FALLEN ANGEL!
It was a screaming headline. The story was accompanied by two separate illustrations of her and the earl. Jane scanned the page and saw that it boasted all the sordid details of their stormy relationship. That she had been, and was, his ward, that she was the mother of his year-old illegitimate daughter, that they were just married, that he consorted with his mistress and she with her manager and “very good friend.”
“What is it?” the earl asked sharply.
“Look!” Jane cried, pale, choked. “Look at this!”
The earl took the paper she shoved at him and began to read. He grew dark and grim.
“Last night they badgered me with disgusting questions about you and me, about Nicole, about the past!” Jane said vehemently. “And the night before as well! The show was ready to close, but since our marriage we’ve had two full houses. But they don’t come to see the play! They come to see the Fallen Angel! I’m no longer an actress—I’m a freak show!”
“I’m sorry,” the earl said harshly. “God, I’m sorry!”
She turned on him, letting loose all her frustration and anger. “How could you!” she cried, standing. “How could you take Nicole to the park yesterday? How could you!”
“Jane, she’s my daughter.”
“You could have warned me! We could have figured out what to do! Did you do it on purpose?”
“Nicole is my daughter. Not some damned secret to be kept hidden from the world! If I want to take her out I will!”
“I’ll never overcome the scandal! My career! I’m ruined!”
The earl was on his feet too. “What would you have us do? Hide? The way you were hiding?”
“Yes!” Jane shouted irrationally. “Yes! If you don’t care about humiliating me”—she thought of Amelia—“then at least spare a concern for your daughter!”
“Nicole is my concern!” the earl shouted. “I’ll be damned if I’ll deny her her place in this goddamn Society! It was her I was thinking of—this I can assure you!”
“Yes.” Jane was bitter. “You would think only of Nicole—and not of me!”
“Nicole is my daughter. I had every right to publicly claim her.”
“And ruin me! But you don’t care, do you? You’ve never cared!”
He froze then. “It will die down. There’s nothing else for them to dig up.”
“Die down,” she echoed grimly, flushed now. “That’s easy for you to say. You’re not the one who’s ruined!”
He flinched. “Think again.”
Jane’s senses returned. He was as much a victim of the scandal as she was, maybe even more. After all, he’d been her guardian. They would blame him at least as much, if not more, for her downfall, for seducing her, his underage ward.
“I should have never married you. Damn it, I was selfish. I wanted Nicole, I didn’t think!”
That hurt—the confession that he’d wanted his daughter. She saw him pace away, rigid with self-condemnation. She suddenly regretted all her words and accusations, even if it hurt to know he cared only about Nicole and not about her. She thought of how he had lived with scandal for the past six years—with scandal and darkness. She hurried to him. “I’m the one being selfish. Forgive me. I can handle this. You’re right. It will die down.”
He turned to her, eyes mocking. “What? A change of heart?”
She regarded him steadily, with compassion. She wanted to touch him, hold him.
Anger flared in his eyes.“Don’t pity me!”
“I don’t!”
But it was too late. He was already striding furiously from the room, and the doors slammed behind him like thunder.
41
