by Gaelen Foley
“Oh…I suppose you have a point.”
Max gazed into her eyes, intrigued. “Am I to understand that you are not at all pleased by my offer?”
“It isn’t that.” She stared at him with a torn expression, then dropped her gaze, blushing slightly. “Of course, I am extremely flattered, my lord. It’s just, it’s very sudden. And I-I can’t help feeling that I have been chosen almost at random!”
“Nothing could be further from the truth.”
“But…you don’t even know me.”
“I know more about you than you think.”
She absorbed this with only a small ripple of uncomfortable suspicion passing behind her eyes. Then she seemed to recall that, of course, any peer of his standing in the world would make sure that all prospective brides for him had been fully vetted.
She lowered her head. “Doesn’t the gossip about me bother you?”
He laughed. “Not one jot, especially considering the source. Believe me, I know all about Carew’s kind of malice. I am not about to stand by and watch him attempt to destroy an innocent person. If you marry me,” he continued, “you will share in my rank, and believe me, the gossips won’t trifle with the reputation of a marchioness.”
“So, you feel sorry for me and that’s why you’re offering marriage?”
“It’s not that. To be honest, Miss Starling, this alliance is to both our advantage.”
“Is that right? How does it benefit you?”
For a long moment, he studied her with wary interest. Some parts of his explanation were not going to be easy to say. “The reputation of the Rotherstone family has been darkened by the bad behavior of a few in recent generations, I’m afraid. My father, you see, was a gambler, just like his father before him.” He eyed her, searching for signs of contempt. But he read none. “Personally, I detest the cards and will not touch the dice,” he said. “I saw what these games did to my father, and what that, in turn, did to my mother, my sister, and me. We were the ones who paid the price.”
More than she’d ever know.
He turned away and forged on. “By the time I was born, our proud lineage had sunk into a state of…lack.” He paused, not at all accustomed to being so open with anyone. “I hated it,” he admitted in low-toned vehemence. “The humiliation of it. And I swore I would not make my children live that way when I grew up. So, when the title came to me, I made it my mission to restore our family’s fortunes. That was the goal of my travels abroad,” he added, having readied this half truth for his case. “I won’t bore you with the details, but the war brought many rich prospects for investment throughout Europe.”
That much was true. At the Order’s castle in Scotland, Max had applied himself zealously to his studies on the art and science of spotting opportunities others had missed, turning them into gold like a modern-day alchemist.
By his twenties, he had proved his particular talents in this area so well that he had been put in charge of managing great sums for the Order to keep their coffers full for their operations. In exchange for his services, he had been permitted to keep a certain percent for himself.
“Over a decade or so, I succeeded in restoring my family’s wealth. I paid off my father’s gambling debts. Tore down the old manor at home and built a new one in its place. I also bought my London house, among my other holdings, and now that all that’s done, the next step, naturally, is to settle down and start a family. There is no point in fortune, after all, if one has got no one to share it with.” He offered her a cautious smile.
She answered with a small nod, perhaps warming up to him by one degree or two.
“But, you see, Miss Starling, here is where I run into more difficulty that my cursed father left me, as yet another charming part of my inheritance.”
“What’s that?”
“Society’s disapproval.” He looked at her again. “You are the patron saint of newcomers. I told you at the Edgecombe ball that I might throw myself on your mercy, and now, here I am. I need your help, as much as you need mine. You belong in Society. People listen to you, respect you—”
“Oh, I’m not so sure of that at all anymore.”
“It’s true. That’s why Carew went after you so hard, first as a conquest, and then, when he could not have you, as his victim. I need a marchioness who can help me to ensure that whatever sons and daughters I am blessed with won’t be treated as outsiders, the way I was. You and I are perfectly suited to help each other.”
“Pardon me, but that doesn’t make any sense.” She was shaking her head in confusion, her brow furrowed. “To me, it sounds like we are both in the same boat, though admittedly, your case is a good deal more severe than mine. How, then, can we help each other?”
“Consider human nature, Miss Starling. What is the source of our common problem? Ton gossip. The very weapon that Albert and your stepmother both have used against you. And what do the gossips hunger for? A drama. So, let’s give them one. I assure you, they’ll be so intrigued, they’ll forget all about Carew’s accusations.”
“How do we do that?” she asked with a fascinated stare.
“Why, we change the story.”
“To what?”
“A romance,” he murmured wickedly. “They will not be able to resist. The lost soul Rotherstone returns to rescue the leading belle from Carew. You reform me from my wild ways. They’ll fall in love with the both of us. Then we both get what we want—for all this to go away. Once they’re satisfied, then we can get on with our lives.”
She stared into his eyes with a look of half-scandalized astonishment. “You actually think you can manipulate the entire ton?”
“Of course. Why not?”
“You are rather an expert at creating ruses…”
“Well?”
“I barely know what to say!”
“You doubt it could work?”
“It isn’t that.”
“What, then? You have to admit it sounds like fun.”
“Fun, yes, and somehow slightly repulsive at the same time.”
He frowned. “I beg your pardon?”
“This is your proposal? A charade? We’re talking about marriage here, Lord Rotherstone!”
“Well, obviously. I’m trying to help you. As I said, the alliance would be to both of our advantage.”
“Indeed, but what makes you think I ever intended to marry for advantage?” she demanded.
Max gazed at her intently. “What did you want to marry for, Miss Starling?”
She tensed, blushed, and looked away abruptly without answering the question.
She did not have to. It was written all over her face.
Oh, dear, Max thought.
“My lord,” she ground out after a moment, carefully avoiding his gaze, “you say you want to improve your reputation, but the first time I saw you, you were staggering out of a brothel.”
She shot him a look of reproach over her shoulder.
“That kind of behavior does not accord with your plan. Nor would I ever accept it as your wife. A gentleman does not partake in the exploitation of women.”
Max’s eyes widened slightly at her stern tone, though he had rather known he had this coming. Hm. He lowered his head with a show of contrition, also to hide his amusement. Perfect lady that she was, he understood this brothel business could prove a real obstacle between them. The disapproval in her stare made that clear.
Telling her the real reason he had been there that day, however, would surely make it worse. What was normal field craft for him would no doubt sound bizarre in the extreme to a civilian. Besides, if he had not been there doing surveillance on her, then the Bucket Street gang would’ve got her. Max had no regrets. Instead, he sighed and chose the lesser of two evils. “Well, you know, my dear, I’m afraid I never said I was a saint. I admit, I enjoyed my bachelorhood to the full, with its appropriate pursuits. Likewise, I intend to enjoy my married life in the correct manner.”
“So, you mean to change?”
“I do. And I think you could be a wonderful influence on me,” he said with winning earnestness.
“Really,” she replied.
“I swear to you, once we are wed, I will never visit such places again. You have my word.”
“Dashed right you won’t,” she muttered. “And what about that wicked club that you belong to—what is it called, the Inferno Club? Would you give that up if I were to marry you?”
He stared at her, taken off guard. But then he shook his head and set his jaw with all the stubbornness in his lineage. “I cannot.”
“Why?”
“Daphne—those men are like brothers to me. They’re the only true friends I have.” He warded off a stab of guilt, but he was not about to drop his cover.
Not even his own sister knew the truth. Max realized he was asking a lot of Daphne, but telling her about the Order was out of the question. She was just going to have to accept his dealings at Dante House and leave it at that.
“I ask you to trust me.” He chose his words with care, his conscience smarting with the irony of the request in the midst of the lies he had no choice but to tell. “Things are not always…what they seem to be, Miss Starling.”
Something in his eyes must have warned her not to press, or perhaps she remembered that he had passed her father’s interviews.
Max had told Lord Starling only the barest sketch of the truth, that his travels involved secret work for the good of England.
He had also forbidden the viscount to tell any living soul, including Daphne, for the girl’s own safety.
She gazed at him for a long moment, reading him as best she could, but at length, she shook her head and looked away. “I do not know.”
“Daphne.” He longed to touch her, just to caress her cheek and let her know that though he could not make all the promises in the world to her, his desire for her was genuine. But he kept his hand by his side, restrained from reaching toward her. He must not scare her away.
Her head was down; she twisted her fingers in her lap, as though carefully pondering each word before she spoke. “I grant you, my lord, you have been much in my thoughts since you first saved my life in Bucket Lane. But I cannot like the way you’ve gone about this.”
“Why?” he asked softly.
“It all feels a little—underhanded.” She looked at him in distress. “I saw how you got Albert and his brothers under control at the ball, and now, apparently, you’ve also worked your influence over my father. If you have the ability to manipulate the whole ton, it only makes me wonder what you’d do to me if I were yours!”
“Miss Starling, I never use my powers for evil,” he said in gentle irony.
“So you claim, and yet they call you the Demon Marquess! I want to be happy in my marriage, my lord, with someone who respects me, someone I can trust. If this is how you undertake the mere proposal, arranging things without giving me any say, then I can only surmise that you’ll run roughshod over me for the rest of our lives.”
“That is not so. I hold you in the highest regard, Miss Starling.”
“Well, it feels like you are determined to take over control of my life, and I don’t appreciate that.”
Max said nothing, mulling her words. Why was control so important to her? he began to wonder. Was the need for it the real reason she had refused every suitor before him?
Didn’t she dare entrust herself and future into any man’s hands?
He began slowly scanning the room, assessing the place, as though he were analyzing the home of some Promethean target. What might it reveal about her?
“What are you holding out for, Daphne? Perfection?” he asked in a musing tone.
“Of course not!” she said defensively.
“Good. Otherwise you’d end up very lonely if that were the case.” His gaze homed in on a piece of embroidery work preserved in a small picture frame on the wall across from him.
Sewn in a messy, childish hand, it had an awkward pink flower in the middle, with an inscription above, and a painstaking needlework signature below. A simple gift, costing nothing, but ever-so-lovingly crafted.
To Mother.
Love Always, Daphne.
As soon as he saw it, Max knew what it meant. He experienced a pang of comprehension. So, while he had been a lad far away in a Scottish castle having the rule of secrecy beaten into him as part of his brutal training regimen, away down here in England, her little world had also been falling apart. My poor, sweet girl.
He lowered his gaze, fighting the urge to gather her into his arms and hold her close. At least now he had an inkling of what lay behind her fear.
He spoke up barely audibly, wanting with all his soul to reach her all of a sudden. “I’ll bet I can guess the first time you felt like everything was out of your control,” he whispered.
“What?” she asked faintly, staring at him. He registered an uneasy note in her soft tone.
“Your father told me you were ten years old when your mother first got sick. You were powerless to help her. There was nothing you could do. You were just a little girl. You must’ve dreaded to wonder what was going to happen to you without her there.”
He turned with a gentle gaze, and saw her staring at him with a stricken look. “Daphne,” he said quietly, “I will always keep you safe.”
She bristled as though he had given her some great insult. “No.” She shook her head, looking accusingly at him. “No one can promise that.”
“Oh, I can be very determined,” he whispered, but with a tender half smile, as he saw he shouldn’t push. It was obvious he’d already touched a nerve. “As I said, my dear, I am not perfect. Far from it, in fact. But this is not a world where anyone should have to be alone, and when you’re mine,” he added softly, “I will do all in my power to make you happy.”
“How?” she demanded, her blue eyes glittering with remembered pain and, he thought, her resentment that he had uncovered her secret hurt. “How can you claim you’ll make me happy? You don’t even know me.”
“I know more about you than you think.”
“Like what?” she challenged him.
“I know you are kind to strangers. You’re witty. Wise enough to know a fool when you see one.” He reached out and very gently tucked a stray lock of her hair behind her ear.
He was encouraged that she did not pull away.
“Your confidence pleases me. Your sense ofhumor delights me. And your heart…your compassion for those poor children compels my admiration and respect.”
She trembled, staring at him.
“You are brave,” he continued as she turned away abruptly. “The fact that you lingered in Bucket Lane at your own risk just to make sure I’d be all right—and then had the presence of mind to send for the constable during that row—it all bespeaks your courage and good sense.”
She sat very still, listening like a doe in the woods, but poised to run from him. Just as she had run from all the others.
“It makes me feel that I can trust you, Daphne Starling. Trust in your integrity. Which is a miracle. Because I never trust anyone. But besides all that,” he added with a simple shrug, speaking utterly from the heart, “I just rather like you.”
Slowly, she looked over at him in dismay; she found herself rendered briefly helpless by his words.
It was difficult to argue with a man who praised her not for superficial things, as Albert had, but for the very qualities that she most valued in herself.
Perhaps he did understand her a little better than she wanted to give him credit for.
He was gazing at her with an air of surprising openness as he sat beside her on the couch in a casual, manly pose, his arm draped along the back of the leather sofa behind her, one ankle resting atop his opposite knee.
He waited patiently for her reply, but her efforts to find an answer flagged when she got distracted by the fascinating blend of sea blues, smoky grays, and crystal greens that made up the pale color of his eyes.
He raised t
hat damnable eyebrow at her, waiting, so knowingly, so thoroughly in control.
She let out a small sound of frustration, rose from the couch, and walked to the other end of the room.
“I am serious about this offer, Daphne,” he said matter-of-factly. “I want you.”
She turned to him with an impassioned air. “Doesn’t it matter what I want?”
“Of course it does.” The intensity receding slightly from his stare, he smiled fondly, rose, and joined her in front of the bay window.
She found it daunting to meet his determined gaze, but when he touched her chin, tilting her face upward as he had at the ball, alas, she became entranced again.
He stared for a long moment into her eyes. “It matters a great deal what you want,” he told her softly. “Just don’t ask me to believe that you don’t feel the attraction between us.”
She turned her face away in blushing frustration.
“Or that you’re indifferent to me, after you sought me out and stopped me from leaving the ball. Or when you so smoothly inquired if I already had a wife,” he added with a faint half smile. “Did you think I had forgotten that?”
She looked at him from the corner of her eye, noted the teasing sparkle in his eyes, but huffed all the same at the reminder of her awkward gaffe on the night of the ball.
She turned her back on him and stared for a moment out the window, trying to gather her thoughts; but her heart skipped a beat when he touched her.
Standing behind her, he gently fingered a lock of her hair. “You’re very beautiful, you know. I suppose you don’t want to hear it, but all the same, it is true.”
She stood rooted in place, unable to pull herself away as he then trailed his fingertips slowly down her spine.
“Yes.” He leaned down to murmur at her ear while his hand came to rest on her waist, his touch fraught with subtle possessiveness. “Quite irresistible,” he whispered. “When you are mine, I will treat you like the rare jewel you are.”