To Woo a Wicked Widow

by Jenna Jaxon

  His reflections were interrupted by Hoskins’s announcement, “Lord Grafton, my lord,” followed by the sight of the man himself.

  Nash leaped to his feet, his napkin flying off to the side. “My lord.” He bowed. “I beg your pardon. Hoskins should have shown you—”

  “He tried, Wrotham. Don’t berate him for giving me my way.” The tall, thin, gray-whiskered man smiled mirthlessly. “I told him to take me to you at once and he did so. Shows he’s either a sensible man or a well-trained servant.” Lord Grafton appropriated the chair on Nash’s right, as imperious here as when in the House of Lords. An imposing man, whom age seemed not to have touched as far as dint of will or physical strength was concerned, the earl sat ramrod straight, staring at Nash with small, round, glittering brown eyes, his hands crossed gracefully over his silver-knobbed walking stick. Nash had seen that stick countless times in the Lords and had a healthy respect for it. Those who did not often found it had purposes that had nothing to do with walking. No, the Earl of Grafton was not a man to be gainsaid.

  “I received your note this morning, my lord. I assume your visit had to do with the Yeoman Warder bill?” Nash tried not to sound too hopeful. The earl’s face gave nothing away. He could just as easily be about to withdraw as to lend his support.

  “It does, Wrotham, after a fashion.” Grafton settled himself in the chair, straightening his shoulders, adjusting his hands on his stick. “I want you to marry my daughter.”

  Nash blinked several times, unable to speak. He stared at the older man, wondering if he was playing some elaborate jest. Grafton’s face had not one laugh line on it.

  “I beg your pardon, my lord,” he said at last, grappling to maintain a stoic mien. He needed to stall for time to compose himself. “Would you prefer tea or coffee?” Had the man actually just asked him to be his son-in-law?

  “Coffee, black.”

  Nash nodded to a footman. Not enough time to puzzle it out. Well, then, forward unto the breach. “You say you want me to marry your daughter, my lord? Yet this is the first time you have broached the subject to me. Is there some recent development that would precipitate such an offer?” God, his daughter was breeding and he wanted to marry her off to keep it quiet. Or, worse, thought him the cad who had ruined her. Gad, what a tangle.

  “I see you are a man to come directly to the point. I was right about you.” Grafton’s smile sent a chill down Nash’s spine. “Yes, there has been a development concerning my daughter that I will not countenance. She has taken up with the most unsavory of men, a rakehell who will see her reputation in shreds and laugh about it at White’s afterward.” The earl’s face had turned a deep shade of red. “I will not have it, I tell you.”

  The footman appeared with the earl’s cup of coffee and set it in front of the shaking man.

  Grafton seized it and drank it half down at one gulp. “Therefore, Wrotham, you will oblige me by marrying this headstrong woman and put an end to her scandalous actions.”

  “I do understand your concerns, sir.” Nash’s breathing had slowed to an almost normal rate, his mind racing to find a way out of this highly distasteful proposal. “However, I don’t believe that I have even met your daughter.” What was the chit’s name? The elder two were married, so the man must be speaking of the youngest one. He hadn’t thought her out of the schoolroom yet. “I can hardly make a declaration to Lady Sophia—”

  “Charlotte.”

  Nash jerked back in his chair. “I beg your pardon?”

  “I am speaking of my eldest daughter, Lady Cavendish. She is a widow.” The gleam in the earl’s eye pierced Nash to the heart. “I believe you made her acquaintance last night at Almack’s, for all the world to see.”

  The rag-mannered woman. With difficulty, Nash drew in a breath and slowly let it out.

  “I did, my lord, render her some slight assistance last evening.” Either their encounter had become the latest on-dit circulating this morning or the earl had excellent spies following Lady Cavendish.

  “Then you know about her shameless liaison with that blackguard Garrett.”

  The memory of the lady, hair mussed, lips swollen, emerging from the stairwell with the young buck rose with startling clarity. His stomach clenched. Now he was more than sorry he hadn’t planted Garrett a facer. Hadn’t the lady’s cousin warned her about the bounder?

  Nash nodded. “I believe I had heard something to that effect.” Best not say what he had seen or he’d never be able to refuse the earl. And refuse him he must. Despite his attraction to Lady Cavendish, if her actions were so scandalous as to drive her father to this desperate action, he was well shed of the woman. “But rumors run rampant in London, my lord. I suspect Lady Cavendish is merely the latest innocent victim of the ton’s need for gossip.”

  “She’s not innocent, Wrotham.” The earl leaned forward, gripping his cane head, eyes bulging. “There were witnesses. This morning they are calling her the ‘Wicked Widow.’” He dragged the words out, making them as horrific as possible.

  Damn. How could he escape now?

  “Mark me, Wrotham, I’ll have no disgrace attached to my name. I stopped her once before and, by God, I will do it again.” He fixed Nash with a stare that would have caused apoplexy in a lesser man. “You will marry her, Wrotham, before she can do more damage. You owe me that at least.”

  “I beg your pardon, my lord?” That last sentence caught Nash off guard. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean by owing you.”

  “Come, now. I have not changed a great deal in six years.”

  Nash frowned. “I don’t understand. We only met—”

  “The tollhouse at Whetstone?”

  His words recalled that chilling scene so vividly—the young man with a pistol to his head, the terrified woman, the icy voice from the shadows—Nash had to blink to bring Lord Grafton back into focus. “That was you? And the young lady . . .” Lord, he remembered her, so frightened yet defiant. Quite different from the woman he had met last night.

  “My daughter. Disobedient and headstrong as always. Now to be your problem.” He cocked his head. “I was surprised you didn’t recognize me the first time we met in Parliament.”

  Still stunned, Nash shook his head and shrugged. “The firelight was behind you at the gatehouse. I couldn’t see your face.” Then he narrowed his eyes. “I never gave you my name that night. How the devil did you know who I was?”

  “I had you followed, of course.” Lord Grafton settled his hands on his cane, his lips pursed in displeasure. “My man lost you once you and Thrush reached London, although he managed to get your name from a tavern you stopped at in Highgate. I have sat on that knowledge until I required your services, as I do now.”

  Nash swore under his breath. “Surely there must be other, more illustrious alliances you could seek?” With his influence, Grafton could have his pick of victims.

  “Had I more control over my daughter, I would do that very thing.” The earl obviously did not mince words. “I did before. Now, however, she has a measure of financial independence and I cannot do as easily as I once did. Therefore, I decided to call in my favor from you.”

  He put up a hand to forestall Nash’s protest. “You thwarted my plans once before; it is only fitting that you now pay the price. It should not be a totally odious one. While my daughter is willful, she is not without her charms.”

  “But—”

  “You’re respectable,” the earl continued, undaunted by the interruption. “You have no vices I’ve been able to discover, you vote as you should in Lords, and you’re almost of an age with Charlotte. She should like that.” He laughed mirthlessly.

  Nash cringed. Like a stallion the earl contemplated putting out to stud. Insufferable.

  “And if I refuse, Lord Grafton?” Nash straightened in his chair. “I sympathize with your situation, however, my actions of six years ago hardly obligate me to marry your daughter. We met but briefly, both then and last evening. I cannot, in good conscience,
marry a woman with whom I have scarcely spoken two dozen words.” Even more especially because her own father had called her reputation into question.

  “Ah, good conscience would have you decline the offer, you say?” The earl leaned back, rubbing the cane head with the palm of his hand.

  Nash kept his gaze on that cane.

  “What will your conscience have to say when your Warder’s bill is voted down at my insistence?”

  Every muscle in Nash’s body tensed. He had worked hard in the past year to write this bill and worked even harder to gain it support in the House of Lords. Traditionally, every branch of service save the Royal Navy could apply to become a Yeoman Warder of the Tower of London. If his bill passed, the retired naval petty officers would have a chance at this honorable position as well, with good benefits the other branches of service had enjoyed for more than three hundred years. He had garnered a good bit of support for the legislation already. Grafton’s considerable influence would make the victory all but sure. Now, however . . .

  “I am sorry, my lord, but I fear I must decline your generous offer nevertheless.” Where he would get the votes now he didn’t know. But if not this year, there was next.

  Grafton rose, bringing Nash to his feet as well, somewhat dazed at his easy victory. “I am sorry to hear that, Wrotham. I believe you would have been quite a force in Parliament from what I have seen in this last year.”

  “Would have been,’ my lord?” The sinking feeling of having a trap sprung about him nigh on suffocated him.

  “Would have been, Lord Wrotham.” The earl turned toward the doorway. “As I said before, a sensible man gives me my way. When I run into a stubborn man, one who thinks to turn me from my course, I fear I have not the Christian way of charity when dealing with him.” He swung back toward Nash, his walking stick whipping around until it was aimed squarely at Nash’s stomach. “You asked earlier for my support on your bill, and I would have been happy to grant it as a familial alliance. But know this, my lord: as no such alliance exists, not only will I remove my support from this bill, but from any other bill you may propose within my lifetime. Any bill you support, I will actively work to defeat. Members will avoid even being seen with you because I will make it known that such an association will incur my wrath and the immediate withdrawal of my support for their bills.”

  Nash stared at Grafton, icy anger flowing through his veins. How dare the earl blackmail him into marrying his licentious daughter? He opened his mouth to tell the old man it would be a cold day in Hades before he spoke vows with the wanton Lady Cavendish, when a niggling little voice whispered to him to close it instead. That voice had saved his bacon more than once. He’d better listen to it now.

  “I do not take kindly to blackmail, my lord.”

  “Then look at it as my way of assisting you in your career in Parliament.” Lord Grafton gave what Nash assumed passed for smile. “I give you my support, you give me yours. Quite simple actually. Once you come to know Charlotte, you may even develop a fondness for her. She has spirit, although she is one of the most stubborn women in England. As long as you keep her from becoming the talk of the ton and are betrothed to her by November first, when the bill comes up for a vote, you shall have my considerable weight behind you.” The earl inclined his head and leaned toward Nash, resting his weight on his cane once more. “Do we have a deal, Wrotham?”

  During Grafton’s little speech, Nash had frantically counted each vote he had already gotten and tried to figure who else he could possibly persuade. Damn the rest of his career; if he could get this one bill passed he’d be satisfied. If he could convince Admiral Lord Hyland to come over, he might be able to swing a block of ex-military members. It would take the rest of the session to see it through, yet it might be possible. Let Grafton believe Nash was courting Lady Cavendish while instead he’d be doing courting of a different kind.

  “I have no idea if Lady Cavendish will even receive me, my lord. But I will pay her a call at my earliest convenience.” That had enough truth in it to appease his honor.

  His butler appeared from nowhere. “From Wrotham Hall, my lord.” Hoskins presented a sealed message precisely in the middle of a silver salver.

  Nash plucked it from the tray and broke the seal. He perused the note and swore. What despicably bad timing.

  “Not bad news?” Grafton raised an eyebrow.

  “As I’m sure you know, my lord, estate agents never send anything else. I will need to postpone my call on Lady Cavendish.” Nash sighed, the chance of garnering a sufficient number of votes to pass his bill without Grafton evaporating like smoke in the wind. The inevitability of becoming Grafton’s son-in-law weighed like a millstone. “I’m for home this afternoon.”

  The earl cocked his head and frowned. “That serious?”

  “Quite. There’s been a gang of robbers terrorizing the neighboring county. Now they’ve moved into Kent. They wounded one of my tenants trying to defend his home. My presence is required.”

  “Robbers in Kent? I’ve an estate and a hunting lodge there.” The earl’s face darkened.

  “I know. Lyttlefield Park abuts my property near the village of Wrotham.” Nash had thought their proximity a boon earlier this summer.

  “Then you won’t mind keeping an eye out for my interests while you’re there?” The older man peered at him, as if he were bestowing a great favor on Nash rather than asking one.

  “Not a’tall, my lord. However,” Nash snatched at a breath of hope, “I will be hard-pressed to court Lady Cavendish if she is in London and I am in Kent. This matter with the robbers may not be resolved easily.”

  Grafton waved a hand in dismissal. “I believe it will not be that difficult for you to find a way to court my daughter, Wrotham, if you put your mind to it. Keep her from public censure and put your engagement in The Times in short order and all else will fall into place. Good day.”

  “Good day, my lord.”

  Grafton strode out of the room. Nash stared after him, crumpling the note in his fist. The only place this could be deemed a good day was in hell.

  * * *

  “What is this Widow’s Club Jane spoke of in her note this morning?” Mrs. Elizabeth Easton wrinkled her brow as she sat in the gold-figured Chippendale chair, a focal point of Charlotte’s perfectly appointed drawing room, sipping tea as they waited for the rest of their friends to arrive.

  “I’ve actually thought of our little set that way all along.” Charlotte poured herself a cup of tea and added two lumps of sugar. “We are all widows, we met because our husbands died at Waterloo, or because of it, and we are now all on the hunt for male companionship once more. We have so much in common, it put me in mind of one of the gentlemen’s clubs.” As the clock struck eleven, she glanced at the door, but it remained closed. Her cousin was never punctual.

  “Except we talk about fashion and children, and our husbands . . .” Elizabeth fought to contain a sob and bent her head to study her teacup. Her shoulders sagged.

  Charlotte clasped her hand and squeezed it. “I know, my dear.” Poor Elizabeth. She had been devastated by her husband’s death. Almost worse, she had had to return to her parents’ home. If Charlotte’s plan for the widows worked, maybe she could help her friend.

  One more squeeze of her hand and Charlotte let go. “Yes, we do talk of much different subjects than our male counterparts.” She plopped in one more lump and stirred slowly. “Our conversations lately, however, have focused on our desire, or the necessity, of marrying again.” She patted Elizabeth’s arm, then sipped her tea. “Marriage is actually what we shall discuss this morning—a way I’ve come up with for us to find new prospects.”

  Elizabeth twisted her plain gold wedding band. She glanced up, met Charlotte’s gaze, then folded her hands in her lap. “Do you plan to bring Mr. Garrett up to scratch, then?”

  Charlotte sputtered back into her teacup. “Dear Lord, why do you ask that?”

  Elizabeth broke into a rare smile and raised
her cup. “I daresay you have not read the scandal sheets this morning.”

  Charlotte’s cup rattled its way into the saucer. The dratted man. She’d be ruined. “What did it say, Elizabeth?” She held her breath.

  “Only that Lady C had been seen behaving in a shameless manner with Mr. G at the Waterloo Ball and Fete.” Elizabeth raised an eyebrow at her, a censure to be sure. “What on earth did you do, Charlotte? One scandal sheet is calling you the ‘Wicked Widow.’”

  Dear Lord. Not ruin, but close enough. Apparently, someone had noticed her emerge rumpled from the stairwell, so anyone who had seen her and Mr. Garrett dance together would assume the worst. Charlotte put her head in her hands. At the very least they would expect her to marry the man. Well, they could all go hang.

  “Yes, I did meet him, and no, I do not have any desire to bring him to the altar. He is a rake who may be trying to ruin me. He certainly acted like it last night.”

  Elizabeth frowned. “So you were not a willing participant?”

  “Hardly.” Charlotte shook herself. “His attentions were most unwelcome. Well,” she paused, and heat crept into her face, “mostly unwelcome.”

  “Mostly?” Her friend gave her an arch look.

  “Please believe me, I didn’t encourage him in the least. But when he kissed me . . .” Lord, she could feel his lips on hers with the mere thought of the word kiss. She shrugged. “I have had no warmth or passion in my life for so long, Elizabeth. It was a relief to know I could still feel something.”

  “I would never have doubted it, my dear. You have an amazing amount of love in you.” She smiled and patted Charlotte’s hand. “Still, if you would not wed Mr. Garrett, there are others you might consider, I suppose.”

  “Actually there is not.” Charlotte drew herself up. Her friend would not like her next statement at all. “I do not intend to marry again.”

  Elizabeth’s face changed from confusion to shock. “Not wed again?” Her horrified voice rose two octaves. “But Charlotte, what do your parents say about such a thing?”

  “They have no say over me now, thank God. Oh, they will be scandalized, no doubt, but I don’t give a fig for what they want.” She turned the cup to and fro in its saucer. “My mother practically abandoned me as a child, then did in earnest when I married Sir Archibald. Father’s decree, I assume. No one in the family was allowed to contact me, although I did receive the odd letter at Christmas from Mama most years, so I do know some of what goes on. Mama was much taken up with my sister Agnes, Lady Ramsay, the good child, and her increasing brood this past year. And she’ll be busy getting ready for Sophia’s come-out next year as well, I daresay. She won’t care that she does not need to plan another wedding for me.”