“What need could you possibly have to speak to me after all this time?” she asked, her voice vibrating with passion. “After what you did?”
“I was wrong,” he said simply. Truthfully.
“You werewrong,” she repeated, her tone one of disbelief. “You planned, from the moment you first realized who I was, to do what you did. You seduced me. Tricked me. You used me to gain Amberley’s debts, and once you had them, you left me to suffer the consequences. Tell me why I should remain in this chamber, why I should even entertain another word you utter.”
“You are marrying my half-brother,” he gritted. “I would think that reason enough.”
She stiffened, her bearing going rigid. “If that is the sole reason for your interest, you can leave me in peace now, Mr. Kirkwood.”
He ground his jaw, stalked closer to her, not stopping until he stood before the chair she was using as a shield against him. Violets, the scent he had hungered for all this time and missed, assailed him in sweet remembrance. “Tell me, my lady. Do you wish to wed him?”
She paled, her nostrils flaring. “Who I marry, and whether or not I wish to marry him, is no concern of yours, Mr. Kirkwood. Indeed, I ceased being a concern of yours the moment you traded me for the vengeance you so desperately longed to obtain.”
Guilty.
He had done that.Yes,he had. But it had been because he had supposed he had garnered her the freedom she wished. It had been because he had been hopelessly torn between atoning for the past sins of Amberley against his mother and his need for Frederica. Because he had known there wasn’t a chance of snow in Hades that her father would ever allow her to wed him.
He had believed he was providing her with the best chance for happiness. That, given the proof of her ruination, her father would send her away, and she would find herself ensconced in some cottage by the sea, happily scratching her pen upon a stack of foolscap, writingThe Silent Baron.
Foolishness, he realized now. Complete and utter foolishness. There was no simple, happy resolution in life. There had not been for his mother, not for him, not for Frederica. Fighting was a way of life. But he would fight for her. For them. He had gained his revenge, but he had lost something far more important. Her. But from this moment forward, he was willing to do anything to right the grievous wrong he had done her.
“There is something I never told you,” he began haltingly. “Something I do not speak of often…my mother was not always a whore. She was a simple country girl. She came to London and was instantly swept into a world of sin. Amberley plucked her from that world and made her his mistress. But when she became with child, he tossed her into the streets. She was forced to sell herself to any man she could, just to keep food inmybelly.”
Her expression softened. “Oh, Duncan.”
But he did not want her pity. He wanted her to understand. He needed to explain his actions, if indeed he could. Mere words would not excuse them, but it would be a beginning. “It was Amberley’s duty to aid her, to give her some manner of restitution, and yet he cruelly turned his back. Just as it was Amberley’s fault, she was killed by one of the men to whom she sold herself, strangled and discarded as if she were no better than an old pair of stockings. I wanted revenge upon the duke for my mother’s sake. For the suffering she had, for the life of fear and worry and pain. And I am sorry, endlessly sorry, to have allowed you to become caught up in my need for vengeance.”
“I had not realized your mother was murdered, Duncan,” she said, her tone gentling with sympathy. With something else, too, but he could not define it.
“I found her,” he blurted before he could stop himself. Something about her wide eyes comforted him, something about her lulled him in a way no one else ever had. “She was cold and bruised, and all I could think about was how scared she must have been. I wondered if she thought of me, called out for me. She had sent me off with some coin to gather buns, and when I returned, she was dead.”
He relived the horror of that day once more, allowing it to engulf him. Only this time, he had Frederica Isling before him. This time, he did not feel as if he was drowning in an icy sea. Instead, he felt as if he had risen to the surface, as if he could swim to shore at last.
“I understand your desire to gain your revenge,” she said. “I always did, even before I knew what you have just revealed to me. But you walked away from me. Left me as if I meant nothing at all to you.
“You meanteverythingto me.”
“I wish I believed that.” Emotion thickened her husky tones. “Too much time has passed, Duncan. You are far, far too late.” Her voice was as pained as her expression, and it slayed him inside.
“Marry me,” he said baldly, half demand, half plea.
Also, not what he had planned. He had meant to woo her, to win her. To convince her of the rightness of shackling herself to him, even if he was a social outcast who had taken her innocence and walked away.
But the conviction, the pretty persuasion he would have offered disappeared, instead replaced by two words, and they would not be subdued. Once spoken, they could not be called back, and he could not honestly say he regretted them. He wanted her at his side, as his wife, in his bed. He did not want to abandon her again. To leave her at the mercy of her father and men like his half-brother.
Her lips parted, shock making her eyes go wide. Silence hung in the chamber seething with condemnation. It was not long before she found her voice. “Marry you? How dare you use me in another attempt at gaining your revenge upon Amberley?”
“Marrying you would be my honor,” he said, and he meant it, though he could not blame her for doubting him. He had provided her no reason to give him her trust. “I do not deserve you, and I know it. But taking you as my wife would have nothing to do with vengeance and everything to do with protecting you as I ought to have done from the moment I took you to my bed. Before that, even. From the moment I first kissed you.”
She stared at him, tears shimmering in her eyes. “I asked you to kiss me that day, just as I asked you to ruin me. I am to blame for the straits in which I now find myself, and I have made peace with my mistakes, Mr. Kirkwood. I will not be your duty any more than I will be your vengeance.”
Damn it, he was making a muck of this. He wanted to skirt the chair, remove the obstacle between them, and take her in his arms. But he was also aware he must do his penance. He needed to earn her. “I am not worthy of you, this I know. Regardless of how much wealth and power I amass, I will always be the bastard son, born on the wrong side of the blanket. I will never be a lord, nor do I aspire to be one. You will not one day become the Duchess of Amberley if you wed me. But I…I care for you, Frederica. I care as I have never cared for another. From the moment I first saw you in my club, disguised as a gentleman, I was drawn to you. My time away from you did not diminish that fierce spark within me. It only enhanced it.”
He spoke from the heart. Truer sentiments could not be found inside himself. He wished he had taken a different path on the day of the masque, that he had proclaimed to her brother and anyone who would listen that she was his. That he was keeping her, like Hades and Persephone. That they would rule his underworld together. Forever.
Her gloved hands gripped the back of the chair in a tight clench. “Why now? It has been six weeks.”
Had she, too, been counting? He took one more step, approaching her as he would a spooked horse. “Six weeks of agony,” he said. “I had convinced myself I had procured us both what we wanted the most. For me, it was revenge. For you, your freedom.”
