“His grace, the Duke of Trent, is here to see you, madam.”
Vivian stood up from the chair at her writing desk where she’d spent the better part of the afternoon working on lingering correspondence and sifting through personal financial accounts, thankful that he’d finally arrived. She hadn’t been able to concentrate on anything anyway, knowing he’d have the manuscript copy ready and that by this time tomorrow their shared nightmare would be over.
“Thank you, Harriet. Send him in,” she acknowledged with a tip of her forehead, wishing she had a moment to freshen up before he entered. The best she could manage was to shake out her silk skirts and smooth down several strands of stray curls that had loosened from the plaits she had wrapped around her ears.
Seconds later she heard his footsteps in the hallway, followed by his majestic presence filling the doorway. The sight of him never failed to take her breath away. This afternoon he wore a formal suit in dove gray, exquisitely tailored to fit his large frame, white silk waistcoat and black Byron tie. He’d combed his hair neatly away from his face in a manner that added distinction to his perfectly sculpted features and dark hazel eyes.
Faintly, she smiled at him. “Your grace.”
He nodded once, minutely, and stepped into her parlor. “Mrs. Rael-Lamont.”
She cast a quick glance to her house keeper who followed him in. “That will be all, Harriet.”
The older woman curtsied once and replied, “Yes, ma’am.” Then she closed the door behind her, leaving the two of them alone.
For a few seconds neither spoke. Vivian’s first instinct was to throw herself into his arms, to kiss him, embrace him, love him. But something held her back. In an instant she became aware of a change in him, from the tight line of his mouth to the subtle look of formal distance in his eyes. Such an unexpected turn unnerved her.
“I—would you like to sit?” she asked, palm outstretched as she motioned him toward a chair across from the pink settee.
He drew in a long, deep breath. “Thank you.”
She swallowed, unbearably anxious of a sudden, watching him closely as he turned and stepped around the settee. Lowering his body into the chair, he tossed a plain white folder of sorts onto the tea table in front of her.
Vivian stared at it, realizing at once that it contained a copy of the signed Shakespearean manuscript. She desperately wanted to open it immediately, but restrained herself because of his unusual demeanor. What surprised her was that she cared more about him and what he was feeling at the moment than she did about the opportunity to clear her good name. That was dangerous.
“I’m not sure what to say,” she remarked, studying every nuance of his face.
He leaned casually against the armrest, his fist at his chin, scrutinizing her candidly. “I have something to confess, Vivian.”
Her eyes widened a bit. “Confess?”
“Why don’t you sit down.”
She didn’t like this change in him at all. “What’s wrong, Will?” she asked very quietly.
He thought about that for a moment, then said again, “Sit down, Vivian.”
Her heart began to race. She couldn’t think of a single thing she’d done to make him angry with her, and yet he didn’t seem angry exactly. Just…distant. Formal.
Shoulders erect, she stepped around the tea table and did as he bid her, arranging her skirts with precision then placing her hands in her lap.
“I’m going to say some things to you that you may not like,” he maintained, his gaze locked with hers. “When I’m finished, I want you to explain some things to me.”
Confusion lit her brow. “Explain what things? Did something happen?”
He lowered his fist, rested his elbows on the arm-rests, and folded his hands across his stomach. “I’m sure you understand that from the first moment you stepped into my home weeks ago with your unusual…proposal, shall we say, I was under obligation to protect myself.”
“Protect yourself?”
“From any potential threats—to my good name, my finances, my property.”
She began to shake her head, now completely stupefied. “I’m not sure I understand.”
He offered her a twisted grin. “I hired a private agent of inquiry.”
It took seconds for her to grasp that disclosure, and when she did, her eyes opened wide in shock. “You had Gilbert Montague investigated?”
His lids narrowed to slits as he held her gaze. “Yes. And you.”
And you.
Vivian felt her heart stop, the blood drain from her face. Dazed, she whispered, “Wha—what?”
Shrewdly, he repeated. “I had you investigated, Mrs. Rael-Lamont.”
She couldn’t breathe.
Oh, my God…
Blinking quickly, she looked around her, her fingers clinging to the cushioned seat of the settee, deathly afraid she was about to lose her stomach, or faint. The room reeled before her, the sudden heat oppressed her, and still he sat across from her calmly, watching her.
He doesn’t understand.
On shaking legs, she tried to stand, uncertain where to go, what to do or say. She couldn’t think.
But he knows.
Her palm flew to her mouth as a rush of tears filled her eyes. Tears shed mostly because she was starting to love him. And now he knew.
It was over.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked in a husky whisper.
Trembling, Vivian walked around the settee, one hand over her mouth, the other clutching the fine fabric of her gown at her belly. For a minute or so she tried to steady herself, to concentrate on what he said to her, to keep from looking at him until this moment of crazed weakness in her passed and she could think about these implications rationally.
She kept her back to him, resting her bottom on the sloped arm of the settee, hugging herself now for her own sense of protection.
“What did you learn?” she asked at last, her tone raspy and low as she stared at the tiny pink flowers in the wallpaper.
She heard him adjust his body in the chair but she didn’t turn around. She wasn’t yet ready to face him.
“I learned you’re still married.”
She closed her eyes. “I suppose that’s true.”
He grunted. “You suppose that’s true? Do you have any idea what that means?”
How could he ask her that? “Of course I know what that means, Will. I am fully aware of all the implications. But there’s much about the circumstances you likely don’t understand.”
“Explain it to me,” he gruffly demanded.
Her eyes popped open as a fast irritation struck her. She whirled around to glare at him. “Don’t you dare think you can come into my home and present yourself as the mighty Duke of Trent, ordering me to explain things to you that, in fact, are none of your concern. I’ll tell you what I choose to tell you.”
He pulled back just enough for her to realize she had jolted him with that bold and unladylike assertion.
“That’s right, darling Vivian,” he remarked caustically, and very slowly, “I can’t order you to do anything, can I? I am not your husband.”
The idea of Will Raleigh as her husband simply stunned her—and made her tingle all over with a heady need unfulfilled. Oh, if only it were so…
She pressed a shaky palm to her forehead and closed her eyes again. “You of all people should understand that I was never married in the complete sense of the word—”
“Goddamnit, Vivian, that’s irrelevant.” He bolted from the chair, turned, and walked swiftly to the window, staring out to Mrs. Henry’s petunias next door.
“It’s not irrelevant,” she countered furiously, “and you should understand that after I told you the cold and horrid facts about my husband and our relationship. Everything I told you was the truth.”
He pivoted to face her once more, his arms crossed over his chest. “The fact is you are married, Mrs. Rael-Lamont, not widowed, and that you never told me,” he enunciated in whisper. “You knew it when you let me make love to you.”
Her mouth dropped open as she fisted her hands at her side. “Let you make love to me? Were you not a willing participant?”
His eyes flashed daggers. “I was not a willing participant in adultery.”
“In my mind, your grace, and by law, it was never adultery,” she seethed, her tone low and daring him to counter. “I have a separation agreement signed by Leopold. You know it’s as good as a divorce.”
He shook his head in wonder. “A divorce. Nobody gets divorced!”
His blatant fury and lack of understanding brought tears to her eyes again, but she remained steadfast in her stance, her gaze locked with his. Softly, she murmured, “No they don’t. Not in our world, Will. But he used me for my money, married me for my name, then couldn’t provide me with companionship or children, and refused to grant me an annulment because of how it would reflect on him.” She inhaled a deep, trembling breath, then added in whisper, “The separation agreement was all I had. Without it, I would have had no life worth living, Will, and above all things I wanted a life.”
Will just stared at her, caught in a turbulent storm of raw emotion. If there was nothing else he understood about life it was that it must be lived. He had nearly lost his through no fault of his own, and for the remainder of his years on earth he vowed to fight if his survival were ever again attacked. As he witnessed Vivian expressing her own desire for personal justice, he couldn’t help but be enamored of her passion, her elegant beauty and strength of will that allowed her to establish herself as a woman of independence and charm when the alternative for her would have been certain boredom, regret, anger, and eventually suicide, whether real or emotional. She had risen above it the best way she could. Will identified with every word she spoke, and even as livid as he was with her now, he knew at that moment that he was beginning to love her.
He shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other, afraid that she would suddenly notice his own revelation. “But you can never remarry,” he mumbled thickly.
She laughed as she wiped a lone tear from her cheek with the back of her hand. “Remarry? What on earth would make you think I’d want to?”
He tried not to let that irk him. “Maybe for love?”
She faced him directly, hugging herself again with her arms crossed over her breasts, chin lifted and eyes shining with a mixture of determination and outright sorrow. “Just as nobody gets divorced, nobody marries just for love, Will,” she returned softly. “It’s an illusive thing, with or without the legal documents.”
He felt like crawling out of his skin. Remarkably, on the outside, he remained composed. “Have you never been in love?” he asked quietly.
She took a staggered step back, then lowered her gaze to the floor and shook her head. “I can’t discuss this now,” she said, lifting a palm to her throat.
“Can’t discuss it? Why?”
“Please,” she begged in whisper. “It doesn’t matter. Don’t make this harder, Will.”
God, she frustrated him! Raking his fingers harshly through his hair, he turned his back on her to stare out the window again, seeing nothing. She couldn’t marry even if she wanted to, wouldn’t divulge her innermost feelings to him. They were at a standstill.
For several long minutes silence reigned in the pink, flower-filled parlor. Then at last he heard the rustle of her skirts and realized she’d sat on the settee again.
“Tell me one thing more,” he said without looking at her.
Seconds later, she replied, “If I can.”
He considered his words, choosing them with care. “You said he married you for your name and money, and yet he is a French aristocrat, thereby surely possessing his own. What, then, did you mean by that?”
She took so long to answer, remained so quiet, he finally had to turn to see if she was still in the room, still breathing. But as his eyes fell upon her lovely form, in her teal gown of costly silk and hand-stitched lace, her composed manner even in the midst of heart-rending discord, her regal posture, dignity, and elegant beauty, he very nearly smiled as a shudder of incredulity passed through him.
“Who are you, really?” he asked, his gentle tone of concern imploring her to reveal what she’d been so long trying to hide from everyone.
Without moving a muscle, without taking her eyes off the ceramic pot filled to the brim with dried daisies in front of her, she breathed, “I am formerly of Northumberland, the eldest daughter of the Earl of Werrick.”
And that’s when Will grasped it all. “Lady Vivian,” he stated through a softly spoken sigh.
She closed her eyes. “Always…”
It had to be the most appalling thing, Will surmised, to pretend for years to be something you are not, or in Vivian’s case, a member of the nobility and unable to shine as one of them. The cold darkness of Northumberland was far removed from the sun and flowers of Cornwall, yet her entire life had paralleled his in almost every other way. She had been raised as he had, educated by the finest tutors, given every opportunity to advance socially, likely spoiled with riches, and married to the best. Only in her case, the best had turned out to be her worst nightmare. Just as his had.
“Why are you living here?” he asked in a hoarse whisper, hoping his own confused emotions would remain in check and unobserved.
After a moment of thought, she lifted her face and opened her eyes heavenward. “You of all people should understand how it feels to be shunned, to be turned away by one’s peers.”
That cut him deeply, but he stayed silent.
She swallowed with considerable effort, her forehead creasing from an inner pain.
“I have two sisters, Will, and no brothers. As the oldest, I was expected to be the one to achieve excellence first, to set a good example, and indeed, my father arranged a magnificent marriage for me to Lord Stanley Maitland, Viscount Shereport. Unfortunately for my father, I didn’t much care for aged, widowed Lord Stanley and all four of his children, even if his property did border Werrick and would eventually become part of our family’s estate.” She lowered her head and stared at her hands as she wrung them tightly in her lap.
“I met Leopold at a masked ball several months before my wedding and quickly became enamored of him. He was French, true, but he was also exotic, handsome, and charming to a fault.” She snickered bitterly, shaking her head. “You asked me if I’ve ever been in love? Well, I was in love once, Will, with Leopold Rael-Lamont, and he in turn loved my dowry and everything he could buy with it, including trips to Nice with hired ladies, very fine wine, expensive suits, and of course his opium, always that. I was deceived by an expert, and the hardest thing of all was admitting to my father in the end that he had been right. I should have married Lord Stanley. I may not have been loved, but I would have been needed. With Leopold, I wasn’t even needed.”
Her voice had started to tremble when she finished her divulgence of past mistakes and difficult memories. Will absorbed every word of it, both fascinated and intensely moved, wondering at the strength of the human spirit that above all else must be free and must feel worth. Vivian had found that freedom, that self-worth, by leaving a husband who deserted her on their wedding night. But at what cost?
“I think you are very brave,” he whispered huskily, wanting to embrace her but holding back because he instinctively knew she’d dismiss it as coddling. She was not, and never would be, a woman to be coddled.
Recovering herself, she straightened and offered him a faint smile. “You’re kind to think so, but I’m probably just the opposite, your grace.”
He began to stride in her direction, though he stopped as he reached the chair across from her, placing his palms flat on the high back.
“I suppose that in the end, your father did not approve of the separation, either.”
Gracefully, she stood to eye him at his level. “I think you know that he wouldn’t have, Will,” she said softly.
“And that’s why you chose to live in Penzance, far away from home.”
She hesitated, then amended, “Far away from disgracing my family. I have two sisters. They’ve made good marriages, but scandal would cost them. I’ve chosen to live out my life here in Cornwall, the relatively wealthy widow of Mr. Rael-Lamont, while my family lives in Northumberland, claiming I’m in good aristocratic company living with my husband’s family on the Continent.”
“And your husband?” he had to ask, even as the question left a knot of coiled tension in his chest.
She clasped her hands behind her back. “I paid him handsomely to sign the separation agreement. I haven’t heard from him in more than ten years, though it’s been rumored that he’s enjoying my funding in the sunny south of France.”
He shook his head in amazement. “Were you the one to come up with this arrangement, or did someone else?”
“I did.”
“And you both win.”
“Yes, in a manner of speaking.”
“In a manner of speaking,” he repeated.
She raised her chin a bit higher. “I do still communicate with my sisters, but only by post. I enjoy my freedom here, Will, my social position and business, for which I’ve worked so diligently all these years, and I suspect I’d do just about anything to preserve them.”
Suddenly, with those carefully guarded words, the initial reason they were brought together in the first place came crashing back into the solemn interlude they’d just shared.
After a brief moment of studying her, Will stepped around the chair and moved toward her. She didn’t back away this time, but remained resolute in bearing, steady in her stance.
When he stood inches from her, he gazed down to her beautiful face, noting the determination etched into her features. Placing his palms on her cheeks, he held her, watching her, until he felt her shiver.
“I will forever guard your secret, Vivian.”
She lowered her lashes, then once each, he kissed her eyes.
“Will…”
He faintly pressed his lips to hers, held them there for several long seconds, then released her.
Damn.
“The forgery is in the envelope,” he said softly against her forehead. “What time is the meeting?”
She raised her hands and placed her palms flat on his chest. “Seven o’clock this evening, at a pub behind the theater on Canal Street.”
He frowned. “The Jolly Knights.”
She backed up a bit. “You know of it?”
“Yes,” he answered without explanation, then added, “He’s chosen wisely in meeting at a public place.”
She nodded, reassuring him. “There will be others nearby. I shouldn’t have to be alone with him at all, at any time.”
Will wasn’t altogether certain she could know that, but he would be taking precautions, something he chose not to mention to her.
He drew in an unsteady breath. “I’ll be watching; my investigator and his men will be watching.” Pulling back, he cupped her chin and jaw in his large hand. “Most importantly, you watch yourself. I don’t want to lose you now. I have no other florists.”
She looked into his eyes a final time, managing a half-grin, though her gaze conveyed a trepidation that made his heart melt. Always together, forever to be apart. In a husky whisper, he assured her, “I’m not going anywhere, Lady Vivian.”
Her gaze softened with tenderness. “Thank you—for everything.”
He smiled reassuringly, gently squeezed her chin. With a parting, soft touch of his lips to hers, he turned and walked out of her parlor.