Courting Trouble

by Byrne, Kerrigan

  “Yes… Conleith.” He gave their lush surroundings another thorough inspection, as if looking for something to condemn them. To Nora’s smug relief, their surroundings were every bit as fine as the furniture at Cresthaven. The rooms even larger and the amenities more tasteful and modern.

  Her mother often pointed out to her father that they could relocate to some of the grander and newer houses being built in Belgravia and beyond, but Clarence Goode stubbornly held on to their Mayfair square, the one where the names were ancient and the titles as archaic as the homes.

  Such things mattered more to him than anything, after money, of course. Tradition, position, reputation, followed by zealotry disguised as faith.

  What an empty and terrible way to live. It was such a shame she could only come to that conclusion after the worst had happened. After she’d lost everything that he held dear. Her position in society, her reputation.

  But what she’d found with Titus was so much more precious than that.

  Passion, acceptance, a sense of wholeness, hope, and wonder. And—someday—forgiveness?

  Dare she hope…love.

  “That boy is taking a great risk keeping you here,” her father remarked.

  “Morley doesn’t think so. Since Mr. Sauvageau doesn’t seem to know I’m here—”

  He pinned her with his most imperious glare. “I’m not referring to the gangsters, Honoria, but everyone else. Everyone who matters. Though your circumstances are greatly diminished and Conleith’s have exponentially elevated, so much about the impossibility of your situation remains unchanged.”

  “Doctor Conleith,” she dared to correct him, wanting her father to give Titus his due. “And I don’t understand—”

  “Of course you don’t,” he snorted. “Doctor Conleith has both made and spent an impressive and astonishing fortune on a bevy of new surgical schemes, or so I’ve gathered.”

  “I know this already—”

  “He’s still nobody, Honoria. He is nothing without his reputation as a surgeon and a man. He has no title to protect him, no lands to rely upon for income. His entire future is built upon the skill in his hands and the trust of his wealthy patients and patrons here.”

  The weight of all that was pressing upon Titus’s shoulders became a heavy lead stone in her gut. Because she knew what her father’s next words would be. And the truth they contained threatened to extinguish the tiny flame of hope with which she’d awoken, and plunge her into a pit of despair.

  “A relationship with you could taint him. You realize that, don’t you? You could ruin the success of any of his future endeavors. That’s how far and completely you have fallen.”

  Her legs gave way as her father yanked the rug out from under them, and she landed on the velvet chair behind her.

  Hard.

  Cresthaven reached into the pocket of the mahogany vest that stretched over his impressive paunch and retrieved his watch to check the time.

  As if he had somewhere more important to be.

  “Your mother and I have discovered a way out of this debacle you’ve found yourself in.”

  At that, her temper flared. “I didn’t find myself anywhere, Father. My husband tried to murder me. This was no fault of mine.”

  He waved his hand in front of his face, as if dispelling an unpleasant scent or swatting away a fly.

  “This past Sunday, I was approached by the Duke of Bellingham. Apparently, his second son, Mark, is in need of a wife, and they’re willing to take you on after the appropriate period of mourning. You’ll be married next summer in Devon, so… enjoy this little rendezvous while you can.”

  “Take me on?” she echoed, aghast. “You’re mad if you think I’ll be impressed upon to marry again, Father; I barely survived the last one!”

  He stepped forward, his threatening manner causing her to flinch away. Her father hadn’t been a heavy-handed parent, but he’d slapped them a few times if they’d provoked him enough.

  “Think of someone other than yourself for once, Honoria,” he blustered, his chins vibrating with the violence of his unchecked disdain. “Mercy and Felicity are being treated abominably, shunned from society, and openly mocked. Their chances at decent marriages are effectively nil. Your mother is possibly on her deathbed with nervous conniptions, her heart growing weaker by the day. I’ve had to instruct the staff to hide the papers and the cordial from her. Business like mine is built on reputation, you daft girl. What do you think will happen to our wealth if our name is in tatters? You are not the only one who has suffered, but you’re the only one who can reclaim some semblance of our family’s honor in the wake of this disaster.”

  Suddenly dizzy, Nora pressed her hand to her forehead, unable to tell if she were feverish, or if her hands were abnormally cold.

  She should have known. She was aware of what the ton did to those who fell out of favor. Nothing that her father had imparted should have been news to her.

  But her sisters had never let on their distress, hadn’t mentioned her mother’s condition. She’d been more than happy to stay cossetted in this tower like a damaged princess, forgetting that she wasn’t the only person in danger. That the ripples of her husband’s actions would affect the innocent, and that she had some responsibility to amend that.

  She’d never really considered that she could become Titus’s ruin. Because he was such a strong and stalwart man. Capable and gifted and ruthless and resilient, she no more assumed she could cause him harm than a butterfly could destroy a lion.

  But it was so much worse than that.

  She could ruin him with her affection.

  Again.

  Was it some sort of curse? To have him for moments of bliss, only to have to choose between him and honor? Or to make him chose between her and ruination?

  “Why would a Duke invite someone like me into his family?” she asked, kneading at her temple.

  Her father’s gaze darted away, sliding a dagger of unease into her ribs. “He’s a victim of his own scandal. Mark was kept from prison only by the hand of his father, the Duke. He’s an invert, so he’s being forced to go into the church… being a vicar’s wife will do you some good, I think.”

  “An invert.” She dropped her hand in surprise. “You mean, he prefers the romantic company of…men?”

  “Evidently fell in love with some French actor. There are photographs.” Her father shuddered. “He’s reported to be nothing like William, thank God. A gentle sort of fellow, studious and dull.”

  Honoria instantly felt a tug of pity for Mark.

  If not for Titus, such an arrangement might suit her quite well. A kind man, one who wouldn’t make sexual demands of her. A quiet life in a country vicarage. She didn’t so much mind the idea of men being lovers, couldn’t understand why it was considered such a sin to begin with.

  A click from down the hall toward the entry told her the door had been opened and shut. The sound preceded Titus’s footsteps down the hall. She knew the cadence of his confident stride, and she stood suddenly. Her heart at once surged to her throat, only to take a nosedive into the pit of her belly.

  This was impossible. No matter what she did, she hurt him.

  If she ended it, she sliced through the tenuous bond they’d only just forged. She broke his heart again, just when he’d begun to open it.

  If she stayed… she might cost him everything. His patients and his patrons. His entire life’s work. Everyone she loved would suffer for that love. She was like a fragmented bomb, laying waste to all who dared to stand in her immediate vicinity.

  Her father, apparently, hadn’t marked Titus’s approach. “I suppose you and Mark will both have to learn to be discreet with your lovers. But perhaps he’ll allow you to keep your doctor on the line. Then, you won’t have to cease being a whore.”

  Titus rounded the corner, looking every bit the gentleman doctor. Hair tidy, jaw clean-shaven, his expensive grey vest buttoned over a shirt rolled up to the elbows.

  Except…
<
br />   He didn’t spare Nora half a glance before he marched up to the Baron, his features a black mask of wrath and retribution as he used his only slightly superior height to look down his nose.

  “It is part of my personal creed to do no harm,” he said in a voice measured only with darkness. “But in your case, I’m willing to make an exception.”

  His fist drove into her father’s face with all the force of a locomotive, knocking the imposing man over.

  Nora rushed forward. Though her father had fallen to his hip, he was still sitting up, holding one hand over his nose. Blood leaked through his fingers as he let loose a string of curses he could have only picked up at the docks.

  Titus shook out his hand a few times, testing the mobility of his fingers before glaring down at the man he’d put on the ground.

  Even though he looked as though he’d like to murder her father, he reached into his pocket and extracted a handkerchief, dangling it in the Baron’s line of sight.

  Lord, but he was an endlessly decent man.

  Her father hesitated for a moment, but then took the offering and shoved it beneath his nose with a pained groan. “In your case, I suppose I deserved that,” he said, his voice almost comically nasal and muffled by the handkerchief.

  “What is deserved is an apology to your daughter.” Titus looked like an avenging angel, ready to go to battle, wielding his righteous indignation. “It is your fault she is in danger. All of this was caused by the man you selected for her. Tell me, Cresthaven, did you know the Viscount was mad before pledging her to him?”

  Dammit, she just fell in love with him again.

  “You can stay out of this.” Her father managed to be imposing, even as he leaned his head back to stem the flow of blood from his nose. “Even now, she’s as far above you as the stars are above the treetops.”

  “You don’t think I always knew that?” Titus gestured to her, keeping his palm up as an invitation for her to take his hand.

  Instinctively Nora reached for him, but then she hesitated. All the words her father said barraged her conscience like a thousand pricks from a thousand daggers.

  You will ruin him. He will hate you for it.

  Not as much as you’ll hate yourself.

  “Honoria,” her father warned. “If you stay, this place will be leveled to rubble at your feet.”

  Titus loomed over him, his fist tightening once again. “Don’t you dare threaten me or this institution.”

  “I’m not, lad. I’m simply telling you the truth.”

  “I’m no lad, you sanctimonious bastard. I’m a doctor, and a soldier, and a scientist. I deserve—”

  “You deserve to keep what you’ve built and to retain the respect you’ve earned.”

  Both Titus and Nora stood there for a moment, jaws loose as they stared at the man struggling not to bleed onto the carpet.

  Had he just paid Titus a compliment?

  The Baron pinched the bridge of his nose with a wince, but he was a hard man, not unused to a swinging fist at the docks in his younger days. “I already told Honoria, an alliance with her could ruin everything for you. Her reputation is in tatters, man.”

  “My associates aren’t as easily frightened off by a little scandal as yours are,” Titus remonstrated.

  “We both know that’s not true.”

  Titus’s eyes flicked away from Nora’s questioning look, and with that, her decision was made.

  And her heart was shattered.

  The Baron only spoke the truth. Her love was the kiss of death, and Titus knew it.

  Woodenly, she went to her father and bent to help him up with her one good hand.

  “Nora. Don’t.” Titus reached down and lifted the Baron easily, stabilizing him on his feet before turning to her. “I don’t care about all that, I never have. We can find a way to…”

  “It’s impossible,” she murmured.

  “No, it isn’t. Listen to me—”

  “You don’t know what you’re up against,” her father said, checking the handkerchief to see if he’d stopped bleeding. “Her sisters are ostracized and persecuted. The press hound us at every turn, making it damned near impossible to leave the house. They camped out at the offices of my company. Two clerks quit. Poor Felicity had a tomato thrown at her the other day by one of the sisters of your dead prostitutes, Honoria. Can you imagine what that did to the bashful pigeon? She almost came undone.”

  Nora closed her eyes, pierced by unrelenting shame. Her sweet sister…how could she bear it?

  She’d been a fool to hope. Last night had been nothing but a fantasy, and now her father had torn that fiction asunder with harsh but pertinent realities.

  Could he not have waited? One more day. One more night?

  Titus shook his head over and over, patently rejecting what she was about to do. “I can help your sisters, Nora. I have powerful allies. We can change the narrative, can influence the press. I’ve seen it done numerous times.”

  “We can change the narrative, but we can’t change the truth,” she said, her words sounding droll and dead, even to her. “Not about me.”

  Titus’s teeth clacked shut, and he looked as if she’d slapped him.

  True to her form, instead of pulling back at the sight of his pain, she forged ahead, ready to rip herself out of his heart once and for all. “It doesn’t change that William killed an Earl. That my sisters are suffering the consequences of my actions because I besmirched myself with other men. And that you will suffer, too.”

  He lunged forward, gripping her hands in his. “I’ll survive it, Nora. I’ve survived worse than—”

  Her father scoffed. “You can’t know that, Doctor. I’ve seen many a businessman obliterated by reputation—”

  “You’ve made your bloody point, Cresthaven. I advise you to not interject into this conversation again.” A finger jabbed in her father’s direction was all it took to press the Baron’s lips together, his mottled skin blanching a little.

  Despite her astonishment at her father’s naked fear, Nora persisted. “I refuse to be something you survive, Titus.”

  “That’s not what I—”

  “I’ve made my decision.” She pulled her hands from his warm grip, already grieving. Mourning. Lamenting his loss. She felt shriveled and bleak, hollowed out by pain. To walk out of here would age her another decade at least.

  But she’d do it. For him.

  His face hardened. His eyes becoming chips of ore, molten in the flames of his temper. “You. Decided,” he bit out. “Because that’s what you do, isn’t it? You make the decision and I have to abide by it.”

  “Yes,” she answered sedately.

  “I don’t get a say. I don’t get a choice. You just run away without trusting that I might know better than him. That we might form a solution together.”

  “I really am sorry,” she said, her throat threatening to close over the pain. She wished it would, that she could stop her breath right here and sink into oblivion. Sorry didn’t begin to touch the desperate regret threatening to pull her under. “It’s hopeless, Titus. I was always going to damage you one way or the other. And this is bigger than you or me. This is Mercy and Felicity. My parents. Your patients. The families devastated by both my choices and William’s. If there were any other way without damaging those I love…”

  He held his hand up to silence her, turning his face to the side as if he couldn’t bear the sight of her. Already his knuckles were swelling, and she wanted nothing more than to kiss them. His perfect, brilliant surgeon’s hands.

  Ones that had saved her life twice now.

  Perhaps it would have been better if he hadn’t, if he’d let fate have its way with her so he wouldn’t feel so tethered.

  So she wouldn’t feel this agony.

  Perhaps they were always meant to belong to something—someone—else. She to her family’s honor. He to his craft.

  “You do what you have to, Nora,” he said, his features cast from granite. “But don’t f
or one minute think that you’re protecting me. Because I’d have burned this entire place to the ground if it meant having a life with you in it.”

  He left in measured strides. Driven away a second time.

  “That’s just it,” she whispered. “I’d never ask you to.”

  The Evening of

  After a week of exhausting himself with punishing amounts of work, Titus had recently discovered drinking as a simpler anesthetic than constant distraction.

  After his second brown ale, the tension in his bones loosened, and the aches abated. After two or three subsequent glasses of whiskey—or gin, if he were desperate enough—he could almost convince himself that he didn’t miss her.

  Almost.

  Her loss had always been an emptiness he couldn’t seem to fill, but this time was especially cruel.

  Because he couldn’t even stay angry with her.

  She’d thrown herself on a sword, becoming a martyr to misery out of some misguided sense of honor.

  Perhaps misguided wasn’t the word… she’d made some salient points, after all. Fate, it seemed, wanted them to choose between their happiness.

  Or the lives of others.

  But he was a scientist, goddammit. He was a man who—when presented with a conundrum—reveled in the solving of it. There had to be a way, and if she wasn’t willing to find it, he would.

  Perhaps at the bottom of his glass.

  “Do you want another one, Morley?” he asked, raising his hand to the barkeep at the Hatchet and Crown. War veterans and officers often took their respite at this mahogany bar, therefore a man with a bleak expression and desire for solitude could find a place to drink unmolested. Men here often wallowed in their loneliness together.

  As the chief inspector was a fair-skinned man, his cheeks now glowed with warmth as he pushed his glass away and fought to contain a belch. “I’ve had quite enough, which is still two fewer than you. I’ll have to pour you into a hackney.”

  “I’ll get him back home.” Dorian yawned from where he perched on Titus’s other side, and drained his stout. “I’ve business in that part of town anyway.”