Three Proposals And A Scandal Part 6

Richard stood and clapped him on the shoulder. "Just another victim of true love, my friend. No point fighting the inevitable."

Marianne discovered at dinner that Elias had joined the overcrowded house party. When she came downstairs, she caught the rumble of his distinctive baritone from the drawing room. Her breath stuck in her lungs, along with a curse. Could this awful day get any worse?

Struggling to present an impervious face, she braved the crush inside the room. This influx of unexpected guests tested even Ferney's resources. The usually efficient chambermaid had been noticeably fl.u.s.tered when she'd brought Marianne's hot water.

To Marianne's dismay, the first person to approach her was Tranter. She wasn't sure why she developed such a distaste for his company, but the prospect of his conversation made her want to run outside into the rain and never come back.

"Lady Marianne, you brighten this gloomy evening like the sun coming out from a cloud."

Given that the room contained two of society's greatest beauties in Sidonie and Genevieve, that was hardly tactful. Marianne dug up a smile. "My lord, any word on the flooding?"

"The flooding?" he asked, clearly disconcerted by her practical response to his overblown compliment.

Luckily Sidonie came up to save her. Less luckily, she brought Elias. "Marianne, the village isn't in danger, but the low-lying fields are underwater. Jonas and his steward went out this afternoon to check."

"I'm guessing this is the end of the hunting season," Marianne said and turned to Elias. It was a battle to sound polite, but she almost managed it. "Lord Wilmott, I hadn't expected to see you here."

He tilted his eyebrows at the edge in her tone, then bowed. "Lady Marianne, how could I stay away? I trust you're enjoying your visit."

Sidonie, unlike the rest of the world, clearly didn't trust her to be civil when she answered and rushed to speak. "Elias has been staying in Barstowe Hall with a view to renting it once we've finished renovations. I asked him to join us when the deluge started. The roof there leaks, you see."

Marianne shot her friend a disbelieving glance. "How...inconvenient." Meaning exactly the opposite. However rundown Barstowe might be, Lord Hillbrook would make sure that any property he owned was watertight.

Color marked Sidonie's cheeks, but she soldiered on with the pretense that she sensed no undercurrents. "Lord Tranter, I'm sure you know Lord Wilmott."

The bows the two men exchanged chilled the air several degrees.

"Wilmott," Tranter bit out.

"Tranter." Elias's smile was insincere. "Didn't know you were in the district."

"London was a wilderness without its shining star." He looked meaningfully at Marianne.

This time, Sidonie heard herself dismissed as a lesser light. Laughter flickered in her large brown eyes. "Oh, ungallant, Lord Tranter. As punishment, you must escort me into dinner."

"But the marquess-" he said with barely hidden reluctance that made Marianne want to box his ears. His hostess had taken him in with a graciousness he didn't deserve. The least he could do in return was treat her with respect.

Sidonie made a breezy gesture. "Oh, we're basically camping with so many uninvited guests. We won't stand on ceremony."

The jab at uninvited guests repaid Tranter's rudeness. Marianne met Elias's black eyes and found an answering glimmer of humor. Fleetingly, she basked in the precious feeling of having a friend, before she reminded herself what an adept actor he was. She looked away and told her heart it had no right to ache.

Clearly expecting Tranter's cooperation, Sidonie extended her arm. With a tightening of his heroic jaw, he complied, but not before shooting Elias a poisonous glance.

Sidonie turned to Elias and Marianne, her lovely face alight with triumph. "If you'd accompany Lady Marianne, Elias?"

The smile Elias gave Sidonie set Marianne's secret, wayward heart cartwheeling again. He really was a gorgeous man. His physical appeal made it difficult to remember his self-serving agenda.

"Stop scowling, my love," he muttered, turning to her and presenting his arm.

"Better to call me your bank deposit than your love," she hissed, although the training of years revived and she kept her expression neutral as she placed her hand on his sleeve.

"I'm sure you're much nicer to cuddle up with at night than cold old pound notes."

She narrowed her eyes at him as they followed Hillbrook and Genevieve into the dining room. "You'll never know."

To her surprise, he laughed. "At least you're going down fighting, my darling."

She didn't bother complaining about the empty endearment. What were a few darlings when he could lie about loving her? It would take more than soft words to convince her that he didn't play her for a fool.

She could feel her father's eyes boring into her back with enough disapproval to leave two smoking holes. What could she do when her hostess had so successfully cornered her? She and Sidonie needed to have a talk. It was pointless and needlessly cruel promoting Elias's suit. And she must speak to Elias alone and make him understand that when her father threatened disinheritance if she married against his wishes, he was deadly serious. Marianne was well aware that losing her fortune meant losing Elias's interest.

She told herself she'd much rather live in the real world than in a romantic fantasy. But the real world meant Desborough and romantic fantasy meant Elias Thorne with his wry smile and ability to make her laugh. Right now that seemed a dire choice indeed, even if she wanted to strangle Elias for following her to Wiltshire.

Sidonie had placed Marianne between Elias and the least voluble of Lord Hillbrook's colleagues. Mr. Bullstrode addressed himself to the food and wine with an attention that discouraged Marianne's most determined efforts at conversation.

In the end, she gave up and turned to the man on her other side. She'd learned early how to scotch unwelcome advances. Surely this was no different from those other occasions when she'd squashed a brash gentleman's presumptions.

Fastening on a dismissive smile, she made her tone as frigid as the rain tumbling down outside. "So you're thinking of moving to Wiltshire, my lord? I'm sure the Hillbrooks will be glad to have you as a neighbor."

His eyes glittered with amus.e.m.e.nt. "Sidonie's story was complete balderdash and you know it."

She choked on her wine and unsteadily put the gla.s.s down. "Lord Wilmott-"

He snickered. "You should know by now the grande dame act doesn't work with me."

"It's not an act," she a.s.serted in an undertone.

"It will turn into stifling fact if you marry Desborough."

"Stop it." She scrunched her napkin into a ball in her lap. The horrible truth was that she worried he was right. "We're in public."

"Does that mean you'll meet me in private to discuss this?"

"No, it does not." She stared down at her congealing lamb. She hadn't had much appet.i.te to begin with. Now even one bite would choke her. "I know you treat this futile pursuit as a great joke, but it's mean."

She chanced a glance at him. The dark eyes were watchful. She hoped to heaven he didn't see past her disapproving facade to the troubled emotions churning inside her. She was so cursed weary of this continual push and pull when she was with Elias. She wanted him. She mistrusted him. She should run. His nearness made her itch to touch him.

"My pursuit of you is anything but a joke," he said gently.

"Whatever it is, it's unwelcome." She caught her father's hostile glower from further down the table. What joy. Another lecture was in store.

"I won't back down," Elias said stubbornly. "The marriage of a lovely, vital woman to a desiccated prune like Desborough is a travesty."

"It's none of your business," she whispered desperately, her shaking hand closing hard around the stem of her crystal gla.s.s.

"And Tranter would bore you silly in five minutes."

Although Elias's voice was quiet, Tranter's head jerked around. Marianne felt a frisson of alarm at the hatred in his eyes as he stared at Elias. It was the strongest emotion she'd ever seen him display. Usually he was so keen to appear the perfect gentleman that he had the depth of a puddle. Observing him now, she wondered if there were darker forces at work inside society's favorite. Her attention fell on Desborough who chatted to Genevieve with a calmness that took no note of his chosen bride's proximity to a handsome man of doubtful reputation.

Of course Desborough's suit had her father's approval and Marianne Seaton was famous as a dutiful daughter. Even during last year's scandal, everybody had described her behavior as impeccable. Although she'd heard spiteful mutterings about Cam getting frostbite from his wooing and preferring a warmer bed than the Seaton chit's.

"He's panting to kill me right now," Elias said with some satisfaction.

Marianne regarded her persecutor with resentment. "He's not alone."

To her chagrin, Elias laughed. "It's nice to see you're not entirely a saint."

"You'd try the patience of the greatest saint."

"Is that why you refused my proposal? Because you fear I'd shatter this false sh.e.l.l of perfection that you've built around yourself? Are you afraid that I won't treat you like a porcelain figurine, but like a real woman?"

Plenty of people had accused her of lacking human feeling. She never betrayed how it hurt. Hearing it from the man who claimed to know her, who claimed to want her, who lied about loving her, stabbed sharper than a knife. She tensed her jaw against the pain and told herself that this was why she was right to reject him.

"You know exactly why I refused you, my lord," she said flatly and turned to Mr. Bullstrode. She began to discuss the weather at such length that it saved her having to address Elias until the ladies left the gentlemen to their port.

Chapter Seven.

Marianne admired how her hostess found s.p.a.ce and sustenance for the mult.i.tude and ensured that the gentlemen had enough port and brandy to oil their evening. All with a warmth and ease that made the party feel like a civilized gathering and not an emergency camp on a flood plain. With the house organized, Sidonie retired after dinner for a coze with Genevieve and Marianne.

Marianne's father had never approved of her friendship with Lady Hillbrook. Sidonie's family was undistinguished, and society had counted the six months between her marriage and the birth of her daughter. Not to mention the gossip clinging to her formidable husband, including rumors that he'd murdered the previous Viscount Hillbrook.

Only the lure of a fat profit on his Hampstead land had brought Lord Baildon to Ferney. Sidonie's charm and beauty had since worked their magic. Tonight, Marianne's father had looked almost jolly once he'd stopped scowling at his daughter. And this was despite the presence of Elias and Lord Tranter. Marianne supposed her father relied on her obedience to his wishes, an obedience inculcated since childhood.

What a predicable little nonent.i.ty she was.

Genevieve and Sidonie were much more dynamic personalities. Both women had fought for their happiness. They'd dared the world's disdain and in return found marriages that united heart and soul-and perhaps most disturbing to a woman facing a loveless future, of body. Even someone as inexperienced as Marianne felt the zing in the air.

After four days at Ferney, she was envious. And stirred.

She couldn't imagine her breath hitching with excitement at Desborough's touch. She couldn't imagine love softening his voice when he spoke her name the way Hillbrook and Richard's voices softened when they addressed their wives.

It was late when she left Sidonie's parlor. After her friends retired, she'd lingered behind to select a book from her hostess's stash of naughty novels. Although given how fragile she felt, some improving volume on stoic philosophy might be a better choice.

Marianne told herself that she felt so low because she was tired and the day had been beyond difficult. But thinking of everything she'd never have made her falter to a stop. Blinking back stinging tears, she leaned one hand on the wall of the lamplit corridor. Standing in the quiet hallway while the rest of Ferney slept, she finally admitted that blindly following her father's dictates was poor spirited. Worthy of George Seaton's insipid daughter, not of the woman who claimed gallant Sidonie Merrick and brilliant Genevieve Harmsworth as friends.

She'd never gone after what she wanted. And because she'd always done what she was told, a lifetime of dreary duty stretched ahead. The house crowded around her, silently reproaching her for her cowardice.

Except when she clambered out of her slough of self-pity, the house wasn't completely silent. Somewhere someone played the piano. Something slow and melancholy.

Marianne had sent her maid away before she came downstairs. Her father had gone to bed hours ago. She hadn't seen her suitors since dinner.

n.o.body waited for her. n.o.body watched her.

This was so unusual that it felt like freedom. If she wished to enjoy beautiful music in the still of the night, no one would gainsay her.

She drifted toward the music room where Desborough had proposed. Even that memory couldn't pierce her trance.

She was close enough now to identify the piece. Part of a Beethoven sonata, slow arpeggios and solemn ba.s.s, music that always made her picture moonlight on a calm sea. When she'd left Sidonie's parlor, she'd been weary to the point of dropping. Now she felt alert, curious, strangely expectant.

The pianist reached the end and Marianne waited outside the closed door, wanting more.

As if in response to her unspoken request, the mysterious musician began the piece again. Soft, sweet, sad, beautiful. Whoever played was an artist indeed. For a long time, she stood captive in the empty hallway, the exquisite music making her want to cry.

Unable to resist, she edged the door open. In Ferney, the doors didn't dare squeak so she was safe from discovery. For a few transfixed minutes, she poised on the threshold.

A branch of candles on the gleaming square piano. Rain catching gold from the candlelight as it battered the windowpanes. The tall man with black hair sitting with his back to her while he played from memory.

"Come in," Elias said softly, without interrupting the steady procession of notes.

Of course it was Elias. Somewhere in her soul, she'd known that from first hearing the music. She glanced past him and realized he could see her hovering figure in its rich purple taffeta gown reflected in the wet gla.s.s.

Her belly knotted in useless yearning. Her fingers curled at her sides, aching to touch those straight shoulders, that long back. She bit her lip to curb a sigh of longing. Good sense dictated that she retreat, but the rebellion that had sparked earlier demanded that she s.n.a.t.c.h this moment. She'd spent her life avoiding danger and all it had got her was a wedding to Lord Desborough to look forward to.

On shaky legs, she edged further into the room and waited without speaking as Elias finished the Beethoven and continued into music she didn't know. Something bittersweet that spoke of opportunities lost and joy so fleeting that it vanished even as it bloomed.

Her fingers clenched around the thin leather volume she carried. She'd heard Elias play before. Occasionally he accompanied a singer at a musicale and he'd played for dancing at Cam and Pen's Christmas party. She'd never heard him make music purely for its own sake. It was a revelation. She'd fought her attraction to him. Tonight as he conjured such transcendent beauty with his fingers, she gave up fighting. Twice today they'd exchanged bitter words, but right now she couldn't summon anything except a forbidden delight in his presence.

When the rippling accompaniment finally stopped, he rested his hands on the ivory keys before he turned to meet her eyes. "You're crying."

She raised an unsteady hand to her wet cheeks. The music had cut through her pretense at serenity to the roiling turmoil in her heart. "Yes."

A smile hovered around his mouth. "Was I so bad?"

Confused emotions crowded too close for her to rise to his gentle teasing. "What was that last music?"

"Something by a young Viennese composer called Franz Schubert. I met him when I visited the city and he gave me a copy."

"It's lovely."

"You're lovely." He rose from the piano stool and approached slowly as if afraid she'd fly away if he made any sudden movement. "I was thinking of you as I played."

She should tell him to be quiet. She should turn on her heel and retreat to her lonely bed.