Her husband must’ve anticipated his children’s animosity and pettiness, because Heartwaite had the foresight to provide her with a substantial annual allowance, a house in Brighton, a coach and team, as well as had named her owner of a cargo ship. All of which, his solicitors had drawn up in a tidy legal document, much to the new duke’s and his siblings’ consternation.
In point of fact, the letter in her reticule was from the current duke, threatening to take legal action against her. Again. Oh, how the pudding soft, jowly George-Curtis, Sixth Duke of Heartwaite, had stormed like a recalcitrant child over the endowment. Swore he’d challenge her inheritance, claiming his father hadn’t been in his right mind when he’d designated the bequeathment.
What a load of fustian blather and codswallop.
Heartwaite’s mind had been as sharp the day he died as the day she’d met him. His body eventually wore out, but his intellect had never gone soft.
“Your Grace?” The proprietress gently urged, bringing Regine back to the present.
Regathering her thoughts, she offered a nascent smile. “Coffee with warm milk, please.” Regine adopted what she hoped was a pleasant, nonchalant mien.
She’d become quite adept at disguising her true feelings. At the beginning of her marriage, it had taken a great deal of practice and self-discipline. Her sisters, mother, and husband had never known how bitterly unhappy she was.
Although, she suspected Juliet might’ve guessed. For all of her youngest sister’s inability to see without her spectacles, the girl perceived much that went unspoken.
Regine wasn’t the sort to make others suffer because she was miserable. She’d chosen to find the good in her life, and Heartwaite had turned out to be a considerate friend. More like a doting uncle than a spouse.
“At once, Your Grace.” Mrs. Delaney bustled off, a broad smile wreathing her lined face.
“Coffee? I’d have thought a proper English duchess would only drink tea.” James wrapped his long fingers around his cup but didn’t bring it to his mouth. Though his nails were neatly trimmed, faint callouses and ink stains marred the fingertips. His words still held a harsh edge, but his features had softened a trifle, his eyes competing with the sea for magnificence.
“I still enjoy a cup of tea, especially India tea.” Regine lifted a shoulder, refusing to feel chagrined for something so trivial or to take to heart his acrimony. She understood his rancor and couldn’t fault him for it. “I acquired a taste for Turkish coffee while abroad.”
“Ah, yes. Touring the Continent, seeing the sights, and all that with your husband.” He made a pretense of searching the coffeeshop and then the damp street through the window. A hawkish eyebrow cocked, he asked, “Where is good ol’ Heartwaite, by the way?”
Wrapped in death’s slumber.
One hand in her lap, the other resting atop the table where she traced the bumpy ridges of the crocheted table cloth, Regine murmured, “He died, almost two years ago.”
Eyebrows lashing together, James had the grace to look repentant. “My condolences.”
“Thank you.” She wasn’t a bereaved widow, but she’d come to like and respect her husband. He’d been kind in his way.
Angling her head while fingering her reticule, she studied James. Fine lines etched the corners of his eyes, and his firm, well-formed mouth had a harder cast to it. She’d wager with his keen mind that he made a brilliant man of law. Yes, she’d made the right decision.
Steering her thoughts to other avenues, she asked, “How are your sisters? Your parents?”
At one time, their families had been the greatest of friends.
He directed a lengthy look onto the street again, the muscle in his jaw working once more—a clue to the vexation he secreted. “My parents are in Australia. Father is shepherding a flock of convicts there.”
Her bewilderment must’ve shown, because he rolled a shoulder. “It’s a long, rather scandalous tale.”
One he, obviously, didn’t want to share with her.
“And your sisters?” She smiled at Mrs. Delaney as she set the milk and coffee spiraling with steam before her. “Thank you. It smells wonderful.”
“Turkish coffee. There’s nothing quite as flavorful. May I get you anything else, Your Grace?” She looked hopeful.
Regine’s stomach took that moment to spasm. A small repast wouldn’t go amiss. “Have you any maid of honor tarts?” She’d never been able to resist the treats, always a favorite of hers. Greek, melomakarona came a close second, however.
“I do.” A toothy smile splitting her dumpling cheeks, the proprietress gave an exuberant nod before hurrying into the kitchen.
A thick silence hung heavy in the air after her departure, like low fog rising from the Thames, and for a minute, Regine believed James meant to ignore her question about his sisters.
Hooking an arm across the back of his chair, he eyed her, slowly raking his focus from her tasteful bonnet to her bright boots, then making the reverse trip and lingering on her mouth for a jot too long. A nuance of something, evocative of when they’d been sweethearts, hooded his eyes.
Sensation pricked behind hers, and it took all of her forbearances to hold her tears at bay. Regret was an awful thing.
“My sisters have all married. Theadosia and Jessica to dukes, and Althea to an artist. Each is blissfully happy.” Rancor tinged his words.
We might’ve been blissfully happy, too, his unrepentant gaze seemed to accuse.
He was wrong, however. Regine couldn’t have—wouldn’t have—seized her happiness at the expense of others. His included, though, he might never understand or acknowledge that truth.
At two and twenty, in training to become a solicitor, he hadn’t had the means to support five women. He’d have been compelled to leave his position for better-paying employment and would’ve been obliged to take on a burden and responsibilities that weren’t his to bear on his young shoulders.
James had never wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps and enter the ministry. Since he’d been a lad of ten and she a wee lass of six, he’d chattered on about becoming a lawyer. Such a prestigious future lay ahead of him. He would’ve had to have relinquished his life-long dream to provide for her and her family.
So, she’d done the only thing she could do. James might despise her for marrying the duke, but her motives had been pure. He mightn’t ever see it that way, however. Oh, she knew full well he thought she’d married for position and wealth. That pricked her pride more than a little.
Believing the chance quite remote, Regine hadn’t considered what to expect if she encountered him. Point of fact, solicitors—he had become a successful solicitor, hadn’t he?—and vicar’s sons didn’t regularly hobnob with the peerage.
Drawing her brows together, she bent her mouth downward. Well, he might do so now that his sisters were duchesses. Good, Lord. That made her sound like the worst sort of snob.
She wasn’t. Not in the least. Why, she didn’t even interact with le beau monde.
In her heart, she was still and would always be, the barefoot young girl from Colechester, sneaking kisses with James in the orchard not so very far from Reverend Brentwood’s parish. They’d held each other, pledging their love, and planning their future. Together.
“Althea has quite a brood, and Thea’s daughter is four or five months old.” He rubbed the right side of his nose. Just like he always had when pondering. “Or mayhap six? I’m honestly not certain. I anticipate the news Jessica and Bainbridge are expecting any day, as well.”
“I hadn’t heard.” Not secluded as she’d been, first nursing her husband, then observing the mourning period after his death. And then a mere six months after Heartwaite’s passing, she’d buried her mother and assumed the care of Juliet. “I’m happy for them,” she said quietly, not missing the emphasis he’d placed on dukes and artist.
His way of jabbing home his point once more. Though he needn’t do so. His condemnation and censure were paltry compared to wha
t she’d conferred upon herself.
“Have you any children?” His wasn’t the casual question it appeared.
She shook her head while smoothing her gloves atop the table. “No.”
Regine wasn’t explaining Heartwaite’s impotence. He’d told her from the beginning theirs would be a marriage in name only, and she’d known she’d never bear his children. In truth, that wasn’t entirely accurate. Heartwaite had waited until they were married to inform her, denying her the right to refuse his suit for that very significant reason.
Father to five, he felt no burden to produce more offspring and had selfishly kept his physical incapability a secret until it was too late for her to deny his suit. She wouldn’t have. Her mother and sisters had no means of support, and James must finish his training.
Neither her family nor James knew the depths of sacrifice she’d made for them. They never would. That brought her some small satisfaction. Not that she considered herself a martyr by any means, but she’d spared those she loved angst and worry.
“How fares your family?” Politesse required him to ask the obligatory question.
“Christiana and Marian are married as well. Mama died just over a year ago, and Juliet lives with me now.” Unwilling for him to see the grief in her eyes from the loss of her mother, she stirred milk into her coffee.
Initially, resentment and anger that her mother could’ve so readily agreed to Heartwaite’s suggestion had hardened Regine’s heart. Eventually, however, she’d had to confront the indisputable truth.
Mama had been at her wit’s end and without recourse. If she could protect her three youngest daughters by sacrificing the oldest, she’d do so. And she had. But, as Regine had learned while her mother lay dying, remorse and guilt had plagued Mama. She’d regretted depriving Regine of the life she might’ve had with James.
Mama had known they were in love.
If Christiana hadn’t just seen her fifteenth birthday, she might’ve become the duchess, but Mama wouldn’t wed a child to George-Arnold, Duke of Heartwaite. So she, too, had done what must be done. Such was the way with women, always at the mercy of men and society.
A tangled knot of emotions, almost impossible to separate, had paraded through Regine. Remorse. Guilt. Resentment. Forgiveness. And finally, after a long while, acceptance and healing.
“I am sorry, Regine.”
Did he realize he’d used her given name? The sound on his lips was a consecration to her ears.
“I didn’t know about your mother.” James laid his warm hand atop hers, and she wanted to weep at his attempt to console her.
The compassionate gesture came so unexpectedly, she shot him an astonished look. She yearned to turn her hand over so that their palms lay against each other, to entwine their fingers as they had hundreds of times prior. A lifetime ago.
His sympathy and touch were her undoing. Fighting the tears burning behind her eyelids, she summoned a brave, if somewhat wobbly, smile.
She still loved James. Always had. Always would. Her heart would forever and always be his. But she’d lost her chance for a life with him.
“Have you married?” Blast and damn her tongue.
Though James’s hand covered most of Regine’s small one, he knew the fine-boned appendage as well as he did his own. Her fingers were delicate, not overly long, and the right forefinger had a scar from knuckle to knuckle where she’d cut herself when she was eight.
He shook his head and withdrew his hand, his palm burning with sensation. “I have no wife.”
“Oh.” Her pretty mouth compressed into a ribbon and color bled into her cheeks as her raven eyebrows, an exact match to the midnight tresses mostly hid by her bonnet, swooped together. “I see.”
Did she? Really?
Bloody unlikely.
The only woman he’d ever loved had married another. He’d begged Regine not to. Would’ve done anything to make her his. In the end, she’d chosen the wealthy, titled, decrepit old duke over him, slashing his heart to shreds.
So much for true love, happily ever afters, and all that blasted fairytale rot and rubbish.
She took a careful sip of her coffee, an expression of bliss softening her features. The mole to the left of her mouth teased James, as it had all those years ago. Begging him to kiss the beauty mark as well as those soft, cherry red lips that tasted of apples and cinnamon and Regine.
Firmly tamping down the incipient feelings attempting to burble to the surface, he gulped a mouthful of cold coffee, barely concealing a grimace as the bitter brew slid down his throat.
“I didn’t realize I’d grown so chilled completing my errands,” she said, conversationally.
Yes, let’s discuss the weather as if we’re mere acquaintances. Not a man and a woman who’d vowed to love one another for eternity.
After slicing a glance outside—much wiser than making a colossal ass of himself gaping at the beautiful woman across from him—he brought his brows together. Scowling at the undeserving ashen sky, he jabbed a thumb toward the street. “It’s freezing out there, and those look like snow clouds. Don’t you have a coach or carriage?”
Pinching his lips tightly, James cursed inwardly. He sounded worried—concerned for Regine’s wellbeing. She was nothing to him now. Merely a woman he’d once given his heart to, and she’d annihilated the organ before casually tossing it in hell’s flames. Now only cinders remained.
She took another sip of coffee as Mrs. Delaney delivered the pastries. “Here you are, Your Grace. I took the liberty of bringing enough for you, too, Mr. Brentwood.”
God. He nearly rolled his eyes. As if he could swallow food, with his mouth dry as dust.
“Thank you.” Regine’s sable lashes widened as her hydrangea-blue eyes lit with pleasure. She took a dainty taste of the pastry. “Delicious,” she declared to the anxiously hovering proprietress.
After another awkward curtsy, Mrs. Delaney hurried to assist patrons at another table.
“I asked my driver to wait with the coach two streets over,” Regine said, in answer to James’s inquiry. “I wanted the exercise. I often take long strolls.”
He remembered that about her. She loved to take lengthy, meandering walks and always discovered something that excited her. A bird gliding overhead. A flower waving in the breeze. The sound of the leaves brushing against each other, or a pretty rock.
Regine had been so innocent back then. So unpretentious and unaffected. He’d never known her to covet fancy gowns or jewels or fallalls. That was why her abrupt decision to marry Heartwaite hadn’t made any sense. Still didn’t after all of these years, in truth.
They settled into silence—perhaps not companionable, but not stilted either—as she nibbled the pastry and sipped her coffee. A crumb balanced upon her lower lip, and she darted her tongue out to swipe it away.
Bloody hell.
James lowered his attention to his cold coffee, lest she see the desire flaring in his eyes. Though he’d only ever tasted her lips, she’d always had the ability to send his lust soaring with a tilt of her head, a twitch of her bottom, a look from those blue eyes, both innocent and seductive at once.
Regine was more delectable than she’d been as a fresh-faced girl of eighteen. She possessed a woman’s refined features and curved form now. Impossibly more exquisite and alluring than the last time he’d seen her, tears streaming from those mesmerizing eyes as he turned his back, refusing to listen to her reasons for marrying Heartwaite. The paunchy, old geezer.
James damn well knew the why of it…
Prestige. Wealth. Position. None of which he could’ve given her. Then.
Why settle for an impoverished vicar’s son? A man newly hired as the lowest ranking employee in a solicitor’s office? Well, there had been two clerks who ranked lower.
And now, James was a partner in that same firm, and if he didn’t say so himself, a damned exceptional lawyer, to boot. His clientele was very exclusive, and his fees very expensive since making partner.
If Regine knew, she’d approve. At least the Regine of old would have. He wasn’t sure about the richly garbed duchess sitting mere feet from him.
A thousand questions he wanted to ask her tapped at his tongue. A thousand things he wanted to say. Things he’d said to himself at least a thousand times these past eight years. Things he’d raged at the heavens a time or two or a hundred, as well.
And yet, he remained silent, unlike the garrulous ladies in the corner who kept sending inquisitive glances his way. Hopefully, their idle tongues wouldn’t carry gossip about Regine. She really oughtn’t to have sat with him. It gave the appearance of a lovers’ clandestine tête-à-tête.
At one time, he and Regine talked so effortlessly about everything. Now an awkwardness existed between them. Eight years in which the chasm had grown ever-wider and filled with uncertainty. Pain. Distrust. Loss. Unbearable loss.
He’d barely functioned the first few months after she’d married and left England. Only by pouring all of his energy and focus into becoming a solicitor had kept the heartbreak from snapping his reason. Well, after he’d stopped drinking himself into a stupor each night. He never wanted to experience that agony again. He wouldn’t survive a second time.
A clock on a shelf near the door chimed the hour, and Regine glanced over her shoulder. “Is that truly the time? Gracious, Juliet will be fretting. I promised to be home with her new spectacles in time for tea.”
She swiftly patted her mouth, and after fishing around inside her reticule, withdrew a letter and a timepiece before locating the coins she sought and placed them on the table.
Did she think he’d expect her to pay? What kind of a cad did she believe him? “I intended to see to your refreshments, Regine.”
She raised her uncertain azure gaze to his. Her eyes had been the first thing he’d noticed about her, as a young girl of perhaps three or four. Wide and round. Clear and bright and an impossible shade of pale blue. Like a frosty morning sky.
Duchess of His Heart Page 3