Once a Scoundrel

by Anna Harrington

  “Then that rumor is the exception.” Her chest tightened until each hard beat of her heart made it difficult to breath. How on earth had she managed to find herself defending Stephen, the very last man she should be championing? “Dunwich is a peer who has given the last four years of his life in service to his country.”

  “Of course,” he said quickly, as if finally realizing that he’d overstepped. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “You didn’t. I just—” The words choked around the knot in her throat.

  Oh bother! She’d sworn to herself that she wouldn’t let Stephen’s presence at Hartsfield Park upset her. Yet her eyes stung with unshed tears, and she trembled. Not with sadness, but anger. At Stephen for the way he’d so cavalierly treated her...and at herself that she still let him distress her.

  She pulled her hand away. “Excuse me. I—I need a glass of punch.”

  “I’d be happy to fetch—”

  She walked away before he could see the hot tears glistening in her eyes. And what a relief that for once he was left staring at her back instead of her bosom. Of course, if Grace’s husband found out that she’d just cut the man, she’d never hear the end of it from her sister. At that moment, though, she couldn’t care less.

  With trembling fingers, she took a glass of punch from the refreshments table, then welcomed the relief when the drink washed away the knot in her throat and helped ease the pounding of her heart.

  The orchestra sent up the opening flourishes of the next dance. A waltz.

  She sighed gratefully. She seldom waltzed and so could safely remain at the side of the room, enjoying both her punch and the moment’s respite to gather herself from—

  “Good evening, Faith.”

  The glass slipped from her fingers.

  A hand shot out and grabbed it before it could smash against the floor.

  She whirled around, her mouth falling open. Her heart stopped. Stephen. For one pained moment as she stared at him the world froze around her.

  She should have hated him, should have scratched his eyes out, should have screamed! All these years, she’d thought about what she’d say to him when this moment came, what cutting remark she’d level on him, what sophisticated and urbane wit she’d unleash on him...

  But now that he stood in front of her, in flesh and blood and gazing back at her with the same wary unease that swirled through her, she couldn’t find any words through the riot of emotions inside her.

  Then he reached past her to set down the glass, and the moment shattered. Her heart lurched to a start, and the rushing blood roared deafeningly in her ears.

  “Hello, Stephen,” she forced out. Why did you simply leave, as if I meant nothing to you? Did you think of me at all while you were gone? Did you know that I loved you? Thousands of questions swirled inside her. But too overwhelmed in the moment to put voice to one, she lifted her chin and accused instead, “You’re late.”

  “Still better than never.” He gave her that devil-may-care grin that had fluttered hearts across England...and broken hers. “I wouldn’t dare miss Strathmore’s birthday party. Or the chance to catch up with the Westovers and Mattesons.” His gaze searched her face, just as uncertain as she about how they would go forward. “I missed you, Faith.” He hesitated, carefully selecting his words. “I treated you badly before, and I’ve come to ask your forgiveness.”

  She struggled to breathe as his words shivered through her. Tell him that you need to return to your friends, that your sisters have asked you to join them...Oh, tell him anything to make him stop looking at you like that! “There’s nothing to forgive.” She forced a smile. “I’d forgotten about it completely, in fact.”

  His eyes narrowed briefly, as if he’d recognized that for the lie it was. He didn’t believe her, but she didn’t give a fig about what he believed. He’d never again get close enough to wound her.

  Even now, with his nearness stirring up the anger she’d carried inside her for so long, she wasn’t certain if she could ever offer forgiveness. But she knew her role for this party, knew she was supposed to smile and be pleasant, to show that the Westover family had accepted him back into the fold with open arms. So she whispered, unable to put full voice to the lie, “We’re still best of friends.”

  He held out his hand. “Then how about a waltz for an old friend?” When she hesitated, he cajoled, “I’ve been away for four years, and my horse made for a lousy dance partner.”

  Panic churned inside her. No, not a dance. Certainly not a waltz! Being in his arms would be torture, even in the middle of a crowded dance floor.

  So she seized on the only excuse she could— “Papa doesn’t like for me to waltz.”

  “Strathmore finds waltzing too scandalous?” he asked, disbelieving.

  “He finds waltzing too scandalous for his unmarried daughters,” she corrected. Not entirely a lie.

  “Even with me?”

  “Especially with you.”

  He laughed easily. Faith was suddenly reminded of how close they’d once been, and an aching sense of loss knotted in her belly. They’d never have that again.

  “I’m a soldier come home from the wars.” He clucked his tongue with mocking disapproval. “Where’s your loyalty to crown and country?”

  With the weight of what seemed to be every pair of eyes in the room on her, she knew she couldn’t refuse him. Not an old friend of the family. Not when the busybodies were simply salivating for any new bit of gossip about him.

  She drew a deep breath to gather her resolve and offered him her hand. “Apparently, the same place as my pride,” she muttered, then winced as soon as the too-earnest words slipped from her lips.

  “Don’t worry,” he assured her with a chuckle as he led her toward the dance floor. “It all goes before a fall.”

  Before she could respond to that cryptic comment, he pulled her into his arms and whirled her into the waltz.

  She’d expected him to be rusty after being away from society for so long, but he danced expertly through the steps, fluidly twirling her around the floor. Each movement demonstrated his natural athleticism, and she followed easily, aware of the heat of his gloved hand on the small of her back and the strength of his fingers folded around hers.

  “For someone who doesn’t waltz,” he commented, carefully keeping his voice guarded so other couples couldn’t overhear, “you’re quite good at it.”

  “I could say the same about you,” she grudgingly acknowledged with a sniff.

  That earned her a crooked grin. “I aim to please you, Faith.”

  She stiffened at the subtle flirtation. Drat her flip-flopping stomach! And drat him for being so charming, for being so...him. He’d always been able to flummox her with only a passing compliment. Apparently, some things never changed.

  “Mama is thrilled to have you as our guest,” she commented, swiftly changing topics. Best to keep the conversation away from flirtations and firmly on the painfully proper.

  “I would never refuse an invitation from the duchess.” He glanced across the room in their parents’ direction, then looked down into her eyes as he turned her in the corner and led her back across the floor. “Or miss an opportunity to see you again.”

  She ignored the butterflies in her belly, knowing his words were only empty flattery. “How odd, because Hartsfield is only a short ride from Elmhurst Park, and you returned to England in June,” she reminded him, an air of pique permeating her voice. “You’re a bit late in paying a call to close family friends.”

  His smile faded. “I am, and for that I apologize. You know how much you mean to me.” He squeezed her fingers and added quickly, “How much all the Westovers do. But I had business to attend to at Elmhurst Park that kept me away.”

  She didn’t believe that. When had he ever cared about his estate? During the years he’d been gone—long before that, if truth be told—she’d heard rumors about the mismanagement there by a series of land agents he’d hired to care about the estate in
his stead. But there was another rumor that had caught her attention...“I’ve heard that you’ve decided to resign your commission and remain in England.”

  “Don’t sound so surprised,” he half-muttered, gazing down into her eyes. “I do have a marquessate and responsibilities here, you know.”

  “Oh, I know that.” She gave a pointed lift of her brow. “I’m just surprised that you do.”

  His expression hardened at her chastisement, then softened into a grimace. “I suppose I deserve that.”

  Faith supposed he deserved a lot more for running away to join the army and leaving his family worried. Leaving her. And if the rumors about his having a mistress and illegitimate son were true, oh, how much more he deserved!

  “I’ll admit that in the past I’ve been a bit...”

  “Inconsiderate?” she prompted, unable any longer to keep her anger at bay. If it were possible to cut a man while waltzing in his arms, this was it. “Selfish? Irresponsible? Callous for not considering your mother’s worry, all of our worry—”

  “Yes, all that,” he wisely interrupted and twirled her through a tight circle before she could describe more of the concern and pain he’d left in his wake. “But I’m a different man now. I’ve come back to England to start over.”

  Ha! And tigers changed their stripes. “I don’t—”

  “Starting with you, Faith.”

  The sincerity in his voice startled her, so much that she tripped. He tightened his hold around her and expertly kept her upright in his arms and moving through the steps. Surprised, she stared into his eyes, her pulse beating so furiously that she feared he could feel it.

  “Me?” she squeaked. And drat his eyes for glittering like that at her discomfort!

  Except that what she felt when he gazed so earnestly into her eyes wasn’t discomfort. Far from it. A warmth simmered low inside her, the comfort of an old friendship mixed with the familiar longing she’d always felt for him, and when he squeezed her fingers, an electric tingle shot up her arm to her breasts, pebbling her nipples beneath her bodice.

  “But I meant nothing to you,” she protested softly, somehow keeping her voice from breaking. “And I told you, I’ve forgotten all about it. There’s nothing to forgive—”

  “That’s a damned lie if ever I heard one,” he bit out.

  She stopped dancing, too stunned to care that the other couples had to step around them or that a new round of whispers went up across the ballroom.

  “I was an arse for leaving you the way I did,” he explained ruefully, bitter anger aimed at himself, “without so much as an explanation.”

  “Yes,” she agreed in a breathless whisper, “you were an arse.”

  Wisely ignoring that, he said instead, with remorse thickening his voice, “And for that you have a right to blame me.”

  She tried to pull her hand away, but he held tight to her fingers, refusing to release her. “It doesn’t matter any—”

  “I want your forgiveness, Faith. I will do anything to have it.” He sucked in an uneasy breath. “Can you at least make an attempt to forgive me?”

  The sincerity on his face sliced into her, leaving a raw wound in her belly. “I don’t know if I can...I don’t know...” Fresh tears stung at her eyes, and her words choked.

  “All I ask is that you try.” He tenderly squeezed her fingers.

  She gave a jerky nod. “I’ll try.” It was the most she could promise now, when her confused heart simply didn’t know what to feel.

  He took her back into position in his arms. They danced on silently for several more measures before he murmured, “You must have hated me.”

  Unable to answer that with the truth, she turned her face away. It wasn’t hate that she’d felt for him. “Your parents must be thrilled to have you home,” she dodged. “They missed you.”

  A knowing flicker registered deep in his midnight blue eyes at her rapid change of topic. “Mother is, of course. I’m not so certain about Father.”

  “He is, too,” she asserted, although she knew how strained Stephen’s relationship had been at times with his adopted father. She also suspected that General Grey was part of the reason Stephen had joined the army, so that he could prove himself in a way the general would appreciate.

  Something else nagged at her, though...She drew a deep breath and charged ahead by asking, “Since you’re already here, will you ask my father for permission to court Margaret?”

  “Your sister?” He puzzled. “Why would I do that?”

  “It’s always been expected that you would marry one of Strathmore’s daughters.” But now that the twins were married and she’d failed at her chance with him...She shrugged. “She’s the only one left.”

  He stared down at her with a peculiar look that she couldn’t place. “I don’t like to do the expected.”

  “Or the proper.”

  He frowned. “What do you mean by that?”

  “That you’ve always prided yourself on being scandalous and stirring up trouble.” And the bigger the trouble, the more he’d thrilled to it.

  “Not anymore,” he said with conviction. “I’m a respectable man now.”

  She wished she could believe him. That would go a long way toward forgiveness.

  And yet...“I’ve heard rumors that you’re keeping a mistress.” Throwing all caution to the wind, hoping that he really had changed and that the gossips were wrong— “And that you have an illegitimate son.”

  He stiffened. Only one missed step as he turned her through the last circle indicated that her comment pricked him, yet no one watching from the crush would have noticed anything wrong at all.

  “Don’t tell me you believe those rumors?” he dodged, glancing away.

  Her heart fell. He hadn’t denied them. He’d simply side-stepped the topic and avoided admitting the truth. Which saddened her more than she wanted to admit.

  Apparently, he hadn’t changed at all.

  “I know what you were like before, Stephen.” And he’d been exactly the kind of man to sire an illegitimate child on a mistress. “Since you’ve returned, you’ve done nothing to discourage—”

  “Daniel,” he bit out with a ferocity that startled her.

  “Pardon?”

  He hesitated, his lips parted as if to tell her— He shook his head, then pressed his mouth into a tight line as he looked away.

  “Stephen?” she pressed, a sudden dread clenching her at the mix of raw emotions flitting across his face.

  “Daniel’s death changed everything,” he said finally, quietly, yet Faith had the feeling that he’d wanted to say something else.

  “Of course it did,” she murmured. She might never forgive him for the way he treated her, but at that moment, her heart melted for him.

  Her eyes stung at the reminder of that letter from two years ago in which he described the uprising, how his regiment had been attacked without warning, how everyone would have been killed if not for Stephen’s order to charge. A charge which resulted in his best friend’s death. She couldn’t imagine the guilt he felt over that, or how much pain he still carried inside him.

  “When you wrote about Daniel, you didn’t say what happened to you.” She swallowed hard. “What was that fight like for you?”

  “Hell,” he answered solemnly, offering nothing more.

  The last notes of the waltz sounded. Thank God. Around them, the whirling couples came to a stop. She gratefully stepped back, although the loss of the heat and strength of being in his arms rushed over her so intensely that she shuddered.

  As she curtsied and he bowed, he murmured, “Meet me on the terrace at midnight.”

  She nearly fell over in her surprise as she rose. “Pardon?”

  “I need to speak with you alone.” When she hesitated, he pressed, “Please, Faith. For an old friend.”

  An old friend. She blinked away the stinging in her eyes and reluctantly agreed. “All right.”

  Stephen took her arm to lead her to her parents who
were waiting at the side of the room. The false smile Faith fixed on her face told everyone how simply thrilled she was to have the marquess back in England, even through her heart was ready to throw him onto a packet to China.

  He lowered his mouth to her ear. “I missed you, Faith.”

  “You did not,” she returned, forcing her smile not to waver.

  “So much more than you realize.”

  They reached her parents, and he bowed politely before excusing himself, muttering something about seeking out a cigar. He gave her a parting look that sent the butterflies in her belly fluttering anew.

  Quick anger at herself flared inside her. Even now, after all the anguish he’d caused her, he could still so easily unsettle her.

  “So,” her father drawled as he watched Stephen walk away, “Dunwich has returned.”

  “Yes,” Faith answered, struck by how Papa had referred to him. She couldn’t remember her father ever using Stephen’s title before. He’d always been referred to as Grey’s son. Or simply Stephen. Never before had Papa acknowledged that Stephen was not only a fully grown man but nearly his equal as a peer of the realm.

  She wasn’t certain he had changed, but his return had certainly changed the way people thought about him.

  Papa leaned down to ask her, “Did you enjoy your dance?”

  “Yes.” Not entirely a lie. There were moments when she’d enjoyed it a great deal. She bit her lip. “Are you upset that we waltzed?”

  “Not at all. He’s Grey’s son and deserves our hospitality.”

  She quirked a dubious brow at that, not certain she believed him, yet she placed a kiss on his cheek just the same. “Thank you.”

  “But be careful with him, Faith,” he warned, as always the overprotective father who had England’s most eligible gentlemen quaking in their boots at the prospect of asking to court his daughters. “The army changes the men who serve in it. He isn’t the same man you knew before.”

  She hoped he was right.