“You can’t spend your life attempting to make up for your parents’ deaths,” he told her softly.
“Neither can you,” she breathed out. Her soft words stabbed into his chest like a knife, wounding him more terribly than he’d ever imagined she could.
Then with a soft cry of frustrated anguish as she gave over to the torrent of tears, she snatched her spectacles from the fireplace mantel and shoved them into her pocket as she fled toward the door.
Unable to stop himself even now, he started after her. “Miranda, wait— Please!”
She glanced back at him, anger and wretchedness marring her beautiful face. The ferocious look froze him in his steps.
“I know why I came here, why I gave myself to you. I wanted to be with you, Sebastian. Because I like being with you, and no other reason. And somewhere between the kisses and the teasing, amid all your warnings…I fell in love with you,” she said quietly, her hands clenched at her sides. “You knew who I was. There was no masquerade mask this time. So you need to ask yourself—if I’m so wrong for you, why did you give yourself to me?”
Then she was gone.
He followed her into the hall, but the door to the back servants’ stairs was wide open. There was no point in chasing after her. She would be gone before he could get to the ground floor to stop her, by now down the stairs and out through the back garden, running back to Audley House as fast as she could. And what would he have said to her anyway that could have softened the pain he’d caused her?
Muttering a string of curses at himself, at his brothers, at her—at everything that led them into this impossible situation—he stormed back into his rooms. He let the anger come, let it fill up the empty hole gaping in his chest where his heart had been, because he knew how to manage anger. What he didn’t know how to handle was love.
He stopped and stared around him, struck by how different the room was now than it had been only minutes before, when they were still happy and she’d been safe in his arms. Her absence filled the space now, only reinforcing how silent and empty the house was without her in it. Worse, because nothing about the room showed she’d ever been here, that she’d ever admitted to loving him. Even her night rail was gone. The only remaining traces of her were the lingering scent of rosewater and her blasted book.
Snapping out a biting curse, he snatched up the book from the floor and tossed it onto the chair. It fell open, and a flattened piece of red paper slipped out from between the pages. His heart stopped as he recognized it. The papier-mâché rose he’d given her at Vauxhall.
He stared at it, unable to breathe beneath the icy pain that squeezed his chest like a fist and threatened to strangle away the tiny bit of life still buried deep inside him.
The aggravating, pestering, trouble-causing gel loved him and wanted to spend a lifetime making him happy, while he wanted nothing more than to let her.
And there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it.
* * *
“Where’s Miranda?” Sebastian demanded as he stalked into the drawing room at Audley House that afternoon and found his sister, Josephine, standing at the window. There was nothing more to be said between Miranda and him, but he wanted to see her to make certain her reputation was still safe. At least that was the lie he told himself. The truth was that he missed her already and wanted to make certain she was all right, hating himself for the pain he’d caused her.
He placed a kiss on his sister’s cheek as she turned away from the window and greeted him.
“That seems to be the question of the day,” she mumbled, preoccupied.
“What do you mean?” His heart skipped with panic. It wasn’t possible that news of what happened between them could have gotten here before him. Unless Miranda herself…Good God. His mind filled with all kinds of terrible possibilities. “Where is she?” He glanced around the room. “And where is Mother?”
“Mama is with Thomas in the carriage.” She reached up to play nervously with the gold pendant hanging around her neck, soft worry creasing her brow. “They’ve gone after Miranda.”
And then his heart stopped completely. “Gone after?” he repeated, his blood turning to ice with worry. “Where?”
She shook her head, and as if sensing his unease, she placed a reassuring hand on his arm. “Miranda wasn’t in her room this morning when the maid went in to start the fire. Mama and I thought that perhaps she’d gotten up early and gone for a walk in the park.”
He kept his face carefully stoic despite the hard worry twisting in his gut. No, she hadn’t gone to the park. At dawn, she’d still been tucked into his bed.
But that didn’t explain where she’d gone after she’d fled Park Place or where she was now. Fresh dread swept through him. “You said Chesney and Mother went after her.”
Josie nodded with a concerned frown. “At some point, she came home, packed a bag, and left again. For Islingham.” She picked up a note from the tea table and handed it to him. “She left this on her bed. She claims her season was a mistake and that she’s needed back in the village.”
He didn’t have to read the note to feel the stab of guilt into his gut that he’d not only ruined her season and taken her innocence but, now, also driven her away. Already he felt the loss of her like a gaping wound he suspected might never heal.
“Mother insisted that she and Thomas go after her,” Josie explained. “She hoped they might be able to catch the mail coach and bring her back.”
“They won’t catch her,” he corrected grimly. As determined as she was when she fled Park Place, as distressed and angry in equal measure, they’d have to chase her all the way to Lincolnshire before they found her.
With a bewildered shake of her head, Josie bit her lip. “I don’t understand. She was having such a lovely season. She even had suitors calling on her. Mr. Downing, especially.”
Sebastian avoided his sister’s eyes. No, not Downing. He’d made certain to chase the man away himself the morning after the opera when Downing arrived at Park Place to ask formal permission to court her with the intention of offering marriage. He’d behaved like a jealous nodcock, making certain the man begged off from their Vauxhall outing at the last minute. Had he known unconsciously even then that he wanted Miranda for himself?
“I thought they were becoming serious,” Josie mumbled, her fingers once again worrying at her pendant. “I was certain that he would offer for her and that she would accept.”
“What made you think that?” He feigned disinterest as he glanced at the note, hiding his growing concern for Miranda. She would be fine on the road by herself, he held no worries about that. In the past few weeks, he’d seen her change from the flighty girl who arrived in London and never looked before leaping to a woman who found the boldness to seize what she wanted, and he’d come to learn that she was far more than capable of taking care of herself. But he worried for her heart now. If he’d permanently extinguished the light in her, he’d never be able to forgive himself.
“Well, he kissed her,” Josie answered, “and a bit more, apparently.”
His eyes snapped up to hers. “What did you say?” Jealousy burned through him at the thought of Downing touching her. At any man touching her but him. “When?”
“The night you all went to Vauxhall.” Not noticing the way he suddenly tensed, Josie took the note from him and placed it back on the table. “She came home all flustered and mussed, and she admitted that he kissed her.”
He grimaced painfully. “That wasn’t Downing.”
“Oh?” She looked up at him and blinked, slightly confused. “Then who?”
“That wasn’t Downing,” he repeated firmly instead, hoping the tone of his voice would discourage her from pressing.
She stared at him curiously for a moment, then she shook her head. “I suppose Mr. Downing doesn’t matter now anyway. But I thought—” She caught her breath as a new thought struck her. “Perhaps she left because she was ill. She’d had those headaches…”
“They weren’t serious,” he assured her. Her only headache—and heartache—had been him. “Most likely she was homesick.” And undoubtedly heartsick. Because of him.
Josie shook her head, not accepting that explanation. “Emily said that you stopped by the lecture and spoke with Miranda. Did she say anything to you about being unhappy and wanting to go home? You two have spent quite a bit of time together lately.” Then her eyes narrowed accusingly on him, in the same disbelieving look she gave all her brothers whenever they tried to dissemble with her, ever since the day they’d strung up her dolls for archery practice. “What did you say to her at the lecture?”
“Flowers,” he answered simply, offering nothing more. He loved his sister and hated keeping secrets from her, but he had no intention of sharing with Josie the subtext of that conversation. “We talked about flowers.”
A dubious expression flashed across her face. “Well, you must know something about what upset her so,” she pressed. “After all, you two have been in each other’s pockets since she…since she…”
Her eyes widened as the words died in her throat, and she stared at him in knowing disbelief. He could do nothing but soberly return her stare, with certain guilt written on every inch of him, and deserving of both her stunned silence and whatever accusation she would level at him as soon as she found her voice.
Her hand went to her mouth, and she stared at him, eyes wide. “My God, it was you,” she whispered through her fingers. “With Miranda that night at Vauxhall…You’re him—the man who curled her toes!”
With a roll of his eyes, he cursed beneath his breath. Curled her toes? He’d done a hell of a lot more to her than that. But he found it hard to regret those precious hours with her, even now, although he certainly regretted hurting her.
“You kissed Miranda?” Then her face broke into a thrilled smile, excited at the possibility that her brother and one of her oldest friends might have gotten swept up in the romance of the gardens. “Oh, Sebastian, I never would have—”
She froze, the words choking in her throat. He tensed with solemn dread, waiting for her to make the connection between Miranda not being in her bed this morning and him hunting her down here. For her to comprehend that he’d done more than simply kiss her. He knew the instant she realized it, when her hand fell limp to her side.
Josie stared at him, for a moment speechless. Then, as if pleading for him to prove her wrong, she whispered, “Sebastian?”
He looked at her grimly, remaining silent beneath her utterly bewildered stare. There was no point in denying his culpability in what she knew to be true, and no point in attempting to explain when he knew she wouldn’t understand. He barely understood himself.
“Oh, Sebastian,” she repeated with compassion and sympathy. He thanked God that he didn’t see recrimination in her eyes. “You’re why she left, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” he answered, his shoulders slumping under both the weight of his guilt and the desolation of the loss of her. She’d fled London because she couldn’t bear being near him. And the truth of that was brutal.
“Then you have to go after her!” Urgency pulsed from her, and she reached for his arm to pull him toward the door. “If you ride your horse, you can easily catch up with her by evening and…”
But he didn’t budge from where he stood. She let go of his arm and drew back to stare at him. In that look finally flashed the recrimination he’d been waiting for.
“You have no intention of marrying her,” she accused softly.
“No,” he confirmed, unable to say anything more. The earlier argument with Miranda over marriage had scraped him raw. He didn’t think he could bear it a second time with his sister.
Her look of cutting reproach deepened, even as she reminded him, “But you have to.” She lowered her voice as if she was afraid they’d be overheard, even as they stood alone in the room. “You’ve ruined her.”
Her soft accusation tore through him. He answered quietly, his voice hoarse, “I cannot marry her, and you know it. So does she. She’s known that all along.”
He saw understanding fall over her, followed immediately by a grief-stricken expression of sympathy for him and concern for Miranda. To those in the ton, Miranda was no better than a barmaid, servant, or shop girl. But he knew better. He knew now how special she was, how fine and regal in her own way. Yet that made no difference in the distance between their stations or who he was expected to marry. No matter how much he cared about her, no matter how happy she made him, she could never be his duchess.
Her eyes softened, glistening with sadness. She rested her hand gently on his arm, still attempting to persuade him as she told him softly, “But if you care about each other—”
“I am a duke,” he snapped out as he turned on her, the frustration and guilt inside him reaching a boiling point. “She is my tenant’s niece and an orphanage manageress. Do you really think she’s what Father had in mind for my wife? Do you?” The impossibility of having Miranda in his life and the loss of happiness he knew she would bring raged through him until he could no longer contain it, and he struck out in his anger. “I made a promise to Father that I would do everything in my power to serve the title well, including finding a proper wife. Can you stand there and honestly tell me that Miranda Hodgkins was the woman he had in mind to be Duchess of Trent?”
Josie gasped at the ferocity of his words and the palpable pain behind them. She slowly drew her hand away as the look of sympathy on her face turned hard, until she stared at him as if he were a stranger.
Immediately, he regretted lashing out at her. Drawing in a jagged breath of remorse, he explained ruefully, “I have no choice, you know that. I have to find a proper bride. Society expects it.” His chest squeezed around his heart so hard that he winced. “And Father insisted on it. When I find the right woman, I’ll marry her. I’ll have a duchess by fall and, God willing, by next year an heir.”
She straightened her spine, her eyes narrowing with disdain. “Congratulations,” she told him icily. “You’ve finally become a true peer. Just as arrogant and cold-hearted as the rest of them.”
* * *
Miranda sat in the overloaded mail coach for Islingham, pressed up against the wall by the five other people crammed inside with her, and stared miserably out the window, with the small bag she’d packed in her hurry to flee resting on her lap. As the city drifted past outside, everything that had happened to her since the masquerade swirled through her mind and only added to the deep humiliation she felt at what Sebastian had told her, and to the utter anguish that pierced her at knowing she would never be good enough for him.
Well, she had been right. The night of the masquerade had certainly led to her ruination, all right, but not at all the way she’d intended.
The irony was heart-stoppingly agonizing. During the time since she stole into Sebastian’s room by mistake, she’d lost her innocence and shattered her heart, she’d been accepted at court and humiliated in the home of the only family she’d ever known, and she’d fallen out of infatuation with Robert and into love with Sebastian.
Oh yes, she still loved him. She was certain of it. Because only love could make her feel this wretched.
She swiped a gloved hand at her eyes, the same pretty gloves that Katherine Westover, Duchess of Strathmore, had been kind enough to give her as a welcome gift when she arrived in London for what was to have been her dream season. Like the rest of her life, that, too, had been ripped inside-out. A London season was meant for a young lady to find a husband, not for her to lose her heart to a man who refused to marry her, even though he wanted to.
But Sebastian would marry, exactly as he’d planned all along. But not her. He would marry the daughter of a peer from an old and wealthy family, a darling of society who would be perfect on his arm at every event to which he escorted her. There would be a grand wedding, most likely at Chestnut Hill and at that beautiful time of year when August faded into September and the stately brick ho
use always looked so beautiful. Of course, she would be expected to attend. To do otherwise would insult the entire Carlisle family, but how was she ever going to bear it? To have to sit there and watch Sebastian pledge his life to a woman he didn’t love, one who stirred no passion in him, who would let him continue to live in that same, soul-killing way he’d been living since his father died…
A woman who wasn’t her.
The tears came unbidden now, and she turned her head aside to keep the other passengers from seeing the anguish on her face and the pain that threatened to consume her. Her shoulders shook uncontrollably, and she pressed her hand to her chest. Dear God, it hurt so much that she could barely breathe! Being with him was supposed to have been pleasure. Now, though, she felt nothing but aching misery.
She’d told Sebastian that she wanted him, and she meant it. With every ounce of her soul and being. She loved him and wanted to spend the rest of her life with him, to make a loving home for him and bear him children. To make him laugh and smile. To simply make him happy.
But he could never be hers. She’d been a fool to ever wish for that.
She opened her eyes and gazed at the last bits of a tear-blurred London slipping away as the mail coach headed north past Hampstead Heath.
The city had held so much promise for her when she arrived, so much potential for fun and happiness this season. But now, how would she ever be able to think of the city again without thinking of Sebastian?
That was the problem with London, she decided as she closed her eyes again and took a deep breath in a futile attempt to choke back her tears. From the outside, the city appeared so inviting, so exciting and wonderful…just like the pleasures beneath the flickering Chinese lamps at Vauxhall Gardens.
But just like Vauxhall, when the lamps died and the dawn came, it proved to be nothing more than an ugly illusion. Like love, it was nothing more than a dream that would never be real.
If the Duke Demands Page 27