A Question of Love

by Angeline Fortin

  “Ahh, but it would be a shame, would it not, if anything were to happen to him.”

  Eve whirled about and faced her husband, gaping in disbelief. “How can you even say that? He is your son!”

  “I could make another just like him, just like that.” He snapped his fingers coldly. “Walk out of here with me now and no harm will come to him,” he offered with dead serpentine eyes. “Create a scene and I promise you, you will never see him again.”

  Eve pressed her lips together, her fear-clouded mind racing, but finding no immediate solution. Where years of being under William’s control had brought humiliation and suffering, she had never feared him before. She thought she knew all that he was capable of and was able to face it. But now as she looked at him, Eve could sense a restrained violence that had never been there before. She had no idea what this William was capable of. That in itself was enough to foster fear. Seeing no recourse, Eve nodded hesitantly.

  “An admirable choice.” Returning the nod curtly, Shaftesbury strode to the door and opened it. “Shall we?”

  “Where are we going?”

  “Initially to my rooms,” he answered as he took her arm firmly in his grasp. “Then I have one last piece of business here before we return to London.”

  Eve walked along by his side, her mind racing trying to figure out how to keep her son away from William so that he couldn’t be used as a threat, how to get away from him and how to get word to her father. She needed help. She needed Francis.

  Francis wondered what was taking Eve so long. The rumor mill had moved on from speculation regarding his relationship with Eve back to the rumors being spread by Vanessa about their marriage and divorce. He wanted to gather her up and take her home, away from this gala where rumor abounded and speculation reigned. If he could not announce his engagement to all the gossip mongers, gaining himself the right to be by Eden’s side – and he recognized that he could not, given Vanessa’s erratic behavior – he wanted to take her home where they might revel in the promise of their future together.

  His ex-wife had begun weaving her mischief again this evening. The thorn in his side had been circling the ballroom, raining a litany of his supposed abuses upon ears eager for gossip. Acquaintances of years past looked at him with pity, while others he did not know so well were examining him with suspicion and conjecture. Let the masses think what they would, he would not give credence to Vanessa’s bile by trying to defend himself against such nonsense. At least their hostess, the Duchess of Roxburghe, had taken notice and escorted Vanessa to the side of the room and was chiding her thoroughly, giving Francis opportunity for a hasty departure. But where was Eden? When he questioned Abby and learned that Eve hadn’t returned to the ballroom as yet, Francis became concerned.

  His height gave him the ability to see over most of the crowd and with relief he saw her finally coming down the stairs. Eve was being escorted by a man Francis had never seen before and though they seemed to be walking companionably together, he could see even from that distance that the hand the stranger had on her arm was forcible and rough, rather than guiding. She was glancing wildly around the hall before her eyes met his across the room. Eve looked at him pleadingly, the apprehension and worry clear in her eyes. A jolt of fear clenched his chest, reading her near panic.

  Francis pushed his way across the room, ignoring the calls of protest that trailed behind him. He broke into the main reception area, which was crowded with people but not as densely packed as the ballroom, just as the pair reached the bottom of the wide staircase. Eve started to come to him but the man pulled her back with a wrench of her shoulder. “Eve! What is going on? You there! Unhand her!”

  “Ah, Lord Glenrothes, we meet at last.” The man gave a mocking shallow bow but did not release Eve.

  “I said let her go, now,” Francis ground out in a low, threatening voice, his hands fisting by his sides.

  “My dear, perhaps you should tell your… friend that you are coming with me willingly. His barbaric stance makes me feel that he believes something is amiss.” Shaftesbury raised his brows at Eve when she wavered. “I would not think of hesitating, my dear.”

  She winced as the man tightened his grip on her arm and Francis took a step forward. Eve held up her hand, her eyes full of anguish when she spoke in a dull voice, “I am going willingly, my lord Glenrothes. Please allow us to pass.”

  “Who is this man, Eden?

  “I’m sorry, do allow me to introduce myself. William Ashley-Cooper at your service,” the man intoned haughtily, snapping his heels together.

  “Ashley-Cooper?” Francis repeated with a frown.

  “Shaftesbury,” Eve whispered. “My husband.”

  Chapter 37

  “Your…!” Francis drew in a shocked breath. “But he’s dead!” A few heads nearby turned curiously as his pronouncement rang out.

  “A nasty inconvenience that keeps raising its head,” Shaftesbury said dismissively. “However, it will soon be remedied. I had wanted to keep my presence here a secret until then and you are doing naught but attracting attention. Now, if you will excuse us, I must see my wife back to my rooms.”

  The emphasis on the ‘my’ had Glenrothes seeing red. He stepped closer and took Eve’s hand, trying to pull her away from the man who she claimed was her husband returned from the dead. Husband! Rage and jealousy burned through him and, in a moment of clarity, he realized how Eve must feel whenever she had been faced with Vanessa’s presence these past several days. “Over my dead body,” he snarled.

  “I would be truly happy to arrange such an event at a later date, but for now, please unhand my wife. Also, I believe you have your own little problem to consider as well. Nasty business with your own wife, what?” Shaftesbury being Shaftesbury, he managed to keep his voice at just the right pitch of politeness, Eve thought. So easy to goad Francis, rile him so that he looked the villain.

  “Francis, please,” she begged. She wanted assistance but a scene wasn’t going to help anything. For completely different reasons than any William might have, she definitely didn’t want anyone to know who this man really was. “This is not the time to create a scene.”

  “You cannot mean to go with him, Eve!” he argued, pulling on her hand. But they were beginning to attract the attention of the other guests, he could see. Richard and Jack were weaving their way toward him through the mass of onlookers with Abby and Moira following in their wake.

  Eve shook her head as her husband tightened his grip even more. She sent him a pleading glance. “Please, Francis! Laurie…”

  Francis understood immediately what leverage Shaftesbury had wielded to gain Eve’s acquiescence. Rage welled in him. Motherly instincts were most definitely her weak spot. “You bastard,” he growled at the other man. “You’d threaten her with something like that?” He took a step forward, fists clenched.

  “Francis, what is going on here?” Richard asked as he finally reached them, holding his brother back as he started to charge the aristocratic man holding Eve’s arm.

  “Richard, please stop him!” Eve begged, as she eyed the gathering crowd and lowered her voice to a fierce whisper. “This is my husband, not dead as was assumed.” She indicated the man with her and waved off Richard’s gasp of surprise, directing her next words to Francis. “This is not the time or place to argue. He is insisting I go with him and I will. Let us leave without a fuss, right now, and we will work this out.”

  “Work it out?” Francis ground out, wrenching his arms away from his brother’s grip, though both Richard and Jack stood by to halt him again if he made an aggressive move. Both saw the logic in Eve’s words.

  Eve stepped as far away from Shaftesbury as he would allow and, in a low tone meant only for Francis, whispered desperately, “Please protect my son. Please…” before the earl yanked her back, gaining another snarl of anger from Francis.

  “Ye better stop yanking her around if ye know what’s good for ye, mon.”

  Shaftesbury tsked lightl
y with some amusement, interested in this new turn of events. He had originally planned on getting his wife out of here quickly and quietly, taking her off before he leveled his revenge upon this Scottish barbarian for taking what was his. Seeing that Glenrothes was not going to allow them to go as such, he quickly revised his plans. In fact, this way might turn out even better for him. He curled his lip tauntingly at the man across from him. “A wife, my good man, should be kept in line by any means necessary, like a dog or horse. You never did learn that with your own wife, did you?”

  Francis lunged forward with a growl as Richard and Jack grabbed his arms again.

  Shaftesbury grinned and leaned toward Francis, lowering his voice. “She is my property, not yours, yes? I own her body and soul. I can do anything I wish to her. Anything at all. In fact, I could take her now and whip her like a bitch hound and there is nothing you can do about it.”

  Richard and Jack traded a significant look and released Francis. Enraged, Francis leapt forward and took Shaftesbury under the chin with a hard right. The earl’s head snapped back and he stumbled backward, nearly dragging Eve down with him before he released her. Glenrothes caught his opponent’s coat front and jerked him forward to meet a punch to the stomach, followed by another to the jaw that had him sprawled out on the floor.

  Around them, guests gasped and whispered over the spectacle Glenrothes was making over the widowed countess and the other man whom no one seemed to know. Fisticuffs over the countess, right there at the duchess’ ball! It was unheard of!

  The whispers grew in excitement as the news travelled across the ballroom. Rumors were renewed of the supposed violence to his former wife and of his propensity toward physical abuse. Some who had dismissed the tales earlier were now reconsidering.

  Shaftesbury struggled to sit up, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed his bloodied lip. He examined the red stain on the linen and looked up at Francis with a strangely satisfied look on his face. “Interesting, Glenrothes. Your savage country’s propensity for violence really knows no bounds, does it? I believe things will be much more interesting from this point.” Expectantly, he turned to the crowd as Vanessa burst through and flung herself against Francis as he was trying to steady Eve.

  “Oh, my lord! How can you do this?” she wept dramatically, her words projected enough to be heard to the farthest ends of the room. “How can you bring such humiliation and scandal down on us? Fighting over another woman, right in front of me?”

  Francis shook her off his arm like an unwanted parasite and pointed a finger right at her face. “Stay away from me, Vanessa, or I might have to take his suggestion on how to control a wife.”

  “He has the right to take her.” Her voice grew low and her eyes seductive as she toyed with his cravat, all weepy drama easily swept aside. “Let him take her away and we can start over.”

  “You knew?” His voice was low and fierce with realization. A quick look at Eve told him she was already aware of the woman’s duplicity. “You were in this together?”

  “Oh, darling.” Her chuckle was sultry. “Don’t make such a fuss.”

  “Get out of my sight before I strangle you right her!” He pushed her roughly away from him and turned back to Shaftesbury. “You, too. Get out!”

  Shaftesbury looked about the room with a satisfied air and nodded regally, tugging at the bottom of his waistcoat. “Very well, I can see that no further progress will be made here, but I will present myself in the morning,” he directed this to Eve, “and I expect to be received.”

  Eve nodded jerkily, realizing everyone’s attention was focused on them. She raised her chin a notch and stared at the crowd unperturbedly, giving the impression to them all that she hadn’t a care in the world. Shaftesbury made an elegant bow to the crowd and sauntered cockily toward the front doors with Vanessa scrambling after him, leaving a fury of questions in his wake. “Who was that?” “Does anyone know him?” “Did you hear Glenrothes threaten him?” “And his wife?” “Fighting over the countess, with his wife right there?” “They divorced, you know.” “Well, the countess is very lovely.”

  “Eden, are you all right?” Francis’ concern was evident in his voice as he took her hands and rubbed them between his.

  Though Eve wanted nothing more than to fling herself into his embrace and weep like a child, she drew her hands away and squared her shoulders, sweeping her serene expression over the assembled crowd. When she spoke, her voice was cool and detached. “Perhaps we should all retire back home and I shall attempt to explain what is going on.” Four other heads nodded, seeing the sense of her words even as Francis ground his teeth in frustration at seeing the properly cool countess come back into play.

  Eve turned to their hostess who now hovered nearby. “Your grace!” Eve offered a curtsy and pleasant smile to the duchess that showed nothing of the turmoil that was threatening to send her reeling. “I must apologize for such a scene. I fear we have quite ruined your lovely ball, though I am quite gratified that Lord Glenrothes was able to rescue me from that strange man. The fisticuffs are, of course, regrettable but the man was most insistent!”

  The Duchess of Roxburghe waved away her apology. “A good scandal always makes everyone who didn’t attend wish they had. However, I agree, that was quite the contretemps. Do you need a place to lie down? Or in the larger scenario, is there anything I can do for you?”

  “I appreciate the offer, your grace, but no, I don’t believe I need assistance. Not at the moment at least.”

  “Well, keep me in mind if you do. Roxburghe pulls quite some weight.” The duchess turned to Francis, raising her hand to him. “I was friends with your mother, my lord, did you know? She would be outwardly appalled by the display you have put on here tonight.”

  Regaining his composure, Francis took her offered hand and kissed it. “I apologize for upsetting you, your grace.”

  “Upsetting me?” the older woman laughed and fanned herself. “Nonsense, I did say outwardly, did I not? Your mother and I always enjoyed a fine knight in shining armor rescue in our day. Inwardly, she would applaud your chivalry in defending Lady Shaftesbury against that man. Who was he anyway? I do not recall inviting him.”

  Glenrothes shrugged as if he had no clue or care, determined not to let Eve’s efforts go to waste. “I haven’t the faintest idea, ma’am, but he was trying to lure the lady outside with him most persistently.”

  The duchess winked at Evelyn. “Thankfully then, you had Glenrothes available to come to your rescue. I will be sure to pass that information along to any that might have mistaken the situation for something it was not. However, Glenrothes,” she chided, leveling him a motherly glance, “you should look after your former wife in company. Divorced you may be, but her actions do reflect upon you.”

  “Aye, your grace.” Francis bowed as the others said their good nights, and they made their way outside, where Eve was quickly bombarded with questions which she begged off until they arrived back at the townhouse.

  Chapter 38

  Naturally, her first course of action was to check on Laurie, finding him safe and asleep in the nursery. After putting a pair of footman to guard the door, Eve returned to the adults gathered in the drawing room to recap what had happened. Seating herself on a settee near the fire, she told them about being intercepted by Shaftesbury in the hallway and his threat to Laurie. Noting the glaze coming over her eyes as she recalled those threats, Francis sat next to her and pressed a glass of Scotch whisky into her hand. She sipped gratefully. The burning liquid traced a path down her throat and soothed her nerves.

  “So what are you going to do?” Abby asked when she was finished.

  “I don’t know,” Eve sighed. “I don’t want to go with him.”

  “You won’t go with him,” Francis corrected firmly. “You have no reason to.”

  Richard added his reassurance, “Laurie is safe here and can be guarded against abduction and, therefore, cannot be used to manipulate you.”

&nb
sp; Francis nodded in agreement. He had been appalled and enraged by the man’s threat to young Laurie, not just for Eve’s sake, but because he had become very fond of the young earl these past weeks. Just recalling the evening’s events brought back the overwhelming fury he had experienced when faced with Eve’s husband. Husband! He felt a growl of displeasure forming deep in his throat before he swallowed it back. Never in his life had he felt such a need to unleash his wrath upon a person as he had that vile Shaftesbury. He tamped down the anger consoled with the certainty that he would have his chance and directed his attention to the matter at hand. “And, since most of Edinburgh recognizes your son as Earl Shaftesbury and is aware of his age, I would not think that your… Shaftesbury will be able to claim that status in town or have credit extended to him under that identity. That means no one yet knows, or at least believes, that he is your husband.”

  Eve shuddered in horror. If it became known that she wasn’t actually a widow, the damage to her reputation would be beyond repair! “I don’t want anyone to become aware of that fact either.”

  “If he’s even claiming to be the earl,” Jack drawled as he leaned casually against the mantle. “My guess is that when he was denied by your staff in England, he realized he cannot use his title as he was declared dead. It doesn’t sound as if he’s taken the time to go to London to announce himself to the Queen and be reinstated as earl.”

  The others nodded and agreed that it was unlikely. “So he’s most likely just using his given name sans title,” Francis concluded. “Or an alias.”

  “At least there is that.” Eve took another long sip of the whisky. “I could not bear it if it became widely known that my husband is alive. The scandal…”