“Perhaps France, now the war is over,” she said with false brightness. “Maybe Italy. My own grand tour.”
“With a two-month-old child?”
Her smile fled. “I just wanted you to know that I regret what I did, Nicholas, my stupid, foolish behavior. I hurt David, and my parents. But I do not regret Jamie. My son is the love of my life. I thought my father might—accept him, after my brother’s death, but he only wants me dead too.”
He stared at the uncertainty in her face, visible in her eyes, even if she kept her jaw set with fierce determination. She didn’t have a clue where she was going.
He took her hands. Her fingers were ice in his. “Julia, don’t leave Town just yet. Wait a few days. I’ll make some arrangements—”
“You’ve done far too much already,” she said, and tried to pull her hand free, but he refused to give it up.
“My brother loved you.”
There was doubt in her eyes. “Did he? Like a sister, perhaps. It’s my fault he’s dead. He fought that duel for my honor, although I had no honor left to fight for. He’d be alive if I hadn’t—”
“He would have married you anyway if he lived.”
She raised her chin, and curled her fingers in his. He felt the scrape of her nails on his palm. “I would not have let him.”
Despite her downfall from earl’s daughter to ruined woman, she was still the girl he remembered. The blackguard who seduced her had suffered no such fate.
“Tell me his name, Julia,” he asked again. “Who is Jamie’s father? Was he the man David challenged?”
“It doesn’t matter, Nick. I have not seen him since that night—” She shut her eyes, blushed. “What would you do if you knew? Another foolish duel? I could not bear it if you were killed too, for my stupidity.”
The blush added color to her pale face for a moment, made her look like the pretty woman she’d always been.
“Then allow me to speak to your father again.”
“No. I cannot bear to see the disgust in his eyes again.”
Desperation filled him, a need to protect her. “Then marry me, Julia.”
It would fix everything, surely. With Julia by his side, as his duchess, his wife, being Duke of Temberlay might be bearable. She was his friend, his sister.
He realized at once it was a mistake.
She looked up in surprise, her dark eyes wide. Then she smiled sadly. “I hear you’re already betrothed, Nicholas. And your grandmother would never allow you to marry a fallen woman. I thank you for the offer, but no.”
Frustration warred with relief in Nicholas’s breast. He didn’t want to marry anyone. He wanted exactly what he couldn’t have, the past back again.
She set his hand aside and got to her feet, lowering the veil again, moving toward the door. “I hope you find happiness in your marriage.”
“Wait,” he said. “Promise me you’ll wait a few days, Julia. Don’t leave London yet. Let me make some inquiries.”
She lowered her eyes to her hands. “Thank you. I find I must accept your kindness yet again. I really must learn to stand on my own two feet. Three days, then I must be gone.”
When she’d gone, he wondered what might have happened if she had accepted his proposal. It would have been so simple, so tidy, for both of them, a comfortable, companionable union . But Julia was right, his grandmother would never accept her now. Instead, he was tied to a woman he’d never even met. Anger flared again at the senseless mess David’s death had created.