A Rogue's Downfall Read online

  She snatched her hand from his and overturned her chair in her haste to get to her feet.

  “Amy—” he said.

  “It is not very flattering to be told that one is a millstone about someone else’s neck,” she said. “But I don’t care. If it is guilt that has brought you here, my lord, you can go back to London tomorrow with a clear conscience. I absolve you of any guilt in what happened. I wanted it to happen. And I am not sorry it happened. So you can go back to your life and all your other women, and forget about me.”

  “Amy.” He tried to regain possession of her hand, but she snatched it away again.

  “And no more games,” she said. “Perhaps they are amusing for you. They are not for me. Go play them with some other woman. Go away. Leave me in peace again. I have lived without you for a year. I can live without you for the rest of a lifetime.”

  She turned to rush from the room, but she jerked back again, before she could stop herself from so spoiling the effect of her anger, to snatch up her rose. She hurried away, waiting for him to say her name again. But there was silence behind her. She had to climb the stairs and make her way to her room from memory. Her eyes were blinded by tears.

  The day was over. The day that might have been hers.

  It was wrong to be feeling so elated, he thought as he walked through the formal gardens to look at the bank that sloped sharply downward beyond them. Sure enough, the brown earth was being nudged aside by numerous green shoots from the daffodil bulbs. There would be blooms before the end of the month.

  And he would see them too this year. By God, he would. The blooming of the daffodils had always been the highlight of spring. He could remember taking a bouquet of yellow trumpets to Cook one year. She had tapped Jenkins’s predecessor none too gently on the wrist when he had called him a young jackanapes. She had ordered the man to leave the dear little lad alone. The aggrieved gardener had gone stamping off to cut away the abandoned stems.

  Even now, long before the daffodils came into bloom, he felt that light soaring of the heart that spring always seemed to bring—except last year. Paradoxically, he had found her bitterness and her anger reassuring. Her words had given him hope.

  I wanted it to happen, she had said. And I am not sorry it happened. She had been speaking of the experience he would have thought she had found the worst and the ugliest in her life.

  He was conceived in beauty. It was the most wonderful experience of my life.

  He went down on his haunches the better to see one shoot that was just peeking above the surface of the earth. He had been. Their son had been conceived in beauty. Strangely it had been beautiful. He had felt so much guilt over it since that he had ignored the memory of how it had been at the time. It had not been the quick, frenzied coupling that one might have expected of two people coming together under such circumstances. He had made love to her. He could not remember making love to any other woman, though he had bedded more than he could possibly count. He had suppressed the memory of the tenderness with which he had given her joy. And guilt had forbidden him to remember the answering joy he had found in her body.

  “I love you,” she had whispered to him over and over again when he was deep in her body. She had been gazing up into his eyes, and he had believed the words and not found them either amusing or alarming.

  “I love you,” he had whispered back. Three words that he had never strung together and spoken aloud before—or since. Words that he had forgotten saying.

  What had made her doubt between that moment and the next morning when she had refused his marriage offer? He straightened up and turned his steps to the hothouses. Perhaps the same thing that had made him doubt—soberness and the memory of who she was, and who and what he was. In her inexperience, she had probably imagined that what he had done to her body and the words he had whispered to her were what normally happened between a rake and his doxy. And in his inexperience, perhaps he had imagined that a young and innocent girl with a few drinks inside her could not possibly know what she did or said—and could not possibly welcome the addresses of the man who had seduced and ruined her.

  No more games, she had said. Go away. Leave me in peace.

  Did she mean what she had said? And yet she had been distraught and crying. And then she had turned back to grab the rose that was part of the game. Perhaps he had spent too long believing what she said and what she seemed to say. People did not always speak the truth, he knew. People did not often speak the truth when they were trying to mask emotions and protect pride. Had he ever spoken the full truth? Perhaps telling only a part of the truth was as bad as telling none of it.

  “Jenkins,” he said, seeing that his head gardener was inside the hothouse where the roses grew, his pride and joy, the one part of the garden that no other gardener was allowed to trespass upon, “show me the loveliest red bud, will you?”

  Jenkins looked glum. “Another one?” he said. “I’m only glad whoever thought of Valentine’s Day did not have the bright idea of making it Valentine’s Week. That one I would say, m’lord. Or would you prefer one that is partly opened?”

  “No,” the earl said. “The tighter the bud the better. That one? Yes, I think I would have to agree.” Jenkins sighed. “That one it will be then. Making up for lost time, are you, m’lord?”

  The earl looked at him sidelong. “I will not dignify that impertinence with an answer,” he said. “I shall come just before dinner to cut it.”

  “She has them side by side in a vase by her bed,” Jenkins said. “So Jessie says. Cook thinks it must be working, m’lord. Which is more than you deserve, she says. And the rest of us agree with her.”

  “Well,” the earl said, “I shall have to remember my servants’ opinion of me the next time I hear a whisper about a raise in wages, won’t I?”

  Jenkins chuckled and moved off to another part of the hothouse.

  She half expected that he would have left during the afternoon, gone back to London without a word of farewell. That was what she had told him to do, after all. But a casual question to Jessie, when the latter had come to dress her for dinner, revealed that he was still there.

  “And such lovely rosebuds those two are, my lady,” Jessie said smugly. “Cut them himself, he did. Mr. Jenkins don’t allow no one else even to set foot inside that hothouse. Fat lot of good the roses do when there is no one but him to look at them, I always say. Except you, of course, my lady. You are allowed in. And now his lordship.”

  “Yes, they are lovely,” Amy agreed. “I must press them and preserve them before they pass their best.”

  Jessie smiled with secret satisfaction.

  She should send word down that she would eat dinner in her room, Amy thought, frowning at the first two evening gowns Jessie held up for her approval, finally settling for the white lace over white satin and the vivid red sash that matched the red rosebuds at the top of each scallop of the hem. And yet, instead, here she was picking out one of her favorite dresses and sending Jessie in search of her red slippers. She would not cower from him, she thought, as she had thought the evening before. She would return to her room after dinner, but she would eat in the dining room. And she was quite prepared to discuss the weather and the season with him again if he felt obliged to keep the silence at bay.

  She did not feel as unhappy as perhaps she ought. She had spoken the truth to him and freed herself of some of the pain of the past year. She had freed herself from some of the oppressive sense of guilt and sin that had hung over her all that time. What she had done was wrong. There was no doubt in her mind about that. But it had not been ugly. She was glad that she had admitted that. She was glad that she had realized it. And glad that she had told him, though it must have been patently obvious how vulnerable she was to him. It did not matter. It had felt good to admit to both him and herself that what had happened had been beautiful. That it had been the most wonderful experience of her life. That their son was the product of beauty.

  She did not care wha
t it had been to him. To her it had been beautiful. It had been an experience of love. Oh, not a very profound love, perhaps, since she had not known him and did not even now know him well. But it had been a love that had induced her to give herself, and it was a love that had not died even though she had spent a year hating him—and for good reason. How could he so cruelly have abandoned her? She would not think of it. It did not matter.

  Satisfied with her appearance some time later, she turned her steps to the drawing room, where he was awaiting her as he had been the evening before. Perhaps, she thought, before he left, if she was given the chance, she would throw the final defiance in his teeth and tell him the full truth. Perhaps she would tell him that the words she had spoken to him over and over again while he had made love to her had been true. And that they were still true. He thought she had been a millstone before? She would be a veritable mountain for the rest of his life. She smiled as he handed her a glass of ratafia.

  She bit her lip hard and willed the tears to stay back out of sight a few minutes later when he led her into the dining room and she saw the deep red rosebud across her plate. He had paid no heed to her words then. He was still playing the game. Whatever it was, he was still playing it. She longed—and dreaded—to know what the end would be.

  “Thank you,” she said. “Oh, it is beautiful. And it matches my sash and slippers.”

  “A red rose tonight,” he said. “Red for passion.”

  If her chair had not been pressing against the backs of her knees already, she knew she would have disgraced herself and fallen to the floor. She sat down hastily.

  “I shall leave you to your port,” she said, getting to her feet. She had scarcely touched any of the food that had been placed in front of her. “Thank you for the rose—for the roses.” She picked up the longstemmed red rosebud.

  “Amy—” he said.

  “I shall retire to my room if you will permit it,” she said. “I have a headache.”

  He took her free hand in his. “I will not permit it,” he said. “And I do not for one moment believe that you have a headache. Sit down.”

  She sat, her eyes downcast, her lips compressed. “Our guests would not take kindly to your going off to bed without even bidding them a good evening,” he said.

  “Our guests?” Her eyes flew to his face.

  “Only two,” he said. “I see from Morse’s nod that they are in the drawing room already, awaiting us. Shall we join them?” He got to his feet, bowed to her, and extended an arm.

  “You did not tell me you had invited guests.” Her voice was accusing, aggrieved. “I do not want to entertain guests. If they are your friends, you may entertain them yourself. I want to go to my room. James—”

  “—was given your full attention not very long ago,” he said. “And will not need it again until much later. It is my turn, Amy. There are two men in your life, not just one. You promised me today. Give me what is left of it. If you still feel as mutinous at the end of it as your tone and your expression suggest at this moment, then you may consign me to hell before you retire for the night. I may even oblige you by going there.”

  He smiled and felt treacherously lighthearted. He watched her lips compress still further and resisted the temptation to soften them with his own. It was a little too soon for that yet. She might reward him with a resounding slap. Besides, Morse, busy at the sideboard with two footmen, was drinking in the whole scene. From childhood on, the earl had realized that his servants were neither deaf nor blind—nor particularly closemouthed. Doubtless, everyone belowstairs would be crowing with delight at the information that he had kissed his wife in the dining room. They could go to the devil with his blessing, the lot of them. He suppressed a grin.

  “The evening cannot pass quickly enough for me,” she said, sniffing her rose.

  He wasted a smile on her bent head. And then sobered. He was sure of nothing. Perhaps he had totally misread the signs all day. Perhaps by tomorrow he really would be consigned to hell.

  “Who are they?” she asked when he paused outside the drawing room.

  Morse had excelled himself. The carpet had been rolled back, and the bare floor shone. The grand pianoforte, which usually stood in one window alcove, had been moved farther out into the room. Miss Sarah Williams, the vicar’s daughter, sat at it with her cousin seated at her side, his violin resting on his lap. The only light came from the single branch of candles that stood on the pianoforte. A table covered with a stiffly starched white cloth stood at the other side of the room, a bowl of fruit punch on it—nonalcoholic out of deference to James—and also a cake. The cake was a surprise to the earl. It was decorated with pink icing and a sculpted red rose and was—yes, by God it was— in the shape of a heart.

  Cook! Dear Cook. She was going to have to endure a hug and a kiss on the cheek tomorrow. He would probably get himself slapped for his pains.

  Miss Williams and her cousin rose to their feet.

  “Sarah!” Amy said, hurrying forward, both hands extended. “And Mr. Carstairs. What a lovely surprise. Have you come to play for us? We are privileged, indeed.” She kissed Miss Williams’s cheek and shook the cousin by the hand.

  “We certainly are,” the earl said, bowing to his guests and noting with some satisfaction that the mutinous expression on his wife’s face had been replaced by a glowing smile. “Perhaps you would treat us to a private concert for half an hour or so?” He seated his wife at some distance from the pianoforte and drew a chair up beside hers. She looked at him curiously and silently as he sat down.

  The earl felt privileged long before the half hour was over. Mr. Carstairs was indeed a talented violinist, and Miss Williams’s accompaniment was in no way inferior. Although he was paying the two of them a sizable sum for the evening’s work, he felt humbled by the beauty of the music they played.

  Amy sat watching and listening with glowing eyes and parted lips. He smiled at her between pieces and, feeling his eyes on her, she looked up at him and half smiled back. He took her hand and set it on his sleeve, covering it with his own. With her other hand, she held the rosebud on her lap.

  “And now,” he said at the end of the concert, getting to his feet after applauding the players and praising them, “to begin the ball.” He reached out a hand toward Amy.

  “Ball?” she said.

  “Ball.” He drew her to her feet. “We will dance on an uncluttered floor with no danger of being mowed down by an enthusiastic dancer and without the necessity of changing partners between sets or of having a variety of different dances. Waltzes, if you please,” he said, turning his head toward Miss Williams and her cousin.

  “We are going to waltz?” Amy said. “Here? Now? Alone?” .

  “Last year,” he said, taking her rose and setting it on the chair, “you asked no questions. Last year I felt alone with you once we began to dance. Did you not feel alone with me?”

  She was gazing into his eyes as if mesmerized. Miss Williams’s cousin was tuning his violin again. “Yes,” she said almost in a whisper.

  “It was this time last year,” he said, “that things began to go wrong. That we began to make some unwise choices. Let us see if we can do better this year, shall we?”

  Her eyes sparkled with unshed tears. Her hand reached up to his shoulder as his arm circled her waist and drew her closer. “Yes.” He saw her mouth form the word, though he did not hear it.

  “It was a pretty mask,” he said as the music began, and he moved with her to its rhythm. “But you look far prettier without it.”

  “And you,” she said.

  He grinned at her. “Prettier?” he said. “Ouch!”

  She smiled fleetingly. “More handsome,” she said.

  “I whispered improprieties in your ear last year,” he said. “What shall I whisper this year? That your beauty has outshone each of the roses I have given you today or all three of them combined? That you were at your most beautiful early this afternoon when your dress was down to your waist o
n one side and my son was at your breast? That the envy I felt of him amounted almost to jealousy? That today I have not been able to regret the events of last year? What shall I whisper that will have you melting against me as you did then?”

  She moaned.

  Steady, he told himself. Careful. He had ruined things utterly last year. Let him not compound the errors this year.

  “Or shall I just be quiet?” he said against her ear. “Shall we enjoy the music and the dance, Amy? My valentine?”

  “Yes.” Her face looked somewhat distressed. “Yes.”

  He stopped talking.

  My valentine. It is my turn, Amy. There are two men in your life, not just one. His words rang in her ears, seducing her with every passing minute. And his whispered words, lavish and expert in their flattery. He would only have to whisper the suggestion in her ear, and she would go with him as she had gone last year. She would allow him his pleasure again and be his dupe again.

  But the music and his closeness and the heady masculine musk of his cologne weaved their inexorable spell about her. The drink had been in no way to blame after all, she thought. This year she had not drunk one mouthful of alcohol. Yet this year she felt as light-headed as she had then, as unwilling to force her head to rule her heart.

  The game was almost at an end, she thought. He would take her to bed—she had no doubt that he intended to do so, and now she knew that she would not refuse him—and tomorrow he would leave again. Perhaps he would return at the end of October again to await the birth of his second child. The game would be at an end, and she would be the bitter loser again. And she was as powerless this year as she had been last year.