An Independent Woman

by Candace Camp

  “I must apologize for what happened,” Nicholas began abruptly, as soon as Eleanor had left the room.

  “For what?” Juliana asked blankly.

  “For that doltish woman’s behavior,” he replied shortly.

  “Mrs. Thrall? She is scarcely your responsibility,” Juliana replied wonderingly.

  “No, but you are. And she would not have given you the sack if I had not given her and her daughter a set-down the other morning. I should have had more care. I did not think how it would affect you.”

  “It’s all right,” Juliana replied, stiffening. She did not care to think that Nicholas regarded her as a responsibility, especially not the onerous one that his expression seemed to indicate. “It’s not your fault. And I will find another position soon.”

  She had already visited the employment agency, and though there had been no openings available for a companion, she hoped there would soon be one.

  Nicholas’s expression darkened. “No.”

  He seemed to realize how flat and dictatorial the single word sounded, and he added, “You should not have to be someone’s companion.”

  Juliana started to speak, but before she could get a word out, he went on quickly. “I have come up with the answer to your dilemma.”

  “You have?” Juliana stared at him, wondering what in the world he was talking about.

  “Yes. It’s quite simple. You shall marry me.”

  There was a long moment of silence. Juliana stared at him, at first too stunned to speak. She was taken aback by the sudden fierce uprush of longing inside her. She realized that she wanted desperately to accept his offer. But immediately on the heels of that emotion came the sharp sting of anger and humiliation.

  It could not be clearer that Nicholas had no desire to marry her, that he was asking her—no, not even asking, telling her!—strictly out of some skewed feeling that he was somehow responsible for her.

  “Excuse me, my lord,” Juliana said icily, lifting her chin defiantly. “You may have a title now, but that does not give you the right to order me around. I am not one of your servants.”

  “Of course you are not,” he replied, with some impatience. “I’m not trying to order you. But this is the clear answer.”

  “Answer? I did not realize I had a question,” Juliana retorted. “This is my life we are discussing, not some ‘problem.’”

  “I know I am talking about your life,” he responded, looking baffled. “I am asking you to marry me.”

  “Asking? I heard no question. All I heard was your declaration that I was to marry you. Have you grown so arrogant in the years since I’ve known you? Did you expect me to swoon at your feet because you deigned to say you would marry me?”

  “Arrogance?” His brows contracted, and his dark eyes glittered. “You call it arrogance to offer you my name?”

  “I call it arrogance to assume that marriage is the only thing that can save me. That my life is a…a problem because I am an unmarried woman. Yes, I have to earn my way, but at least I am independent. I choose what I do.”

  “You call it independence when you are at someone else’s beck and call?” he shot back.

  “At least I am paid to be at someone’s beck and call. I have a day off every other week, and if my duties become too much, I am free to leave. I am not at some man’s beck and call twenty-fours hours a day, every day of the week, with no money of my own and no possibility of leaving!”

  “And that is what you think marriage to me would be?” Nicholas thundered. “That I would seek to control your life? To force you to obey me? I offer you a chance to escape from a life of drudgery, and you toss it back in my face, as if I were trying to harm you.”

  “I did not ask for your help!” Juliana exclaimed, knotting her hands into fists at her sides. “You thrust it upon me. Without any by-your-leave, you tell me I will marry you. You tell me my life is a misery, and you will mend it.” She stalked forward until they were nearly toe-to-toe, looking up into his face pugnaciously. “Well, thank you very much, but it is my misery, and I will thank you to keep your nose out of it.”

  “Of all the suspicious, ungrateful—” Nicholas broke off, his eyes fiery.

  For a long moment they simply stood, glaring at each other, too angry to even speak. He faced her, his fists on his hips, head thrust forward, and she stood in an almost identical pose, practically quivering with her indignation.

  Then, suddenly, to Juliana’s surprise, humor glinted in Nicholas’s eyes, and he relaxed, his hands falling to his sides and a laugh escaping his lips. “You were always a Hotspur, weren’t you?”

  Juliana tried to maintain her fury, but she felt it slipping away from her, and after a moment she had to chuckle, as well. “I am not the only one.”

  “Ah, Juliana, please, don’t be angry with me. I meant no insult to you. If I was arrogant, I apologize. ’Tisn’t the title, I’m afraid, but the fact that I have grown accustomed to giving orders. I meant nothing but to help you. But, as you know, I was never one who allowed good manners to be drummed into me.”

  “Perhaps your manners would have been better if they had not tried to drum them in,” she responded. With a sigh, she moved away, saying, “I know you have my interests at heart, Nicholas, but…”

  “But what?” he asked. “Please, Juliana, just listen to me. I am not trying to force you into anything. I have no wish to control you, and I mean no disrespect. I am merely offering you a…an easier life. Think of the advantages. You would have money, clothes, the freedom to do whatever you like. It would be a marriage in name only. I would not expect you to be my wife in all ways.”

  “But, Nicholas, this is mad. Why would you want to offer such a thing?”

  “It would be advantageous to me, as well,” he argued. “I need a wife. I have a title now, and there are certain social obligations that come with it. And you know me—I am thoroughly unskilled in the social graces, as you have just witnessed. I would blunder through Society, alienating everyone.”

  “Do you care?” Juliana asked skeptically.

  He chuckled. “Perhaps not much. But it might be, as I grew older, that I would regret having earned the enmity of all the peers of the land.” He paused, and his face fell into more serious lines. “I know what people think of me. Wild and wicked. Most of the time, it does not bother me. But there are times…” He shrugged. “I am not completely inured to it. I think that I might wish not to be a…a creature beyond hope.” Something flickered in his eyes and was gone. “You could make me respectable. You would know what to say and do, how to hold parties, and who to invite so I would not want to howl at the moon rather than listen to them.”

  Juliana half smiled. “I am not sure there is anyone in Society who would fit that description. Besides, I am just as much an outsider as you.”

  “Mayhap. But you, at least, are a good person. You know what is right and wrong.”

  “So do you, Nicholas. If you were not good, you would scarcely be offering to give me all this.”

  “Not so good. We both know I need a wife. I have two households to manage. And I need someone to soften my rough edges.”

  “But surely you need someone more your equal. A girl from an excellent family.”

  “There is nothing wrong with your family. Your father was merely a youngest son.”

  “Of a younger son,” Juliana added. “Yes, our name is good enough, but we have no wealth. No stature.”

  “Do not let Aunt Lilith hear you so denigrate her family.”

  “I am merely her cousin.”

  “You are worth a hundred of her, however. That is what is important to me. I have no interest in wealth; I have enough of that. Who should I marry, Juliana? Tell me that. One of those silly chits who chases me? Whose mothers lay traps for unwary bachelors on the marriage mart? Perhaps a beauty like Clementine Thrall?”

  “Nicholas! Of course not. But there are other women….”

  “Who? I am not interested in giggling girls. I know
you, and I know that you would do an exceptional job of everything that is required of a nobleman’s wife. And if you marry me, I will no longer be pursued by every nubile young lady of the ton, which will be, I can assure you, a great relief to me.”

  “Nicholas…this is ridiculous.”

  “Not at all. Just think, I have to travel to Lychwood Hall soon and face my relatives. Surely you would not be so cruel as to make me meet Aunt Lilith and Crandall on my own, would you?”

  Juliana looked at him. Despite his joking manner, she sensed that deep down there was a serious element to his plea.

  Then, with a wicked grin, he went on. “Come, tell me the truth now. Wouldn’t you like to face Aunt Lilith as the new mistress of the house?”

  “But what about love?” Juliana blurted out. In all his careful arguments, he had not spoken once about it.

  Nicholas cast her a sardonic look. “What about it?”

  “Wouldn’t you want to marry the woman you love? Isn’t that the whole purpose of getting married? To be with the one you love for the rest of your life?”

  “Is it?” he retorted, and moved away, his face falling into its usual hard lines. “I don’t believe in love.”

  “Don’t say that!”

  “Why not? It’s the truth.” He turned to face her. “Love is mostly a fairy tale, with little purpose except to make people feel better with their lot. Certainly I have seen little of it in marriages.”

  “But your parents…”

  “I scarce remember my parents.” Nicholas’s face was closed, and he seemed, for the first time, very much a stranger to her. “But I remember my aunt and uncle, and there was nothing between them but pride and dislike.”

  “You cannot use Lilith and Trenton Barre as an example!” Juliana cried. “They were a good example of nothing—not husband and wife, or parents, or even people. My mother and father loved each other. They were happy together.”

  “And your mother was a ghost all the years I knew her,” Nicholas responded.

  Juliana knew that his words were no less than truth. Her mother had lived the last of her life in a sad, remote fog, and nothing that Juliana did could make her happy again.

  “At least she had love for a time,” Juliana said stubbornly.

  “Juliana…” Nicholas crossed the room to her. “You are the one person in the world whom I trust. You are as close to real family as I have ever had. I want to see that you are taken care of. I have the means to do it, and the desire, but there is no other way to see to it that would not dishonor your name. Marriage is the only way that I can give you what you deserve, what I want to see you have. Beyond that, I have no feelings for any woman. I have never felt anything more than lust, easily satisfied.”

  Juliana’s eyes widened at his blunt words, and she could feel heat creeping into her cheeks.

  “I know,” he said with some impatience. “I should not speak of such things to a lady. But I must be honest with you. I have to make you see—I care not for love. I will not regret marrying without it. I will deal quite easily with an impassionate relationship. Desires of the flesh can be taken care of outside the marriage. Discreetly, of course. I would not embarrass you.”

  “Well, what about me?” Juliana shot back, ignoring the fiery blush that stained her face. She would be every bit as straightforward as he. “Am I to find love in affairs, too—discreet, of course?”

  A cold light flashed in his eyes, and for a moment Nicholas’s face was cold and dangerous. He looked every bit the pirate some claimed he had been.

  Then, with a visible effort, he relaxed. “I will trust your judgment, of course.”

  He sent her a challenging look, one brow raised, and Juliana knew that he was fully aware that she would never seek out an illicit affair, even in a loveless marriage.

  A little miffed that he had called her bluff, she snapped back, “Well, whatever your feelings on the matter, perhaps I still hope to marry someone I love someday.”

  “And how are you to find that person?” Nicholas asked sardonically. “Be practical, Juliana. Who are you going to meet while you are fetching and carrying for silly girls or wealthy old ladies?”

  Tears stung Juliana’s eyes at his words. Nicholas was depressingly correct. In all the years that she had been a companion, she had met no eligible man, or, at least, none that would consider marrying her. And she was realistic enough to admit that during the years ahead, she would only grow older and therefore more unlikely to be asked to marry, even if she did find a man whom she could love. It was a bleak prospect, and one that had more than once made her shed tears into her pillow late at night.

  She turned away, fighting the tears that threatened even now to choke her voice. “I am aware that I have no prospects. Still…” She squared her shoulders proudly and turned back to face him, her chin going up. “At least I alone control my life.”

  His face softened, his eyes suddenly touched by regret. “I am sorry if I have hurt you. My words were too blunt. I never meant to bring pain to your eyes.”

  “Tis not your fault you speak the truth,” Juliana replied.

  Nicholas reached out and took her hands, gazing down into her eyes. “You are a brave and wonderful woman. If the world were fair, you would be a duchess, and all the Mrs. Thralls and Clementines of the world would be waiting on you. I cannot change what has happened to you. But I am offering you what I can. You will have money to do what you wish, buy what you want. You will have servants to take care of you, and there will be no one who can look down on you or order you about. I would not be a controlling, demanding husband, I promise. We would be, as we always were, friends. And you would be quite free and independent. I would never put a rein on you.”

  Juliana’s heart ached within her. She was overwhelmingly aware of Nicholas’s closeness—the faint roughness of his hands upon her skin, the cool metal of his ring, the masculine scent of shaving soap that teased at her nostrils, the warmth of his hard body so near to hers. If only he were offering her his heart as well as his hand. If only it was love she saw in his dark eyes, not just kindness.

  “What about children?” she blurted out, surprising even herself.

  “What?” Nicholas looked startled.

  Embarrassed, still Juliana plowed ahead. “What if I grew to want children? ’Tis a natural enough thing for a woman to wish for a baby. A family to love and nourish.”

  Nicholas gazed at her for a long moment. Juliana waited, the flush of her embarrassment beginning to mingle with an entirely different sort of heat.

  “When that time comes,” he said at last in a husky voice, “then you need only to tell me.”

  He leaned toward her, his face looming ever closer. Juliana’s eyes went involuntarily to his lips. “If you should decide you want a different type of marriage,” he murmured, “that can be arranged.”

  Juliana’s breath caught, and she closed her eyes. His lips touched hers, soft but firm, moving ever more insistently against hers. Her head whirled, her senses suddenly, vividly alive. His hands came up to rest on her arms, fingers pressing into her flesh, and the heat from his body was a palpable thing, touching and warming her.

  She trembled a little in his grasp, her head falling back and her lips parting under his. The taste of his mouth was honeyed, intoxicating. Juliana could not breathe, could not protest; she felt as if she were teetering on the edge of some vast precipice, and she knew that she wanted only to tumble over it, to fall forever into this dark chasm of desire.

  Nicholas pulled back and looked down into her face. His own eyes blazed with a dark fire.

  “Think about it,” he said hoarsely. “That is all I ask.”

  With that, he turned abruptly and strode out of the room, leaving Juliana staring dazedly after him.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  JULIANA DID THINK ABOUT IT. Indeed, for the rest of the day, she did little but think about the scene that had taken place between them. Nicholas’s kiss had left her rattled and disturbed, filled w
ith strange sensations and random, clattering thoughts—and thrilled down to her toes.

  What had he meant by that kiss? There was a part of her that wanted to think his kiss had been an indication that he felt more for her than he had expressed, that despite his declarations of not believing in love, deep down he felt it for her.

  But, sternly, she turned herself from such thoughts. She knew enough about the world to know that there was a distinct difference between love and lust. And men seemed to quite easily feel desire without any sort of deeper connection. It would be the height of folly for her to allow herself to believe that Nicholas’s offer was anything other than what he had stated: a marriage in name only, without any love.

  Nor could Juliana deny that it was a very desirable offer indeed. Many women would have leapt at the opportunity to be Lord Barre’s wife, even without the slightest hint of affection. To be Lady Barre, the mistress of two households and a large number of servants, automatically given a great deal of status in Society, would be the dream of many a marriageable girl. For a twenty-seven-year-old spinster with no fortune, forced to earn her own way in the world, it was an almost unimaginable gift.

  All her life, Juliana had been on the fringes of the world of wealth and privilege, always looking on, but never actually participating. She had helped some girl, like her cousin Seraphina or Clementine Thrall, dress and do her hair, then watched, stuck in her own drab clothes, as that girl sallied forth to dance or attend the opera or go to some soiree.

  Marriage to Nicholas would change all that. The clothes she would buy would be her own. She would be giving elaborate parties and attending others as a welcomed guest. She would wear jewels and rich fabrics. And she would never again have to placate an employer or worry about what she would do if she could not find another position. It would give her, just as Nicholas had said, an immense freedom.

  But, still, she could not help but recoil from the idea of a loveless marriage. She had always believed that she would marry for love. She carried the memory of her parents’ love—the laughter and affection they had shared. Money had never been plentiful, but they had not minded; their love had made up for any lack. That, she knew, was what she wanted for herself.