“No more protestations,” the viscount told her calmly. “I’ll explain everything to them.”
The carriage lumbered into motion, and it seemed that at least for the night, Elizabeth’s fate was sealed.
CHAPTER4
“I’m afraid I don’t understand, Torrie. How in the good Lord’s chemise did you manage tosteala governess?”
Torrie grimaced as he paced the length of the Duke of Montrose’s study. The hour was exceedingly late, and he had successfully delivered the woman he was going to have to marry to his sister’s efficient care. Harriet, who was kindhearted to a fault, had taken the governess to a guest chamber, showing nary a hint of shock, surprise, or dismay at being woken from her bed to answer her brother’s foibles. It was not the first time he had been grateful for his sister’s remarkable self-possession since his injuries.
Nor, he feared, would it be the last.
What was he going to do with a wife? Torrie hadn’t the slightest notion. The obvious answer was to send her away somewhere. To his country estate, where he might forget her existence and carry on as he was.
He turned to face the duke, who had been Torrie’s closest friend before the phaeton accident. And who afterward had married his sister. Much of the years of their association remained enshrouded in mystery and shadows in his imperfect mind, but from what he had gleaned since his amnesia, Monty had been no saint himself in their wilder years. Still, how to explain the prurient nature of this evening’s epic series of mishaps?
He sighed. “I was meant to kidnap the Countess of Worthing. The governess in question was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and I wasn’t able to realize my error until after I had her in my carriage, bound and gagged.”
“God’s fichu. Bound and gagged, you say?”
Well, yes. It did sound particularly dreadful when one repeated it, but the entire affair had been Eugenia’s idea, and he’d never intended to hurt anyone. Let alone to take the wrong woman, giving her the fright of her life and leaving her penniless and prospectless. Most especially not to find himself forced into marriage with a woman he’d only just met.
But still, Monty’s habit of elaborate cursing grew wearisome, and whether it was the lateness of the hour, the frustration over his own foolish actions this evening, or his fury over Eugenia’s treatment of the poor governess he’d inadvertently kidnapped, he couldn’t say. But Torrie was vexed beyond measure, and there was something as nettlesome as a burr beneath a saddle about the duke’s silly oaths.
He raked his fingers through his hair and pinned his brother-in-law with a glare, feeling distinctly ugly, as if he might tear everything in sight apart. It wasn’t an unfamiliar inclination. Since he’d woken in agony on that cursed day without a memory, not even his own goddamned name, he’d been in a state that varied in degrees of terribleness.
“Have you always used these appalling epithets?” he asked the duke. “I cannot think I would have befriended you if you had. It’s quite irritating.”
Monty’s countenance turned wry. “I’ve committed far greater sins than inventive oaths. I would be grateful you don’t recall them, but considering I’m the source of your lack of memory, an apology seems more the thing. I’m damned sorry for what happened. I know I’ve said it before, but with every reminder comes a waterfall of guilt.”
The duke had apologized profusely for the part he had played in the phaeton accident that had grievously injured Torrie and robbed him of his memory, but Torrie didn’t like being reminded of that night or its consequences. Indeed, he strove to forget it had ever happened.
Not so different from the rest of his life, only he’d forgotten that bit against his will.
“I’m here and well, am I not?” he asked.
Monty regarded him solemnly. Regretfully. And, worst of all,kindly. “I don’t know how well you are. You’ve been in many scrapes—most of which we’ve been in together—but you’ve never kidnapped an innocent before.”
Ah, Christ.
Yes, he had indeed committed the very worst crime this night. He had taken a respectable governess, swatted her on the rump, and cost her everything.
“I intend to pay for my sins,” he said, straightening his shoulders against the rush of dread that accompanied his declaration.
For he didn’t want to marry. He was in no condition to marry. He didn’t even know who he was, aside from a flurry of hazy shadows of the past which had slowly and indistinctly returned. How could he promise himself to another?
It didn’t matter. Not now that he’d ruined the poor woman. He had no other option.
“How do you intend to pay for your sins?” Monty asked, frowning at him and looking upon him with an expression Torrie imagined the duke might reserve for suspected footpads.
“I’m going to marry the chit, of course,” he said, then huffed out a sigh and paced toward the opposite end of the unfamiliar study.
He had been within these walls before many times in his former life, he knew. But only because others had told him. The scents, the colors on the wall, the fireplace and its ormolu mantel clock—all of it was still relatively new to him, his visits to Hamilton House intentionally sparse. With so much of his past life a gaping hole, the feeling that he was hopelessly lost was never far. He’d done his best to drown it with women and whisky, but look at where that had left him.
Now, he had no choice but to wed.
“You’re going to marry her?” Monty repeated, sounding stunned at the prospect. “You?”
Was that an insult? Was that suspicion he heard in his supposed friend’s voice? Torrie spun on his heel.
