She began bouncing Freddie on her hip with more concentration than the task warranted and shot him a pleading look, tempering her voice maddeningly. ‘We don’t have to change things, Tristan. We can still be together.’
‘What? In secret? An illicit affair when we have no reason to hide it?’ Reasons to kiss Tristan number blasted two! ‘How will that work, Penny, when the trial is done?’ He was hurt by her distinct lack of faith in him and couldn’t hide it, but he kept his voice low for Freddie. ‘Or is this only a temporary liaison borne solely out of curiosity? Will I be receiving my marching orders at some point once the trial is done?’
‘We can make it work. I am moving back to London...your work keeps you in London...’ Her tone was reasonable, but it did nothing to placate him. He thought making love had immeasurably changed things between them. Ratified and clarified their relationship as something unique and special. It certainly had for him.
‘Oh, how splendid. I get to sneak into your lodgings at night time and creep out before dawn in case anybody sees me? I don’t want that. There is no future in that. I don’t want a mistress or an affair, Penny. I am not like my father. And I am nothing like Penhurst!’ Temper leaked out and he couldn’t stop it. How dared she? How...dared...she?
‘I don’t want an occasional lover. I want a wife. A home. A family.’ His eyes drifted to Freddie and he tore them away. He’d had plans for the pair of them, dreams of a gaggle of siblings and a house filled with laughter. Teaching them how to slide down the banisters, play piano, ride...
‘But I don’t want to be a wife again. Surely you can appreciate the reasons why?’
‘Oh, I appreciate them, Penny!’ For the first time since he had met her, Hadleigh was totally disappointed in her. She didn’t believe in them. Wasn’t brave enough to fight for them. A different sort of grief ripped through him and his voice shook as he fought against it. ‘You are the hypocrite, not I. You were disgusted at me when you thought I was comparing you to my mother and trivialising all that you were. You told me, quite rightly, that I couldn’t change the past or rid myself of guilt for it by bestowing it on you. Yet you are allowed to compare me to Penhurst—to damned Penhurst, of all people!—and I am supposed to blithely accept that and not mention the dreadful unfairness?’ He threw up his hands in the air. ‘Well, I won’t. I’ve seen your list, Penny!’ He looked momentarily forlorn despite the level and measured tone of his voice. ‘Reasons to kiss Tristan, reasons not to, and I’ve done my best to prove all of your doubts wrong. But if I have failed to do that in my actions and my deeds, I flatly refuse to be the discreet affair that makes you forget the chore of the marriage bed and I’m damned if I’ll allow you to use me out of curiosity! I’d rather have none of you, Penny, and suffer the heartbreak than only ever have the leftover scraps from your table!’ He stalked to the door. ‘And I won’t be compared to a monster from your past to allow you to justify not facing your demons there. I am nothing like blasted Penhurst and you wound me by thinking it.’
Chapter Twenty-One
Hadleigh stared back at the house and set his jaw. He was back to loathing the damned place again. It was funny how a few hours and a few words could shift everything. ‘It definitely looks like snow.’ He stared at the angry beige sky to prove his point as he loaded another box of papers on the carriage. ‘I won’t risk months of hard work on the weather. Better to leave today than chance leaving it till Sunday. Especially now the Attorney General is no longer gracing us with his illustrious presence.’ Although it wouldn’t take a house full of spies long to realise it had been he who had dispatched the express before dawn changing the day’s plan and informing his superior he would meet him instead this afternoon at his chambers.’
‘I think you should at least say goodbye to the ladies. They’ll be expecting you at breakfast.’
And see her? Not a cat’s chance in hell. Thanks to her, all he had left was the tattered remnants of his pride and a thoroughly broken heart. ‘For pity’s sake, Seb! They are your wives, not mine. I doubt any of them will care that I’m gone.’ She thought he wasn’t good enough. That was the long and the short of it. She’d happily share his bed and his body, but she did trust him enough to give up her freedom. As if he would ever try to curb it.
‘I told you they had had a row.’ Gray saw his angry expression, nudged Flint and winked. ‘The agent on the watch last night said he was positively fuming when he stalked back upstairs in his shirt tails.’
‘In his shirt tails, you say?’
‘Well, he had been to her bedroom again—like he has been every night this week—except this time apparently, he didn’t return to his own room at a reasonable hour. He stayed...’ Hadleigh tried his best to ignore Gray’s raised eyebrows. ‘But what I want to know is what happened after the lady arrived looking all tousled and scandalous in the kitchen? Because the agent said she practically floated down the stairs.’
‘Do we suspect tomfoolery?’
Any second now and he was going to punch Flint. His friend had been shooting him knowing looks all morning. Except they didn’t know the half of it. Hadleigh had thrown himself headlong into love. She had guarded herself against it. He wanted marriage. She wanted a discreet affair. Pathetically, he felt used and undervalued. More than a little betrayed.
‘Undoubtedly. I suspect he showed her his credentials.’ Gray tapped his nose and winked again. ‘Perhaps they were unimpressive...’
Huh! Lewd analogy aside, clearly she did find his credentials unimpressive if she refused to see he was nothing like her hideous husband. Hadleigh was a man of integrity. One who cared. One who would never lift a finger to hurt another. A righter of wrongs and a defender of justice. If he likened Penny’s actions to the trial procedure, she had found him guilty first and used hearsay, speculation and false witness testimony to condemn him. A true miscarriage of justice if ever there was one. And it hurt. On top of everything he hadn’t thought he was capable of more sadness—until this. So of course he had stormed off. It had either been that or beg as he had been sorely tempted to. Or weep again at the tragedy of it all.
‘And he’s such a tall man, too...it’s a great pity he failed to measure up.’
Hadleigh growled at Flint, ‘Enough! Have your fun elsewhere! I’ve got a trial to prepare for.’ As Seb was aiding much too slowly, he hauled the last box of documents into the back of the coach himself, prompting his friend to shake his head in exasperation.
‘Go talk to her. Find a compromise. There’s always a compromise. It’s obvious she’s as miserable and upset about the argument as you are. She’s been moping around all morning. Or apologise for whatever you did wrong. Women like a man who knows when to apologise.’
At that, he snapped. He had nothing to apologise for. Nothing! Aside from loving her significantly more than she cared for him. Great affection wasn’t love. It clearly fell a good way short. He jabbed his finger at Seb.
‘As if I would take advice from you! Everything you know about women could be written on the back of a calling card and even then there’d be space for the Lord’s Prayer! And as for you two...’ his finger waved menacingly at the grinning Flint and Gray ‘...make one more innuendo about Penny and me and I swear I’ll wring both your blasted necks!’
With that he stalked off to the sounds of their irritating laughter, keen to put as many miles between this house, his foolish heart and the woman who had pitilessly stamped upon it, vowing never to come back.
* * *
Penny learned he had left from Seb, who patted her arm sympathetically, gave her a little speech about compromising and apologies, despite clearly knowing nothing whatsoever about what she and Tristan had fought about, how Hadleigh had a tendency to crack a nut with a mallet...whatever that analogy meant...? and reassured her he was sure it would all come out in the wash. She wasn’t reassured.
She still had no idea what to say or what to do to make th
ings better. Her inner thoughts were at war with themselves. Why couldn’t he see her side of things? What was the rush? What should she do? Was he right? Was she? Surely it had all come about far too soon? And if so, why was she painfully mourning the loss of him and dangerously close to tears?
He was clearly in high dudgeon and had typically gone off to lick his wounds as was his wont. Except this time, she doubted she’d see hide or hair of him until the trial was over and who knew how long that would take? The trial—yet another thing which worried her. Because surely he should be approaching the biggest trial of his career with a clear head and now he wasn’t thanks to her hurting his feelings and the guilt of that was overwhelming. If she could turn back time...
Why had he proposed to her last night when she was barely awake, let alone able to comprehend such a momentous thing? Everything about her relationship with Tristan was so unexpected, she would never have predicted things would gallop along at such a rapid pace. He had caught her completely unawares and then she’d mishandled it. She hadn’t even told him she loved him in return, which might well have softened the blow of her reluctance to consider his proposal had she been thinking straight. But she hadn’t been thinking straight and that was his fault.
He’d made tender love to her. Twice. Leaving her thoroughly and delightedly exhausted from the experience, then threw her completely with a proposal on the back of it when she was barely compos mentis and still completely befuddled by all the new emotions their intimacies had stirred up. Emotions she was still to properly examine and digest. She wouldn’t be herded into a future when she still didn’t know if it was what she wanted, too. Despite his excellent closing speech, which she kept listening to over and over again in her mind.
Feeling despondent and wretched, she had gone about her day, furious at the man for leaving her to deal with it all alone when it had been he who had kicked the hornets’ nest. He who had opened Pandora’s box. What to do? What to do? Was she in the wrong? And if she thought of one more annoying analogy she was going to scream!
Stop it!
‘Stop what?’ Good grief, she had said it aloud. Loud enough that Jessamine had put down her book and was staring at her as Penny cleared away the afternoon tea things in the drawing room.
‘Nothing. I’m preoccupied. So much so, I’m clearly talking to myself. There is a lot to do before you all leave tomorrow. I don’t want any of you to forget anything.’ Like leaving without saying goodbye or giving her a chance to think things through.
‘If we forget something, we shall muddle through. Besides, it will give me a good excuse to come back here. This is such a lovely house, isn’t it? I will be sad to leave it. And you.’ At her feeble attempt at a smile, Jessamine frowned. ‘Penny—what is it? You’ve been in an odd mood all day? Is this to do with Hadleigh?’
‘No.’ Penny grabbed the last cup and snatched up the tray. Then dropped it noisily back down on the sideboard. ‘Maybe it is. I’m all at sixes and sevens with the dratted man.’
‘Sixes and sevens! Mon Dieu...that sounds serious. It sounds exactly the sort of thing a lady needs to discuss with a friend. And I am your friend, non?’ She patted the seat next to her on the sofa. ‘Would it help to know that anything involving sixes and sevens and dratted men would never be shared with another living soul?’
‘Yes... No.’ Penny covered her face with her hands. ‘This is mortifying.’
‘Ah! If your face is red and your whole body is cringing as it is now, we are talking passion. Have you and Hadleigh finally done the deed?’
‘You know about our little affair then?’
‘The whole house knows. It is the only exciting gossip any of us can talk about.’ Jessamine smiled to soften that news. ‘Being stuck inside waiting for the trial, things have been a little dull and repetitive. Watching the pair of you and speculating what you’ve been getting up to every night when he tiptoes to your room, then tiptoes out all dishevelled and grinning, has been the only thing making life tolerable. And is it really just a little affair? The ladies will be disappointed. We all believe it is quite serious. From the heated looks the pair of you have been exchanging these past weeks, I confess we all assumed it was more than a dalliance.’
‘I had originally intended it as a dalliance. A discreet affair to help me move past the memories of my husband but... Tristan proposed last night and I don’t know what to do about it.’
‘But you are considering it?’
‘I turned him down. He didn’t take it well.’ An understatement. By the devastated expression on his face and the way he had slammed the door in his haste to stalk out of the kitchen and then this house, she had hurt him badly and desperately wished she had handled things differently.
‘You turned Hadleigh down?’ Clarissa, Harriet, Lord Gray’s redheaded wife Thea and the Dowager practically fell through the closed door, making no apology for the fact they had all clearly been listening at the keyhole. ‘Whatever for?’
‘How long have you all been there?’
‘Long enough to know you’ve done the deed, thought it was nought but a little affair and he’s taken your rejection very badly.’ Harriet waved it all away as she sat down in the chair directly opposite. ‘What possessed you to turn him down? He is a such a fine specimen of manhood.’
‘I can’t marry him.’ Penny wanted to weep. In case she did, she covered her face with her hands. ‘Despite his obvious physical appeal.’
The Dowager bustled over and enveloped her in a perfumed hug. ‘Did he turn out to be an atrocious lover?’
‘No!’ She didn’t lift her face from the Dowager’s shoulder. They might find it perfectly natural to talk about intimacies—but she was new to that world. In both the talking about them and indulging in them. ‘He was a lovely lover.’ Passionate. Attentive. Could do positively sinful things with his mouth. And his hands. And his other parts. Made her heart burst with the joy of it all. ‘Excellent, in fact.’
‘Well surely that’s a point in his favour?’
‘This has nothing to do with intimacies and everything to do with me. I don’t think I want to marry again. I don’t understand why we can’t continue exactly as we are.’ But Tristan didn’t want the scraps from her table.
‘Because—and I’ve said this before, darling—men are surprisingly simple creatures.’ Harriet gestured for Thea to ring the bell. ‘Order us some tea. And cake. Such a deep and meaningful conversation requires some sustenance, or we’ll all get indigestion.’ Then she turned back to Penny sympathetically. ‘And your Hadleigh is one of the simplest of them all. Undeniably brilliant as he may be, that man is entirely black and white.’ She slashed the air decisively with her hand. ‘I mean, seriously—things are either right or wrong with him. Yes or no. Truth or fact.’
Marry me or have none of me.
‘That’s true.’ Clarissa perched on the arm of Harriet’s chair. ‘Seb says he makes pages and pages of lists. Always with two columns—never three. For a man like that, he is either madly in love or he isn’t. There is no in between.’
‘He said he loved me, too.’ And that he was heartbroken. That thought only made the knot in her own chest tighten further. ‘But this has nothing to do with love.’
‘Forgive me if I am wrong, ma chérie, but surely if a marriage is about anything it should be about love?’
Penny couldn’t stop a tear escaping as she replied to Jessamine, ‘I’ve been married. I hated every second of it.’
‘Then this is not so much about Hadleigh as Penhurst?’ Which is exactly what Tristan had accused her of. Five heads nodded in understanding. ‘You worry a marriage to Hadleigh will turn out the same?’
‘I don’t know. I made one horrendous mistake because I married in haste—I won’t risk another.’
‘Then let’s discuss your suspicions and get to the bottom of them. Between us, I’m sure we can dig to the root of t
he problem. We are all married ladies, after all—and all of us are your friends, Penny dear.’ The Dowager appointed herself the prosecutor. ‘Do you suspect he might harbour a violent temper?’
‘Of course not! Tristan storms off when he’s angry or hurt.’ Because by his own admission, powerful emotions made him uncomfortable. And then he sulked. That was his second worst trait, the first being his overbearing stubbornness in what he believed was best.
‘You found the marriage bed a chore with Penhurst—does that put you off?’
Penny shook her head miserably. Her body had wanted Tristan last night and still wanted him now. It was like an itch tucked inside a tight boot, that nothing so far had managed to scratch. Yet another fitting analogy and not one that made her feel better.
‘Is this about Freddie, then? Do you worry that he won’t take to the child of another man?’
‘No... Freddie adores him.’ And Tristan was a natural father. He’d even managed to get her son to drink out of a cup for the first time last night, which was more than she had managed. And he blew raspberries on her son’s cheek which made him giggle. Oh, how the sight of that had disarmed her last night.
‘Has he objected to you reopening Ridley’s?’
Penny shook her head. ‘He said he wouldn’t interfere.’ And she believed him.
‘Do you love him?’
‘Yes.’ Completely. Which was what made this all so hard.
‘Then perhaps that is enough.’ Thea spoke for the first time. ‘We can’t know everything about a man. Sometimes, you have to take a leap of faith.’
‘This has nothing to do with any of those things. This is all about control.’ Clarissa sighed and offered her a sympathetic smile.
‘Tristan can be stubborn sometimes and you’ve seen the lengths he will go to get his own way when he thinks he knows what’s best for me when he doesn’t always,’ Penny said.
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