and be my love,

  And we shall all the pleasures prove.

  She had no doubt that if anyone could prove all the pleasures, it would be Gideon. She shivered as she thought of it. Further lines echoed in her head as she descended the stairs.

  And I will make thee beds of roses,

  And a thousand fragrant posies;

  Beds of roses. There would be an occasional thorn, no doubt, but with Gideon, who would notice? Or care?

  Fair-linèd slippers for the cold,

  With buckles of the purest gold.

  She had no need of gold buckles on her slippers. A ridiculous extravagance. Not to mention out of date! Besides, once she was free, she would go to him barefoot!

  She reached the drawing room. It was time to put aside the dream of a love without cost or judgment, of proving pleasures and lying in beds of roses with a dark-eyed laughing man. First she had to face what she had done with her life. Only then could she move on.

  “Phillip,” she greeted him as she entered the drawing room.

  “My dear Prue!” Phillip strode across the room, placed his hands on her shoulders and kissed her carefully on each cheek.

  It was as if she were standing outside her body, observing the whole with dispassion. He smelled of…some exotic scent—patchouli and musk, perhaps? It was oddly redolent of the Duke of Dinstable’s butler. How bizarre. Here she was, being embraced by her long-lost fiancé, and his scent reminded her of someone’s butler.

  At last he released her. “Ah, Prudence, Prudence,” he exclaimed. “How you have grown up!” He stared at her for a moment, then placed a kiss on her lips.

  Prudence, feeling guilty, endured it stiffly. It was not how he’d kissed her in the past. His lips were seeking, demanding. She kept her own lips firmly closed.

  His ardour was very disconcerting. She hadn’t expected it. She should have. As far as Phillip was concerned, they were still betrothed.

  He loosened his grip and Prudence stepped quickly backward.

  “Still a shy little mouse, I see.”

  She tried to smile, to mitigate her rejection of him. “It’s been such a long time, Phillip. I…I am sorry.”

  “I must say, I expected a warmer welcome from you, little Prudish,” he said. “We did a sight more than that when you were a girl, if you recall.”

  “Only once. And I didn’t want it then, either,” she retorted. “And there were such consequences of that act—” She bit off the words. It was not fair to greet him with complaints and recriminations. Not after all this time. Water under the bridge. She was finished with this man.

  She softened her tone. “I am sorry, Phillip. We are not the people we once were. We need to acquaint ourselves with the people we have become. Muc
h has happened since that day we became betrothed.”

  He frowned.

  She drew the ring from the neck of her gown. “I have kept your family ring safe all these years.”

  He looked a bit nonplussed. “Ah, yes. Good.”

  This was the moment she had been waiting for. She slipped the ring off the chain and said, “Phillip. I’m sorry, but I cannot keep your ring any longer. I cannot marry you.”

  There was a short silence in the room. He placed his hands on her shoulders and turned her to face him.

  “You are breaking the betrothal?” His voice was incredulous. “After four and a half years of wearing my ring?”

  She swallowed and nodded. The first promise she had ever broken.

  “Why?”

  She said nothing. She held the ring out to him. He took it and examined it carefully, hefting it in his hand as if gauging its weight. “Solid.”

  “Well, it would have to be to have been handed down by all those female ancestors, wouldn’t it?”

  “Female ancest—? Oh yes, indeed, yes. The ancestors.”

  He fiddled with it, as if unsure what to do. “Does Lord Dereham know about this?”

  “If you mean the ring, no. I kept it hidden, as you instructed. If you mean does he know of the betrothal, no again. In any case, Grandpapa is no longer the issue—we’ve left his house, never to return.”

  “Yes, your sisters said this morning that you’d run away. A most foolhardy thing to do, Prudence. He is your legal guardian!”

  “In a short time, he will be my guardian no longer. Once I turn one and twenty, I shall take possession of my inheritance, and we shall all be free of Grandpapa forever.”

  “But why go to these hysterical extremes and risk his displeasure? What if he should disinherit you? It is most unwise, Prudence, most unwise!”

  Prudence stared at him in disbelief. She had told him in her letters how harshly Grandpapa treated them. She’d even told him the worst thing, the thing she had told no one else. “You know how unbearable it was living with him,” she said slowly. “I wrote to you often about it. You can’t possibly have forgotten.”

  Phillip waved a dismissive hand. “I am wise enough in the ways of the world to recognize excessive female sensibility when I see it.”

  Prudence blinked. Excessive female sensibility?

  Phillip, oblivious, continued, “It could not have been easy for the old man, having five young females on his hands. If he was a little old-fashioned, well, that is understandable. And a little discipline never hurt anyone. Besides, he must be very old by now. He can’t live for much longer, and then it will all be worth it. He’s full of juice, you know.”

  Prudence said slowly, “So that is why you never responded…”

  “Now, Prue, be fair. I probably didn’t get the letters you’re talking about. You know how unreliable the posts are to India.” Phillip did not meet her eyes. “In any case, if I’d done as you begged me—come home to take you all away—by the time I returned home you would have forgotten whatever little problem it was you’d written about in the first place. A pretty fool I would have looked then!”

  He didn’t seem to realize he’d contradicted himself. He had received that all-important letter.

  “So you simply ignored what I said.”

  “Now, now, Prue, don’t be difficult. I was a world away. You have no idea of the hardships I was facing in India.”

  “But when I told you…the baby…” She could not speak.

  He flushed. “Hush. There is no need to talk of such indelicate matters. How it happened was unfortunate, but it was no doubt for the best.”

  Indelicate matters. She walked over to the window and stared out of it blindly. She had wanted so badly to share her grief about the baby with him, the father, and now it seemed he felt none.

  She turned back suddenly. “So, you think we should have stayed with Grandpapa—for the money? And simply overlooked his cruelty toward us?” She searched his face. “And it was cruelty, Phillip, not ‘a little discipline,’ as you call it.”

  He shuffled his feet uncomfortably. “Females are apt to exaggerate such matters. If you only knew the hardship, the privations I suffered in India trying to make my fortune—”

  Prudence narrowed her eyes. “It’s all money with you, isn’t it? You think we should have stayed for the money. You did not send for me when I needed you, because you were too busy making your fortune. Were you always like this? Was I simply blind?”

  Phillip shrugged and said indulgently, “Now, would I bother you with weighty financial matters when we were courting? Females are well known to be impractical and unworldly—”

  Prudence snorted, and misinterpreting, Phillip hastened to reassured her. “We men do find it charming, I assure you. I admit, even last year I might have sung a different tune, for it looked like your grandfather had lost his whole fortune. The company nearly went bankrupt, you know, and we all had an anxious time of it. But then four or five months ago it took a sudden turn for the better and now it is flourishing like you wouldn’t believe! He is still worth buttering up, believe you me.”

  Prudence felt queasy. How could she have ever thought this pompous, mercenary creature was the love of her life? He must have had this mercenary streak in him all along. How could she not have seen it? He did not even care about their child! He’d received the letter and simply hadn’t bothered to respond. Her baby was an indelicate matter. Its death was for the best.

  She could barely look at him, let alone be polite to him. Rage and bitter betrayal filled her throat, threatening to boil up out of her and scald them both. She wanted to punch him, to scream at him like a virago. She was unable to speak.

  She had wasted years of her life—and worse—on an idol with feet of clay, a vain and shallow man to whom money was more important than Prudence or their child. How could she have been so blind, so stupid? Gideon was right. Phillip had been her rat.

  He sat down, smoothing his elegant inexpressibles, seemingly oblivious of her emotional state, and glanced critically around the room. “If you won’t stay at Dereham Court, I still don’t understand why you are not with another relative, your great-uncle, for instance. These people you are staying with, have they cozened you into this bold and unbecoming independence? Because I’ll have you know I made investigations and I cannot like your being here, not one bit! Staying with some woman you don’t even know. The relict of some fellow in the Argentine! Good grief, Prudence, don’t you know any better?”

  Prudence put a firm hold on her temper. “Lady Augusta—”

  “According to my…my hosts, who are very respectable people, this Lady Augusta del Foreigner simply appeared in Bath one day. None of them had heard of her at all before that. She is not listed in Debretts! She is an adventuress, mark my words!”

  “Nonsense—” Prudence began, but Phillip swept on.

  “I have had her pointed out to me in the street. She has a head of hair that would shame an opera dancer.” He glanced at her own red hair as he spoke. “And she paints her face. Lady, my foot!” He sniffed. “They make up titles over there, you know.”

  “Fustian! She is—”

  He waved her assurances aside with a lofty hand. “Be guided by one who has experienced a great deal more of the world than you have, Prudence. My hosts do not know her, and my own common sense has filled in the rest of the picture.”

  Prudence folded her arms militantly. Her hands itched to box his pompous ears. Had she been totally blind at sixteen? It was a frightening thought, to realize one could delude oneself so completely.

  “In addition, there are serious doubts about this duke your sister is supposed to be betrothed to,” Phillip declared. “One of my hosts is second cousin to the aunt of a duke, and is in a position to know such things. They are acquainted with all the most important members of London society and they know that while a Duke of Dinstable is listed in Debretts, he actually lives in the far north of Scotland and never sees
a soul. I think that shows you.” He sat back and regarded her smugly, but when she didn’t respond, he added, “Your so-called duke must be a fraud.”

  “No, he was a hermi—”

  “You have led Charity into a pretty pickle. I’ll lay odds her betrothed is a nameless adventurer after your sister’s inheritance.”

  “Poppycock!” snapped Prudence. “Your hosts are mistaken.”

  “They are extremely respectable, extremely well-connected, well-to-do people,” Phillip rebuked her. “And as for Lord Carradice, my hosts have heard of him—and it’s all to his discredit, believe you me! He is notorious, Prudence! He is a rake, a rogue, and a libertine—”

  “Nonsense!” Prudence retorted. “He was a rake, I know, but to us he has been nothing but kind and generous and I will not have him slandered in this—”

  “You cannot be expected to understand. No doubt he has exerted his fatal charm on your feminine sensibilities.”

  Prudence had had enough. “Well, yes, actually he has! So much so that I am going to marry him.”

  Phillip’s jaw dropped. He rallied quickly. “So this is at the core of it. You poor, deluded creature! Rakes like Carradice don’t marry girls, they seduce them and then abandon them.”

  His blatant hypocrisy took her breath away. Prudence raised her eyebrows and stared at him in silent indignation.

  Phillip reddened as he made the connection. “That was different. I gave you a ring.”

  “That made it all right, did it? Well, now I’m giving the ring back.”

  “To marry Carradice?” he scoffed and put the ring on the table.

  “Yes. As a matter of fact, he proposed to me not an hour ago, in this very room.”

  “Proposed or made you a proposition?”

  “Proposed.”

  Phillip snorted. “I did not hear the thunderclaps announcing that the world had changed. Did he actually say it, in so many words?”

  “What do you mean? Of course he said it.”