She could feel his stare boring into her back. “That’s why I . . . didn’t want to marry you or anyone else.” Bitterness crept into her voice despite her attempts to quash it. “Because I didn’t want to spend my life like your mother—wed to a man who despised me because I ‘let’ some scoundrel assault me.”
Twenty
“Let? No woman chooses that,” Edwin said softly, determined to banish the bitterness from her voice. “And I do not despise you. I could never despise you.”
Her shoulders shook violently, but when she spoke again, her tone was still harsh. “Perhaps you misunderstood me. I’m not chaste. I have lain with another man.”
“I understood you. I simply don’t give a damn.”
It was true, oddly enough. Even as a boy, he hadn’t understood the idea of being possessive of another person. Slavery was outlawed in England; people should belong to themselves and no one else. No matter what the law said, it had never made sense to him that women should be chattel.
And after his father’s betrayal of his mother, he understood it even less. Love was supposed to mean accepting and trusting the object of one’s affections over all others, wasn’t it? Instead, it seemed a sort of license to mistreat someone.
So no, he didn’t care that she was unchaste. But that didn’t mean he didn’t care how it had occurred, and a thousand feelings were roaring through him. Frustration that she’d felt she couldn’t tell him this before. Relief that it wasn’t he in particular who frightened her. Fury that some bastard had hurt her.
Horror that she’d lived with this weight on her soul for years.
Years? How could that be?
“When did it happen?” he asked. He needed information so he could help her. Given the anger and belligerence in her tone, he could easily say the wrong thing, do the wrong thing. And any misstep, like a bell lightly struck, could reverberate down their future for a very long time. “How long ago?”
“Seven years, give or take a month,” she clipped out. “During my debut.”
His heart constricted in his chest. What a terrible thing for a young woman to endure during the period that was supposed to be her triumphant entrance into society. “Who was the man?”
She stiffened. “Why do you want to know?”
“So I can kill him for hurting you.”
His hard words made her rigid shoulders relax a fraction. “You’re too late. My brother already did that.”
Bloody hell. “Niall?” Then he realized— “The duel. Oh, God, that’s what the duel was about.”
She nodded.
Suddenly a number of things fell into place. Why the circumstances of the duel had been kept so mysterious. Why Clarissa never spoke of it if she could avoid it. Why no one had seemed to know what woman the two parties had fought over.
But now Edwin knew who her attacker was. “The Honorable Joseph Whiting. Damned bastard. No wonder Niall killed him.”
The vehemence in his voice made her whirl on him with a look of surprise. “You knew Mr. Whiting?”
“I did. Not well, but he happened to attend school with Samuel. He thought he was God’s gift to women. And as I recall, a number of women thought so, too, despite his reputation as a fortune hunter. He was a very handsome man with a glib tongue.”
Her lips tightened into a line. “Yes, he was. And I was a stupid, foolish girl who fell for his . . . smooth advances.”
The self-loathing in her voice pierced him. “You were barely eighteen, the kind of innocent whom men like Whiting prey on. He was older, more experienced, and a third son with a small allowance looking for a pretty heiress to marry.” He reached up to cup her cheek, relieved when she let him. “I daresay his attack was part of his plan to force you into marriage. Am I right? Do you even know?”
Taking his hand from her cheek, she gripped it in hers as if holding on for dear life. “You’re right. And ironically, that’s probably why the gossips have never heard of my . . . ruin.”
“How is that?”
She dropped her gaze to his chest. “The night that Mr. Whiting took my innocence, Niall came in upon us almost immediately after it happened. Mr. Whiting instantly offered to marry me, but Niall could see me lying there weeping and . . . bleeding and torn, so—”
“Torn?” Rage tore through him. “How badly? Where?”
She glanced up at him, clearly startled. “You know where. Down there. The way all women bleed and tear when they . . . do that.”
All women? Oh, God. The situation might be more complex than he’d initially thought. What if she wasn’t frightened of being bedded, but of being hurt?
The thought made him want to punch something.
But he controlled his anger, lest she think it directed at her. He must let her finish her tale. Once he had all the facts, he could pursue understanding how badly she’d been “torn.”
“Go on, then,” he said, sandwiching her hand between both of his. “What did your brother do when Whiting offered to marry you?”
“Niall wouldn’t hear of it. In a fury, he challenged Mr. Whiting to a duel at dawn.” She swallowed convulsively. “Mr. Whiting accepted the challenge, but said Niall would come to his senses in the morning and would realize that marriage was my only choice. That if he didn’t, Mr. Whiting would happily shoot him and overcome any objection by the family.”
“Bastard.” It was getting harder by the minute to control his anger at her attacker. “That was a blackmail as bad as any Durand ever came up with.”
She nodded. “I’d almost think the count had learned his tricks from Mr. Whiting, except that they couldn’t have known each other. Count Durand had been in Paris with his family for years by then, and Mr. Whiting couldn’t even afford to go to Brighton, much less France.” She ducked her head. “I just . . . seem to attract men who won’t take no for an answer.”
“That’s absurd. You attract men with a penchant for beautiful women, like me and all those pups who were flirting with you at the theater, and half the fellows in the world. You’ve merely run afoul of a couple of bad eggs. Very bad eggs, unfortunately.”
“At least Mr. Whiting’s brand of blackmail didn’t work,” she said. “Niall was a better shot than the scoundrel realized. So after he killed Mr. Whiting, he fled England.”
“That’s one thing I don’t understand. Public sympathy would have been on Niall’s side during any trial. He probably would have been acquitted. Rarely do they convict a peer of murder in the case of a duel of honor, especially when it involves a family member.”
With a squeeze of his hand, she pulled free to go over to the window. “I know. It wasn’t fear of hanging that prompted his exile. He fled England for me.”
The reason hit him like a hammer. “Because a trial would involve your telling the world what had happened.”
She nodded. “Papa and Mr. Whiting’s widowed mother agreed that neither family would be well served by having it come out that I was the reason for the duel. Apparently, Mr. Whiting had already told her that he was anticipating marrying me, so afterward, Papa had to convince her to say nothing about that in order to protect my identity. She agreed to comply, since she said she’d gone through this sort of . . . trouble with her son and young women before.”
“Like my father with Samuel.”
She nodded.
“But the seconds knew it involved you, surely.”
“No. Mr. Whiting didn’t tell them—he just said he and Niall were fighting over a woman.”
“I’m surprised. You’d think he would have bragged about his conquest to his friends beforehand.”
“Given what Mr. Whiting had told his mother, Papa assumed that at the time of the challenge, Mr. Whiting was still hoping to gain my hand and thus my fortune. Slandering his future wife wouldn’t have fit into his plans for eventually cutting a fine figure in society with an earl’s daughter on his arm. The morning of the duel, Mr. Whiting apparently just asked if Niall had changed his mind, and when Niall said no, they fought.
And to everyone’s surprise, Niall won.”
“Thank God.”
“No!” She whirled to face him, tears welling in her eyes. “I mean, yes, I was glad Niall wasn’t killed, but I begged him not to fight in the first place. I told him to let Papa deal with it, but he wouldn’t listen. And when it was over and he and Papa agreed that Niall should flee to protect me, I . . . I begged him not to do that, either.”
“Why?”
“Because now he can never return! He won’t risk putting me through a trial. He and Papa kept the whole thing utterly quiet—from Warren, from the rest of the family, from everyone. They didn’t even tell Mama, for fear that she would let it slip. If she ever finds out that I was the cause of her son’s exile—”
“You were not the cause of Niall’s exile, blast it!” He strode up to seize her hands in his. “Whiting was. Your brother did a very noble thing by protecting you after the fact. And if I ever see him again, I will thank him for it.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I do. You feel guilty over something that wasn’t your fault.”
“But it was my fault, don’t you see?” Tears trickled down her cheeks. “If I hadn’t gone into the orangery with the Vile Seducer—”
“The ‘Vile Seducer’?”
“That’s what I’ve always called him in my head. I can’t think of him as a . . . as a person with a name.”
“That I can well understand,” he bit out. “Though you ought to call him the ‘Vile Rapist.’ Because that’s clearly what he was.”
“Was he?” Jerking her hands from his, she turned her back to him once more. “I went willingly with him. I let him kiss me—a lot. Like some tart, I let him put his hand on my breast.”
“You did all that with me, and every time you balked at going further, I retreated. Because that’s what a gentleman does—even with a woman who initially encouraged him. Even with his wife. A gentleman does not force a woman. Ever.”
As if she hadn’t even heard him, she went on in a harsh rasp, “I should have fought him harder. I protested when he began to lift my skirts, but I didn’t seriously struggle until he tore my clothes and held me down and . . . and pushed himself into me and—”
“Raped you,” Edwin said fiercely. The very idea of that bastard tearing her clothes and holding her down made him wish he could march into hell and kill the man all over again. Bare-handed. “It’s clearly a rape to me. And it clearly was to Niall, too. And your late father.”
With a shake of her head, she wrapped her arms about her waist. “I’m not so sure. A-after it happened, they could barely even look at me. Father never chided me, but I—I’m sure that he blamed me.”
“If he did, then he was wrong. But I doubt that he did. The Lord Margrave I knew would never have blamed you. He was as different from my father as I am from Samuel. He was a man of character, and if he didn’t look at you, it’s because he couldn’t stand to see you hurting. Couldn’t stand the fact that he wasn’t there to protect you.”
Desperate to make her see, he came up behind her and pulled her back against him. “I can’t stand the fact that I wasn’t there to protect you, and I didn’t even know any of this was going on.”
She was crying now, though he could only tell because of the hitch in her breathing.
He held her as close as he dared, as close as she’d let him. “I’ve seen how you react to a man crowding you in, and being on top of you, sweetheart. I heard you scream after your nightmare. If that isn’t the behavior of a woman who was raped, I don’t know what is. I only wish I hadn’t assumed that your balking was due to your dislike of me. Perhaps then I would have recognized it before.”
“I told you it had nothing to do with you,” she said in a small voice.
“Yes, you did. I just didn’t believe you. Forgive me for that. Though if you’d told me in the first place—”
“I couldn’t,” she whispered. “I was afraid you would condemn me, would blame me for . . . for . . .”
“Being raped?” That wounded him to his soul. “I suppose your fear shouldn’t surprise me, given that Father condemned Mother, but I thought you knew my character better than that. I realize that you and Yvette think me cold and unfeeling—”
“Not cold and unfeeling.” She twisted in his arms to face him. “I never thought you that, and she didn’t, either. It’s just that you were always so . . . rigid. So disapproving of my outrageous behavior.”
“Because I worried about you.” He brushed a lock of her hair from her eyes. “I knew what could happen to a woman with high spirits who was so damned appealing and intoxicating . . . and heedless of her own safety.”
“Never that,” she whispered. “Ever since the . . . attack, I always have an eye on who’s behind me and where I am. I always know how many people are within screaming distance, because . . .” She shivered. “No one could hear me cry out in that orangery. It was too far away from the party, and there was too much noise in the house.”
The very idea of her screaming and having no one come to her rescue until it was too late sent a shaft of ice through his heart. And reminded him of her screaming in the woods, and brandishing the hairbrush at the theater. The signs had all been there; if only he hadn’t been dwelling on his own insecurity.
“Oh, sweetheart,” he said through a throat tight with sorrow. “I hate that it happens to any woman, but to have it happen to you, to think of your being hurt so badly that you still have nightmares about it . . .” He clutched her close. “I can hardly bear the thought.”
That’s when she began to sob. She buried her face in his shoulder and cried, while he could only hold her, soothe her with nonsensical words of comfort, offer her his handkerchief.
It took her a while to cry it all out. She’d practically soaked his handkerchief through by the time she ventured to speak again. Dabbing at her eyes, she lifted her chin with a hint of the stalwart Clarissa he knew.
“I don’t know why I’m . . . being such a watering pot,” she said. “I’ve worked very hard to stop being afraid. I’d even managed to halt the nightmares. I’ve only had that one in some years—”
“The night we married,” he said hoarsely. “The night I crowded you in the carriage.”
She winced. “Yes, but . . . you were there after the nightmare to make it better.” She flashed him a tremulous smile. “And I haven’t had one since.”
“Still, I wish I’d guessed at your pain years ago. I wouldn’t have been so . . . so . . .”
“Snooty? Arrogant?” she said tartly.
“Disapproving. Without knowing what you were suffering.”
“I’m glad you didn’t know.” She tipped up her chin. “It means I succeeded in hiding it from the world.”
“You certainly did.” But now that he knew, he could see her determined cheer and her impudence for what they really were—an attempt to put the past behind her and prove to herself she was no longer afraid, the way a boy whistles in the dark.
She’d been whistling in the dark for years. Until he’d come along and forced her to face the monster lurking there.
Her gaze dropped to his waistcoat. “No doubt you regret marrying me, now that you know everything.”
“Not for one minute. Why would I?”
“Because men want chaste wives.”
He chose his words carefully. “Some do, I suppose. Not all. As I said, I don’t care one way or the other. Especially when my wife had no choice in the matter.”
“Then you’re the exception to the rule,” she said acidly.
“Sweetheart, I am the exception to the rule in many things. I don’t see why this should be any different.” He tipped up her chin. “Except for your difficulties in the bedchamber, we’ve had a lovely time so far, have we not?”
Her ghost of a smile cheered him. “We have.” Then her face darkened again, like the sun going behind a cloud. “But I don’t know if I can ever . . . I mean, I had hoped that after all these years, the thought
of marital relations wouldn’t panic me so.” She blushed. “I do want to be with you . . . I like all the beginning parts, the kissing and the touching. It’s just later on—”
“It’s all right,” he said, seeing the anxiety come into her face again. “We will take it slow, get through it together.” He refused to believe that his bold and sassy wife couldn’t conquer this with a little help.
He caressed her cheek. “Tell me what to do to make it better.”
Her breath hitched in her throat. “I don’t know. Everything is fine until you get on top of me, and I remember the orangery and the Vile Seducer and I . . . go a little mad.”
Thinking of how well she’d reacted when he’d been behind her, and below her, he said, “What if I don’t get on top of you?”
She blinked. “What do you mean? How else can you . . . can we . . .”
A rueful smile escaped him. “I forget that you can still be as naïve and innocent as any virgin.”
“That’s not true,” she said mutinously. “I know things.”
Her taking umbrage amused him. He would never figure Clarissa out, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to. “You know some things, yes. Clearly not others. Like the fact that a man doesn’t have to be on top of a woman to bed her.”
The hint of hope in her gaze struck him to the heart. “He doesn’t?”
“No, minx, he doesn’t. The woman can be on top, can make love to the man, just as easily as he can make love to her.”
Her brow knitted as if she were trying to work it out. “I can’t see . . . I don’t understand—”
“Shall I show you?”
He regretted the words when she tensed up and glanced away. “I—I don’t know . . .”
“Clarissa,” he said, catching her head in his hands and drawing her gaze back to his. “We won’t ever do anything you don’t want to. We can stop in the middle as often as you want, as many times as you want—”
The Study of Seduction: Sinful Suitors 2 Page 23