The Heiress Effect

by Courtney Milan

She stared at him. “Mr. Cromwell. This is becoming improper.”

  He shrugged and moved closer to her. “How convenient,” he said, “that you notice impropriety when it serves your purposes.”

  She sucked in her breath as he reached out his hand.

  “And when it doesn’t…” His fingers were inches from her face. He could have reached out and touched her.

  He didn’t. He snapped his fingers. She jumped.

  “Miss Fairfield,” he said quietly, “I am not your enemy. Stop treating me as one.”

  Her heart slammed in her breast. “I have no enemies.”

  “That, Miss Fairfield, is bullocks, and you know it. You have only enemies.”

  “I…I…”

  “And I,” he said, “know exactly what that feels like. Look at me, Miss Fairfield. Think about what I am. I’m a duke’s bastard, raised on a farm. I’ve never belonged anywhere. I spent my first few months at Eton with these jackasses, getting into fights three times a day because they wanted me to know I didn’t belong. There’s little love lost between me and Bradenton.”

  She swallowed and looked at him. There was a proud set to his jaw, a fierce light in his eyes. She knew all too well that a little thing like expression could be falsified, but… She didn’t think he’d manufactured that note of anger.

  “Bradenton thinks he can dictate what I do,” he told her. “So insult him and his ilk all you wish. I’ll applaud you every step of the way. Just stop lumping me in with them. I’ll tell you my truth, if you’ll tell me yours.”

  She shook her head, not knowing how to answer. Nobody had ever questioned her act. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Then don’t talk,” he said. “Sit, and hear me out.”

  She needed to go. Immediately. She shouldn’t listen. She…

  “Sit,” he repeated.

  Perhaps it was because he didn’t speak it as a command. He indicated the chair she had recently vacated, and somehow turned a word that would have been a single, solitary demand in another man’s throat into a polite gesture.

  She sat. Her stomach fluttered. She didn’t know what to say to him, how to regain what she had just lost. “I’m not going to marry you,” she finally blurted out.

  He blinked twice and shook his head. “Is that what this is about? You’re trying to avoid marriage? You’re doing a good job of it.”

  She couldn’t breathe.

  “In fact…” He tilted his head and looked at her. “But I promised you truth, so here is mine. You’re the last woman I would marry.”

  Her breath sucked in.

  “I don’t need your money. My brother and I are on good terms, and when he reached his majority, he settled a good sum on me. If I needed more for any reason, I would apply to him first.” He shrugged. “I want a career in politics, Miss Fairfield. I want to be a Member of Parliament—and not some distant day in the future, either. I need time to gain influence. I want people to listen to me, to respect me. I will be prime minister one day.”

  Not I plan to be or I want to be. Not for Mr. Marshall. I will be.

  He leaned forward, his eyes blazing.

  “I want every man who slighted me—everyone who called me bastard behind my back—to bow down and lick my boots for daring to think I was beneath him. I want everyone who tells me to know my place to eat his words.”

  The air felt heavy and thick between them. His hand was a white-knuckled fist at his side.

  “And so the last thing I need is to be tied to you. You’ll open no doors for me, bring me no influence. If the rumor is right, you only have a fortune in the first place because you’re a bastard like me.”

  She let out a breath.

  “Just like me,” he said. “Yes, you legally have parents. But the man who sired you…”

  Those damned hundred thousand pounds again. She put her fingers to her forehead. She’d been thirteen when a complete stranger had died and left her a fortune. She’d been fifteen when she finally understood why the man she thought of as her father had abandoned his wife and her children—those two so-different-looking daughters—on a country estate.

  She was the bastard, the foul fruit of that imperfect union. She was the one Titus Fairfield disapproved of. She’d never belonged—not here, not in her uncle’s home. Not anywhere. And those hundred thousand pounds marked her out.

  “I know,” he said. “I know what it is like to lie awake at night scarcely able to breathe with the weight of isolation. I know what it’s like to want to shout out loud until it all falls to pieces. I know what it’s like to be told again and again that you can’t belong.”

  It was too much, too much to hear the words she’d whispered only to herself echoed in the real world. “Why are you saying these things?”

  He shrugged. “It’s simple, Miss Fairfield. Because I think everyone deserves a chance to breathe.”

  Breathe? Around him, she could do no such thing. The light of the oil lamp reflected off his glasses, obscuring his eyes, making it almost impossible to divine his intent. But she could feel, rather than see, his gaze on her—a sharp, penetrating look, one that cut straight through the garish pattern of her silk gown. No. He didn’t make breathing any easier.

  “I have no difficulties drawing air,” she said with no regard for the truth.

  “Oh?” His eyebrow raised and he tilted his head at her. “That’s not what I see. I see shoulders that dare not relax, muscles that dare not twitch, lips that dare not do anything but smile. You’re awash in choices, Miss Fairfield, but you know as well as I that the wrong one will bring your carefully husbanded awful reputation to naught.”

  She swallowed again.

  “Don’t lie to me,” he said. “What is it that you say to yourself in the dead of the night, when nobody is about to hear your words? Do you shut your eyes and look forward to the morrow, eager to greet it, or do you dread each new day and count them off as each one passes?”

  He took a few steps toward the door.

  “You count,” he said softly. “That’s what it means, to not belong—it means that you count. It wouldn’t be bearable if you didn’t know it would end. How many days, Miss Fairfield, until you can drop this illusion? How many days until you can stop pretending?”

  “Four hundred and seventy-five.” The words escaped her. She raised her fingers to her lips, stricken, but he didn’t look at all pleased at having wrested that admission from her.

  He shook his head instead. “You have four hundred and seventy-five days of this on your shoulders. Miss Fairfield, don’t tell me you can breathe.”

  “I have no difficulties…” The words sounded weak, though. Unconvincing.

  “I know that,” he said. “If I’d not been here, you’d have kept on. That’s what it means to count—that you get through it, no matter how crushing that number is. I know that because I’ve counted. I counted my way through Eton, through my years when I was a student at Cambridge; I’m counting my way through this particular visit. I know what it’s like to count, Miss Fairfield.” He took off his glasses and rubbed the lenses against his shirt. “I know it quite well.” He looked up.

  Without his glasses, she had imagined that he’d be bleary-eyed, unable to see her. But whatever the fault in his vision, his eyes fixed on hers, sharp as ever, blue as the sky.

  “You’re an intelligent woman,” he said. “Logically, if you’re pretending to this…whatever it is that you’re trying to avoid is awful.”

  She wanted to speak, wanted to say something, to say anything. But all that came out was a little choke, deep in her throat—something guttural and painful, something she hadn’t even known was lodged inside her.

  So this was why she’d felt that frisson. It wasn’t his eyes. It wasn’t his height. It wasn’t even his shoulders—and she absolutely was not going to think of his shoulders. It was simply that he knew what it was like to stand outside everyone else. He knew, and she hadn’t even had to tell him.

  “Th
at’s the truth?” she finally managed to say. “That is the truth you promised me?” It had been more than anyone had given her.

  He tilted his head and replaced his spectacles.

  “It’s ninety-five percent of it,” he finally said.

  He inclined his head to her, and then—before she could think of anything to say—he tapped his forehead in a sort of salute and left her alone.

  It was the missing five percent of the truth that rankled Oliver. The air on the verandah was cold against his cheeks; behind him, he could hear the sounds of a piano duet played by the inimitable Johnson sisters.

  Nobody had said anything when he’d wandered from the music room out onto the verandah, cold as it was.

  They really didn’t care about him, and he returned the favor as best as he could.

  He didn’t want to take Bradenton up on his offer. He’d told himself that he’d find another way to convince the man. Maybe that was why he’d talked to Miss Fairfield the way he had—to prove he wouldn’t do it.

  But he hadn’t said no the other night when Bradenton asked.

  And Oliver had greeted her on the streets in part because of Bradenton’s suggestion. Some part of him—some sick part—had wondered how it might be done. He thought of her eyes just a bit ago, so wide. Her mouth parted ever so slightly, as if to whisper her agreement. Her hands wringing together. He’d hit on the key to Miss Fairfield and he knew it.

  Bradenton was right; he could break her. He knew exactly how it was done.

  It was that memory—one that made him break out in an uneasy sweat—that had brought him out into the cold. It was possible to break someone who was alone. It was easy to break someone if you gave them a support, allowed them to lean on it…and then swept it all away.

  Oliver had no answers, which is why he was standing outside in the middle of a January night. The chill brought no clarity of mind. Cold stone and cold walls surrounded him in the middle of this cold city. The verandah was little more than a square space of outdoors a few paces wide. He’d grown up on a farm; this was hardly any room at all.

  Hardly a surprise. Cambridge always made him feel caged.

  The outside door opened behind him. He didn’t turn.

  Miss Fairfield came to stand beside him.

  Her beads clacked as she moved, her brocade glittering in the dim light in a garish imitation of military braid. It was the ugliest gown he’d ever seen, and she wore it like the shield that it was. She set her hands on the balustrade, gripping it tightly, not saying a word. Her breath was ragged, as if she had climbed three flights of stairs. As if even the thought of trusting another person had her heart racing.

  It should race. She should walk away. But he didn’t say that. He just regarded her, watched her watching him back.

  “Well, impossible girl?” he asked. “What’s it to be?”

  She took another breath. “I count,” she finally said.

  It took him a moment to remember their previous conversation.

  She twisted her hands together. “I count every day as it passes.”

  He didn’t say anything. He wanted to comfort her, but that seemed cruel, given the possibilities of what lay between them.

  “I am afraid to even speak to you,” she said. “If I open my mouth, I’m afraid it will all spill out. I’ll talk and talk and talk and never be able to stop it all. There’s too much.”

  He tilted his head and looked at her. “Did I sound like a man with a moderate number of complaints?”

  “No. No.” She shook her head, and then threw her arms in the air helplessly. “I don’t know what you want. I know what everyone else desires, but you… I don’t know about you.”

  Oliver thought of Bradenton, dangling his vote in the Reform Act before him—dangling it like the tempting bait that it was. He thought about what it would mean for his chances at achieving office. He thought about the marquess, believing that Oliver was his for the purchase.

  Nobody shoved Oliver around. Nobody.

  “I went to school with Bradenton,” Oliver finally said. “He was an ass back then, until…” He paused. “He’s better at hiding it now, that’s all.”

  She didn’t say anything.

  “I want him to pay,” Oliver said. “For every filthy assumption he’s made.”

  He turned to her. She was watching him, her eyes wide.

  “It’s that simple,” he said. “You’re annoying him. Good for you. I don’t want you to feel alone.”

  Her breath caught.

  God, that had been a cruel thing to say. The prospect of friendship was a hell of a thing to dangle in front of a woman who felt she had no choice but to drive everyone away. He had no idea what she was facing, but he’d wager that whatever it was, it was a lonely path.

  And there was the fact that he didn’t know his own mind. Maybe he meant every word he was saying. But if he’d wanted to take Bradenton up on his filthy offer, he’d have started this same damned way—by earning her trust.

  For all that he rejected the idea of doing Bradenton’s bidding, there was a vicious symmetry to using the marquess. To fooling him into thinking that Oliver was complacent, that Oliver would do whatever he wanted. It would mean something, to boost himself with Bradenton’s help. To exceed his power and then pay him back years later.

  He wanted that so badly he could taste it.

  She let out a shaky breath. “Say it again,” she said.

  It wasn’t a lie. Not really. He wouldn’t do what Bradenton wanted; there was no need to tell her about it.

  And if you do decide to do it, it’s best not to mention it. You’re just keeping your options open.

  Oliver pushed that voice away.

  “You’re not alone,” Oliver said.

  It was ninety-five percent of the truth.

  Oliver took leave of the company a few minutes after midnight. He was rather surprised when Bradenton followed after him, walking with him to the pavement out front. Instead of ignoring him, though, the marquess called for his carriage and gestured to Oliver. Oliver came—reluctantly—to stand by him.

  “You should meet them,” Oliver said quietly. “The people who will be most affected by the extension of the franchise. You’ll see—”

  Bradenton laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous, Marshall. I meet them every day. They stitch my shoes and measure me for my trousers. I cannot walk anywhere without tripping over a worker. Showing me yet another one won’t help your case.”

  Oliver contemplated the shapes of the buildings across the way. In the dark, he couldn’t make out much more than the silhouette of peaked roofs, rough dark pools of windows with lamplight glimmering from them. The sound of Bradenton’s carriage—hoof clops and the creak of leather—drifted to them from the mews behind the building.

  “I said meet them,” Oliver replied. “Not use their services. Meet them. Talk with them. See what sort of men they are. My sister-in-law and I are organizing a set of dinners when I return to London, for—”

  “You mean I should treat them as my social equals? I do enough charity work, Marshall.” He smiled. “Here I am, talking to you.”

  If this is a sample of your charity, I’m sure you’re well-loved on your estate.

  But he didn’t say it. He held all his complaints in the stillness of his heart, marking them down to accounts earned but not yet repaid.

  “You’ve always been amusing,” Oliver said instead. “But there’s no need to laugh off what I’m trying to tell you. Which is—”

  Bradenton laughed. “Leave off, Marshall. I don’t want to talk to you about your precious reform.”

  The carriage turned the corner, a dark ghost in the mist.

  Bradenton turned to Oliver. “You’re thinking about my proposition. You cannot know how gratifying I find that, to know I judged you rightly after all.”

  Oliver’s hand tightened, his knuckles whitening.

  “So what did you mean with her tonight, then? I suppose if you want to hurt her by ma
king her fall in love with you and then sending her into a decline, it will serve. Still, that seems overly sordid.”

  “You can’t hurt someone you don’t know,” Oliver said. And I know you well. “Sometimes the easiest way to break a person is to make him think you’re on his side and then withdraw your support.”

  He shouldn’t have spoken words laden with such double meaning. But Bradenton laughed.

  “That is why I need you to do it. I’ll pay you no false compliments, Marshall. I admit, I have a personal interest in seeing Miss Fairfield too unhappy to move about in society any longer.” His lip curled. “But you’re clever and too ambitious by half. I won’t allow you a foothold until I’m sure of you.”

  “One choice on my part will make you sure?”

  “No.” Bradenton shrugged. “One, you’ll dismiss as accident. Two, you’ll doubt yourself. Three times…” He paused, as if recalling something. “Three times, and you’ll convince yourself you were right to act as you did. Three times doing a thing will change a man’s character.”

  “So there will be other tasks, then.” He couldn’t do it. Even contemplating this one made him feel sick to his stomach. It brought back old memories, memories he had long since vanquished to their rightful place.

  But Bradenton shook his head. His carriage stopped in front of him, and a footman jumped down to open the door. Bradenton advanced forward, “There’s no need for anything else,” he said airily. “By my count, you’re already at two.”

  Chapter Five

  There were three skills that Miss Emily Fairfield had found necessary in her current position in life: lying, smuggling—and most important of all—scaling walls. It was the last she’d put to use at the moment.

  After a tepid ten-minute walk around the garden at midday, she’d been put down for a nap in her room as if she were a child of four.

  She waited until the house grew quiet, the servants departing to mop floors and go to market. Then she’d hastily changed her clothing and scrambled down the stone wall outside her window. She wanted to go away—anywhere, so long as it was not here.