Shameless

by ROBARDS, KAREN

  “It seems the obvious solution, doesn’t it? Yet I believe I must make an exception for you.”

  “You cannot expect me to keep silent if you kill my brother-in-law.”

  “I wonder if I meant to spike my own hand?” There was a musing quality to his voice. “I won’t kill you, and I can’t expect you to keep quiet. What does that leave to me, then? Clearly I must now flee the country at the very least, and do my poor best to deal with whoever catches up.”

  Unspoken between them hung the near certainty that sooner or later, someone who caught up might very well deal with him instead.

  “I have a better solution,” Beth said. “One that I believe will save us all. I will marry you.”

  Chapter Twenty-five

  A SMALL VILLAGE in the south of Dumfriesshire, Gretna Green was less than four miles from the River Sark, which served as the dividing line between England and Scotland. It was a notorious place, the scene of many a scandalous marriage, because the law provided that a couple need only show up in town and pledge themselves to each other in the presence of another person, and the deed was done. To wed over the anvil, as it was called, was such a disgraceful act that the shame of committing it made Beth shudder inwardly. Adding to her dismal spirits was the knowledge that she was submitting to a yoke from which she would find it most difficult, if not impossible, to ever free herself. From the time the vows were said, her life would no longer be her own. When a man and woman wed, they became one person according to the law, and the man was that person. To all intents and purposes, she, Lady Elizabeth Banning, would cease to exist. The lure of becoming a marchioness—if indeed Neil was telling the truth about the title, which she rather thought he was but could not be sure about—did not tempt her in the least. Yet she stood in the marriage room of the village blacksmith’s house—a half-timbered cottage with chimneys at each end, the smithy’s workplace behind, and a single window that looked out onto the cobbled street in front—and with outward calm said the words that would make her Neil’s wife.

  Her blood drummed so hard in her ears that she scarcely took in a thing after that, or heard what he replied, or what the smith—the smith!—said to them. All she knew was that the whole exercise—from the time they walked in the door, said the words, and signed their names to the registry and the marriage lines, to the time they walked out again—took less than five minutes.

  Then she found herself outside again, standing on the smithy’s stoop in the cold starry quiet of a Scottish night, dressed in the same plain blue gown that had been lent to her by Creed’s nephew’s wife at the White Swan, and worn now for more than twenty-four hours straight. Her hair had been groomed by a borrowed brush, and, although she had done her best to put it up properly before the ceremony, tendrils had already escaped to curl around her face and straggle down her back. She had washed her face and hands, but longed badly for a bath, and her own—or at least fresh—clothes. In the last twenty-four hours, she had napped for perhaps a total of two hours, wrapped in Neil’s arms in a leafy copse after they had stopped to share a purloined lunch basket that a farmer busy plowing his field had left unattended. Exhausted, hungry, wearing a sadly crumpled dress, Beth shuddered inwardly at what she had done. Shorn of the trappings that she had never before realized meant so much—wedding gown, flowers, church, society’s approbation, her sisters’ support—she was nonetheless a bride. She was also freezing cold, sick to her stomach, and, save for her new husband—husband!—now standing silently on the stoop at her side, utterly alone.

  She had never felt so low in all her life.

  This is my wedding day.

  “Well, ’tis done,” Neil said, and walked on down the steps. Dry-mouthed, Beth watched him descend. Wearing a buff coat and a cravat he had purchased from the smithy, who was fortunately a large man himself, along with the previously borrowed shirt and his own pantaloons, he, too, presented less than a creditable appearance. But as handsome as he was, an unshaven jaw, disheveled, poorly fitting clothes, and mud-spattered boots lent him a raffish air that a fair number of people might have found added to his attraction. Certainly, over the course of the day’s journey, Beth had caught more than one female, including the smith’s plump wife, looking him over with appreciation.

  “Yes,” Beth replied, following him, for there was nothing else to do. More buildings of various descriptions lined the broad street, which was the main one for the village. Except for the inn, which possessed a lively taproom and where they were to pass what was left of the night, the world seemed asleep. They dared not tarry much past daylight, because the threat of their pursuers catching up was ever present, if remote, for who would expect to find them in Gretna Green? Already it was late, and moonlight cast a pale glow over all. He waited for her in the street, watching her come to him with an absolutely expressionless face. Without touching, without another word exchanged between them, they turned and walked side by side toward the inn. Walked, because he’d had to sell the horse to pay the half-guinea cost of the smithy’s services, and provide sufficient funds for their night’s lodging, and meals, and various other sundries, and to hire a carriage to convey them back on the morrow to London, where at Beth’s insistence they were to go immediately to Richmond House and thus seek protection in the very belly of the beast who sought Neil.

  But first they had to get through this night.

  This is my wedding night.

  Her stomach dropped clear to her toes at the thought. If she had been prone to fits of the vapors, she would have had one right then. But she was not so prone, she was distressingly unhysteric by nature, and so she just kept walking, feeling all the while as if she were trapped in the unreal landscape of a bad dream.

  I’m married.

  Her heart knocked in her chest.

  “I bespoke dinner, upon our return,” Neil said as they passed through the inn’s arched doorway into the warmth and light inside. He bestowed a curt nod on the innkeeper, who had come out to greet them and showed them into a private parlor. The innkeeper was a round little man, with a florid face, white hair, and a look in his eyes as they slid over Beth that was far from what she was accustomed to. Drawing herself up in response to it, Beth returned his gaze with some surprise, then realized that of course that less-than-respectful look was because she had just contracted a clandestine marriage at Gretna Green, putting her quite beyond the pale, and she felt even more wretched.

  The private parlor was small, made dark by wood-paneled walls and tight shuttered windows despite the fire in the fireplace and the bunches of candles guttering in their sconces, and smelled of smoke. Noise from the taproom next door made conversation all but impossible, which Beth didn’t mind because, thanks in some part to the listening ears of the innkeeper’s stout wife, who waited upon them and cast numerous surreptitious but avid looks over the newlyweds whenever she thought herself unobserved, she seemed to have lost her tongue. Uttering the few commonplaces that occurred to her, jumpy as a cat on hot bricks, she responded to Neil’s unexceptional conversational gambits almost at random while picking at her capon and broccoli without ever tasting the few morsels she put in her mouth. In the end, she sat sipping tea while he made a hearty meal.

  It was all she could do to keep her hand from shaking. Despite her efforts, though, the china cup rattled more than once in its saucer as she set it down.

  “I—believe I will go upstairs now,” she said when the port was brought in and the dishes cleared. At the thought of what going upstairs implied, her heart fluttered and her stomach knotted so tightly that even the little she had eaten was in danger of resurfacing. She badly needed a few moments alone, a few moments to settle her racing mind and calm her shredded nerves, a few moments in which to come to terms with this drastic change in her estate.

  A few moments to come to terms with the notion of being married.

  “I’ll join you in, say, half an hour,” was his reply. It was rendered no less dismaying because it was spoken in a perfectly calm v
oice. He sat there in front of the smoking fire, looking quite at his ease, pouring himself out a glass of port, his long legs disposed carelessly beneath the table, his broad shoulders blocking most of the fireplace from her view. There was nothing of the lover about him. Indeed, there had not been since, after a great deal of spirited argument, he had been brought to see that—because Beth knew with certainty that Richmond would do all in his power to protect one who had become, irrevocably, a member of his own family no matter how much he might dislike the necessity—wedding her was the only rational answer to their dilemma. But still her knees were practically knocking together as with a murmur of assent she escaped his presence and all but fled up the stairs toward their—their!—chamber.

  A maid emerged just as she reached it.

  “I’ve made all ready, mum, just as the gentleman ordered,” she said, bobbing her head.

  “Th-thank you,” Beth stuttered, unable to contemplate with anything approaching equanimity the idea that this sturdy Scotswoman knew that she would be sharing a bed with her new, most scandalously married husband. Managing to preserve her countenance for long enough to pass into the room, Beth closed the door behind her. Then, leaning back against it, she surveyed the scene before her with nausea-inducing anxiety.

  Lit solely by a fire burning low in the grate, the room itself was well enough, with a carpet in muted colors covering the floor, a single shuttered window that looked out, she thought, on the stable yard, a washstand, a dressing table, a wardrobe, a pair of mismatched chairs, and a large bed practically smothered in quilts and hung with heavy, tawny gold velvet curtains. Beth could barely look at the bed, and the other comforts awaiting her, though welcome, were no more calming.

  Steaming gently in the firelight, a bath stood before the hearth. Beside it, a night rail had been laid out across one of the chairs. There was also a portmanteau and what looked like a dress and the appropriate undergarments, along with a brush and other necessities. Those would be for the morrow, of course, and had doubtless been scrounged up by the landlady at Neil’s request, in return for some small sum.

  The bath and night rail were for tonight.

  The hollow feeling taking up residence in the pit of her stomach was, she decided, at least preferable to the sickening churning that had previously occupied it.

  This was your idea, she reminded herself. You talked him into wedding you, and must now stick to the bargain.

  But marrying had seemed so much easier in the abstract.

  For a moment, no longer, Beth remained where she was, back pressed against the door, wishing with all her heart she was safe back in her own spacious chamber in Claire’s house in Cavendish Square. Then she realized that a goodly number of the minutes that Neil had promised to allot her had already ticked past, and this galvanized her into moving.

  The first thing she did was turn the key in the lock so that she could be certain he would not take her unaware.

  The second was to scramble out of her clothes, which presented her with some difficulty as the hooks in the middle of her back proved difficult to reach, and the strings to her stays had knotted.

  The third was to climb into the bath.

  The hot water felt heavenly. Closing her eyes, she sank down into it, letting it soothe muscles that ached from the hours she’d spent riding pillion, enjoying its silken comfort against her skin for a long, luxurious moment before the specter of Neil’s imminent arrival once again reared its demoralizing head. Sitting up, making liberal use of the soap, she scrubbed herself until her skin glowed, rinsed, and climbed out again, all much faster than she would have done if she had not feared hearing his knock on the door at any second. Shivering a little, she dried herself and pulled the night rail over her head. Long-sleeved and high-necked, it was of white cambric, a deal too large for her, and, except for a few rows of pin-tucking around the neckline, completely plain, but it was clean and fresh-smelling and covered her, and that was what mattered most. Ears straining now as she listened with growing trepidation for Neil’s footsteps approaching the door, for surely he would arrive at any second, she unpinned her hair and brushed it out. Although she usually slept with it in a long braid, that didn’t seem appropriate. Perhaps he would prefer it loose?

  I’ve given him the right to have a voice in how I wear my hair.

  The thought so appalled her that she twisted it up with more haste than care, scraping the hair back from her face anyhow, thrusting pins into the unwieldy bun at her nape with such speed that more than one stabbed into her scalp. Having finally tamed every last wayward tendril, she then discovered as she finished that after all she would have been better served by leaving it loose: with the firelight shining through it, the night rail was all but indecent, and, loosed, her hair would have at least covered the most private parts of her anatomy. Horrified by the discovery, she was still staring at herself in the mirror over the dressing table in some shock when the knock she had been dreading came.

  It was a soft, most discreet rapping, which for the effect it had on her could have been a furious pounding of fists.

  She jumped, stared at the portal, took a step toward it, paused as the impossibility of opening the door clad as she was impressed itself upon her, then quickly snatched the topmost quilt from the bed. Wrapping it around herself, setting her teeth, she went to open the door.

  Neil stood on the other side of it. Their eyes met as she pulled the panel wide, and at the same time as she was once again registering just how very tall and broad-shouldered he was, his gaze slid down her quilt-wrapped body. When their eyes met again, she could read nothing at all in his. Clutching the quilt tighter, feeling hideously self-conscious and so nervous she could scarcely breathe, she stood back to let him enter.

  He did so, then took the door from her cold fingers, closed it, and turned the key in the lock. The click would have made her jump had she not managed to control the impulse just in time.

  Then, finally, they were utterly alone. He was her husband. She was his wife.

  Icy curls of panic chased each other through her system as he turned to look at her.

  Barefoot as she was, her head just topped his shoulders. With the best will in the world, she found she couldn’t quite meet his gaze, and instead ended up looking steadfastly at his chin.

  “You shaved.” The surprise of it saved her, unglued her tongue from the roof of her mouth, where she had feared it was permanently stuck, gave her something to focus on besides the fact that they were married. It was, she realized, the first time she had seen him completely clean-shaven. Without the scruff that had darkened his jaw for most of their acquaintance, he was even more wickedly handsome than she had known.

  “Totally in your honor.” He gave her the faintest of smiles. “Having purchased a razor and other essentials from the landlord”—he held up a small traveling case that she had not previously seen, and which she assumed contained the newly acquired items—“I thought I might as well make use of them. I called for a can of hot water and some soap, and the deed was done. Although the water I was provided with was cold. I trust your bath was not?”

  “Yes. No. I mean, it was wonderfully warm. Th-thank you for thinking of it.”

  “Considering your comfort must always be an object with me, of course.”

  He crossed to the fire, set the traveling case down beside the portmanteau, then glanced around the room. She, meanwhile, stayed where she was, watching him. Rather like, she realized to her own annoyance, a frozen-in-place rabbit might watch a dog it feared had found its scent.

  You are not such a coward as this.

  She put up her chin.

  “The situation is a trifle awkward,” she said. “But we need not let it be. We are married, and must just make the best of it.”

  “The ceremony isn’t binding until it’s been consummated,” he reminded her, coming back toward where she still stood by the door. It took a great deal of determination, but Beth neither moved nor flinched as he stopped in front
of her to regard her with a gathering frown. “You realize that, don’t you? There’s still time to change your mind. You have only to say the word, and I’ll take myself off.”

  “I don’t wish to change my mind.” She wanted to wet her lips because her mouth was excruciatingly dry, but refrained because she felt the gesture would reveal too much about the state of her nerves. “Do you?”

  “No.”

  “Well, then.” Swallowing, she met his gaze head-on. Despite her brave words, she was conscious of teetering on the brink of developing the coldest of cold feet. “Oh, the devil! Could we please just get on with this? Bed me and have done.”

  His eyes widened fractionally, and then he laughed. “Such a romantic as you are!”

  “Don’t laugh. I’m not funning. I need this to be over with. Quickly, if you please.”

  Girding herself as if for battle, she let go of the quilt. It slithered to the floor. Stepping out of the puddled folds, she took the few steps needed to put her right up against him and determinedly put her arms around his neck.

  “Hold a minute.” His hands spanned her waist, holding her back when, with great resolution, she would have risen on her toes to kiss him. His eyes glinted in the uncertain firelight as he looked down at her. “You’re white as paper, and as cold to the touch as a corpse. It’s not me you’re afraid of, I’ll swear, and if my memory serves, you recently assured me you did not fear having sex with me. So what’s all this dread in aid of?”

  Beth made a face as the truth burst upon her. “Marriage, I suppose. The idea of willingly making myself some man’s chattel, subject to his orders, my happiness dependent on his benevolence, or lack of it. . .” It was all she could do to repress a shudder. “I confess I find the prospect daunting.”

  Though she had told him only the broadest outline of her childhood, comprehension dawned in his eyes.

  “I doubt the man exists who could rule you against your will, Madame Roux. You may believe me when I tell you that I would never make the attempt.”