Scandalous Love

by Brenda Joyce

  “You know damn well why I am upset!” She hoped her curse would shock him.

  It did not. It only angered him. “The moment someone enters this corridor, we shall be a spectacle.”

  Nicole laughed. “We are going to be a spectacle the minute our engagement is announced! Rather—a scandal!”

  “I will not allow you to be the brunt of any scandal. I shall take the full brunt of any repercussions.”

  “By pretending to love me?”

  For a moment he did not respond. “Trust me.”

  “Trust you?”

  He blushed. Yet he set his mouth in a hard, grim line. “There is no point in beating a dead horse,” he warned. “I have already said I take full blame for yesterday’s incident.”

  “Yesterday’s incident?” Tears abruptly came to Nicole’s eyes. This man facing her was as cold as ice—not the passionate one who had held her and loved her. But that was just it—he hadn’t loved her, not really. And now he was going to pretend to love her. “I am glad you blame yourself. We shall let bygones be bygones. But I am not marrying you!”

  “You are very foolish, and besides, at this point, no one is asking you.”

  “How right you are!”

  “I did ask you,” he reminded her grimly.

  “And I said ‘no’!”

  “You made your feelings abundantly clear. Why do you insist upon this argument?”

  “My whole life is being decided without my consent and you ask me why I argue with you?”

  “Nicole,” he said tiredly, “you may argue until you are blue in the face, but the matter has been decided. We are getting married the second Sunday from today. And that is final.”

  Nicole lifted her chin. Tears filled her eyes. Her back was to the wall and she knew it. It was hopeless unless she did something terribly drastic, but she had not even dared to think that far ahead.

  “Hadrian!” A woman called. “There you are—I was wondering where you had got to!”

  Nicole stiffened and the Duke released her arm. She blinked away her tears of impotence and fury. Stacy Worthington smiled sweetly at the Duke, ignoring Nicole. “Shall we go back inside?” she asked.

  “My dear,” the Duke said, taking Nicole’s arm. He shot her a warning look which Stacy could not see. His thumb stroked her gloved wrist. “Shall we?” he asked, giving her one of his rare smiles. It softened his features, and for a moment Nicole stared, mesmerized.

  Stacy was staring, too.

  Nicole could drown in his golden eyes. With an effort she realized that this was a game, that it was all pretense. Her heart turned over. She tried to pull away, but his grip tightened so quickly that she could not move an inch. In fact, she was pressed against his side.

  She did not want to be pressed against his side. She did not want to be anywhere near him. She did not want to be the recipient of such an intimate and tender look. But there was no choice.

  “Stacy,” the Duke of Clayborough said. “I believe you have already met Lady Shelton?”

  “Yes.”

  “Lady Shelton has done me the great honor of agreeing to become my wife,” he continued, giving her another too-warm look.

  Nicole told herself fiercely that she would not burst into tears, she would not.

  “Hadrian!” Stacy gasped. “B-but…Elizabeth!”

  The Duke looked at his cousin. “Elizabeth is dead,” he said. “And I am marrying Nicole in less than two weeks time.”

  Nicole closed her eyes, but not before seeing the other girl’s wrath.

  His arm moved and slipped around her shoulder in a warm and intimate embrace. “I am afraid I just cannot wait,” the Duke said.

  Nicole left Lindley’s immediately, begging a ride with the Serles, who were also preparing to depart. She was distressed from her encounter with Hadrian and she knew it showed. Martha, however, would never question her in front of her husband, and Nicole had been counting on this. She practically leapt from their coach when they stopped at Tavistock Square, mumbling her thanks and hurrying into the house. Once within there was no need for pretense. Aldric’s expression was openly worried as he watched her rush through the foyer. “My lady,” he called after her. “Are you all right?”

  “No, Aldric,” Nicole cried wildly, already flying up the stairs. “I am not all right!”

  Her room was no sanctuary. Not many minutes later, she heard her parents and Regina in the hall outside, saying their good nights. Nicole quickly turned off the lights in her room, wanting to maintain her privacy. She heard her parents moving down the hall. A moment later there was a wild pounding on her door. She groaned. By now, her own head was pounding as well.

  Regina did not wait for Nicole’s response and barged abruptly in. “You look as if someone has died!” Regina exclaimed, her own enthusiasm not dimmed in the least. “Is it true? Is it true that you are to become his wife? Several people asked me just as you were leaving Uncle John’s! They said he said you were engaged! Nicole! Are you to be the next Duchess of Clayborough?”

  “Please.” Her headache had just increased.

  “Oh, God, it is true!” Regina cried. “What happened? I thought you refused him!”

  “I did!” Nicole said crossly. “The wretch went to father. Father accepted without my consent.”

  Regina beamed. “That is wonderful!”

  “I am not marrying him.”

  Regina’s smile vanished. “I hope you’re joshing me.”

  Nicole gave her a dark look.

  “Father has arranged it! He is the Duke of Clayborough! What is wrong with you? You told me yourself you’re mad about the man!”

  By now, Nicole had no idea how she felt about Hadrian Braxton-Lowell, although she genuinely suspected her feelings had turned. “Not any more, I’m not.”

  “You’re a fool if you don’t marry him.”

  “Then I guess I’m a fool.”

  Regina huffed, fists clenched. “You’re going to fight this, aren’t you? You’re going to fight Father, aren’t you?”

  “I am. Why are you upset?”

  “Why am I upset?” Regina looked as if she were on the verge of tears. “Well, Nicole, I’ll tell you why. Because you’re being bloody selfish!”

  Nicole had never heard her sister curse and she was shocked. “I’m selfish?”

  “I’ve never complained before. But if it weren’t for you I’d already be married! Bloody hell! I’m almost nineteen and they’ve been making me wait hoping that one day you’ll get an offer so you can marry first. Well now you’ve got an offer—a good one! But you’re too stupid to be reasonable. And I’m sick and tired of being an old maid. Bloody hell!”

  Regina was so distraught that tears pooled in her eyes. Nicole was aghast, having had no idea that her sister had been so distressed. “Please try and understand. I can’t marry him, I can’t.”

  “I don’t understand—I’ll never understand! You are being selfish and stubborn and just plain stupid!” Regina ran from the room, slamming the door behind her.

  Nicole was trembling. She and her sister were very close. Although they’d had plenty of spats, they’d never fought like this. How long had Regina felt this way? How long had she blamed Nicole for being forced to wait to marry? Nicole suddenly felt as if her sister was right and that it was her fault that Regina was still unwed. She felt as if she had wronged Regina. She loved her little sister; she wouldn’t hurt her for the world.

  But Nicole also felt as if her sister had abandoned her. And that hurt her. Now, when she needed her sister desperately as a friend and ally, Regina had deserted her.

  “Nicole, we must talk!” Martha cried.

  It was teatime the day after Lindley’s at-home. Nicole was immensely glad to see Martha. All day she had been confronted with the wedding preparations now madly under way. Apparently, despite the haste, or because of it, the Duke was determined to have the grandest society wedding in years, and Jane was immersed in a whirlwind of planning.

  Nic
ole did not care what they planned. But her mother made sure she was kept informed of the more important details. Jane had also sent for a seamstress from one of the top fashion houses, and Nicole had been forced to endure that woman’s attentions for many hours as her wedding gown and trousseau were chosen, fitted and refitted. In fact, it was going to be a week of endless fittings.

  Nicole grew angrier and angrier.

  It was apparent from Martha’s distraught tone that she had learned of the impending nuptials. “It’s all over town! I didn’t believe it! But when I walked in here and saw Mr. Henry—the best chef in town—and Madame Lavie—the most creative and expensive designer in town—I realized it is true!”

  Nicole was in her undergarments in her bedroom, Madame Lavie having just left. She paced away. “It’s true.”

  “And you didn’t tell me!” Martha cried, hurt.

  Nicole whirled. “Everything happened yesterday! Only yesterday! Ohh! That bastard has made sure that there is no way out!”

  “You had better tell me everything,” Martha said, instantly concerned.

  Nicole sat and did so. When she had finished Martha looked shocked—for Nicole had not hidden the real reason for the marriage. Yet she reached for Nicole’s hand to hold it comfortingly. “I know this is not how a woman dreams of being married, but this is what you wanted from the first. And there could be a child, Nicole. Of course you must marry him. Why are you being so stubborn and foolish?”

  Nicole stood. “I am tired of being told the same thing by everybody I love—by everybody who is supposed to be on my side.”

  “Do there have to be sides, Nicole?”

  “He has turned this into a war,” she said darkly. “If he had only waited…”

  Martha looked at her inquiringly.

  Nicole grimaced and refused to speak aloud her unfinished thoughts. But they were there. If he had waited, then maybe, in time, all of this might have happened the way it should have. With him seeking her hand in earnest.

  “You poor dear,” Martha said softly.

  “The last thing I want is your pity. How am I going to get out of this now?”

  “You can’t!” Martha cried, horrified. “Everyone knows of the engagement and that event alone is unseemly enough!”

  Grimly Nicole sat down facing her friend. “How unseemly? I may as well know all of it. What are the gossips saying now?”

  Martha hesitated.

  “They’re saying the worst,” Nicole guessed, pained even though she had known it would turn out this way—another scandal with her at the center.

  “It’s that bitch Stacy Worthington,” Martha declared heatedly, her vulgar language shocking Nicole and causing the older woman to blush. “I heard her myself this afternoon at Sarah Lockheart’s.”

  “What is she saying?”

  Martha hesitated. “That there is only one possible reason why the Duke of Clayborough—a man of honor—would wed you so shortly after his fiancée’s death.”

  “And she’s right,” Nicole said. “So much for Hadrian’s pretense!”

  “What pretense?”

  Nicole told her how he planned to play the lovesick fool to remove all suspicion about the reason behind their abrupt wedding.

  “There is that gossip, too,” Martha said eagerly. “Sarah’s the one who said she heard that Clayborough is absolutely mad about you and that is the real reason for such haste.”

  “Who would believe that?” Nicole asked sadly, her heart wrenching anew.

  “I would.”

  Nicole jerked. “Now you’re being foolish.”

  “Time will tell all, won’t it?”

  The possibility that, in time, the Duke might come to love her flooded her with such fierce yearning that Nicole choked. “He is a cold man,” she whispered, but she remembered him in the library, embracing her as if she were a phantom that might disappear at any instant. Embracing her as if he needed her desperately. As if he loved her. She closed her eyes, not wanting to remember—not wanting to hope.

  Martha suddenly smiled. “This won’t be like the last time, Nicole. Scandal cannot hurt you now, not as the Duke’s bride. Not as his wife.”

  Nicole took a breath, composing herself. “I must face it, musn’t I? I am going to marry him—and in a week and a half’s time. There is nothing I can do to avoid it.”

  Martha stared at her solemnly. “You ran away from Percy. You could always run away again.”

  Nicole gazed back at her dear friend. How could she possibly explain to Martha that she would not even consider jilting Hadrian in such an awful manner, when she could not even explain it to herself?

  Martha smiled. “But you won’t, will you, Nicole? And it’s not because the Duke won’t let you.”

  Wisely, Nicole did not respond, for she had no plausible response to make.

  Hadrian returned to Clay borough House in a black humour. His lawyers had spent the day with Shelton firming up the marriage contracts, and several hours ago he had signed them with a flourish. Then he had dressed with unusual care to pay a proper call upon his bride. He had no illusions; he was certain she would be in a fine temper—as fine a temper as she had been in last night. He was prepared to hold his own responses in check, and he resolved not to be goaded by anything she said or did.

  He had not seen her. Upon arriving at Tavistock Square, the butler had informed him with expressively dismal eyes that Nicole was indisposed. Although the man’s face was impassive, it was clear he was lying for his mistress and was distressed at denying the Duke. Shortly afterward the Countess appeared. She apologetically informed him that Nicole was ill and confined to her bed. Hadrian could guess exactly how ill she was, and just what the cause was of her malady.

  He pretended to accept Jane’s excuses, inquired politely after Nicole’s health, and informed the Countess that he would return on the morrow, and hopefully, Nicole would be well enough to receive him then. Yet once he was ensconced in his coach, the civil facade he’d worn dropped.

  He strode into Clayborough House, so irritated and preoccupied that he did not even see Woodward, who was waiting for him to hand him his coat. He slammed the doors of the library resoundingly shut. He did not need this pretense of hers to know that she was unhappy with the arrangements. She had already made her feelings very clear when she had rejected his suit out of hand herself.

  This game would end soon enough, he thought grimly. The Countess had understood his veiled warning that Nicole had better receive him on the morrow. If she insisted upon being so openly opposed to their union, how was he going to save her from scandal? He was trying to protect her, yet her actions were going to undo all that he sought to accomplish.

  Yet he should have known better than to expect her to demurely accept wedlock to him when it was arranged without her consent. There was nothing demure or passive about Nicole and there never had been. Hadn’t he secretly admired her more than once for her daring disregard of convention? Yet now was not the time to contravene the social codes. That reckless streak that so attracted him—and he assumed that this was the lure she possessed—would make his intentions to protect her that much harder to fulfill.

  But fulfill them he would.

  She was going to become his wife, and as such, she would gain not just his name, his title and his wealth, but the respect that was due her as well. He had never given a damn before about what his peers said about him. He had always known that they were not just in awe of him, but secretively harbored some degree of doubt about him, as well. But now there would be no more doubts, not about him, and not about his wife.

  He would make sure of it.

  Isobel arrived at Clayborough House that evening dressed for supper in a magnificent crimson gown, the skirt beaded elaborately along the hem. Although Isobel’s figure was still shapely enough that she could get away with the most daring of current fashions, she was realistic enough to know that at fifty-plus one she did not have the skin of a twenty-year-old and her gowns were more
modest than revealing. To match her gown she carried a dark red reticule beaded in jet, and she also flashed rubies on her ears, at her throat and on her wrists.

  By now she had heard the gossip. She did not doubt it. Not after the tension she had witnessed between them. She intended to ask her son directly if he was marrying Nicole Shelton in less than two weeks time.

  Woodward greeted her with a smile that was reserved exclusively for her. Isobel suspected that he had fallen in love with her when she first married Francis, but wisely, she had always pretended ignorance of his emotions. “Hello, Woodward. How are you this evening?” She had always been familiar with the staff—even when Francis mocked her for it.

  “Fine, thank you, Your Grace. His Grace is in the red salon awaiting you.”

  Isobel smiled, handed him her mink wrap, and allowed him to escort her to her son and announce her formally.

  Hadrian greeted her warmly, although he seemed disturbed. When they were alone and seated with drinks, tea for him and white wine for her, Isobel looked at him directly. “I have heard gossip, Hadrian.”

  He grimaced. “Which gossip?”

  “All of it, I suspect. Are you marrying Nicole Shelton?”

  “Yes, I am. I am sorry you had to find out this way, before I could tell you.”

  “Is the rest of the gossip true, too?”

  He stood restlessly. “If you mean am I madly in love with her, no.”

  Isobel eyed him.

  “I intend to circumvent any unsavory rumours by appearing absolutely lovestruck,” he stated.

  “I see.” She had to smile. “I cannot imagine you acting besotted.”

  “All the more reason my behavior will be credible.”

  “Hadrian, do you mind me asking? Why are you marrying Nicole Shelton so soon after Elizabeth’s death?”

  He flushed. “Because she could be with my child.”

  “I see. So there is truth to the rest of the gossip, as well.”

  His face darkened. “So that is the talk, is it? I shall nip it in the bud quickly enough! I shall find out the perpetrators of this gossip and make my displeasure unequivocally known.”