The Wicked Ways of a Duke(49)
“It was the only way I could think of to show you I’m sincere. I could have agreed to give you total control of the inheritance in some sort of prenuptial agreement, but my creditors would still come after the money and demand payment of my debts, so you would always have cause to suspect my motives.”
“Especially since the moment after we were wed you’d begin trying to sweet-talk your way into gaining control of it from me anyway,” she accused. “You would just keep trying to trick me.”
“I knew that’s what you’d think, and that’s why I did it this way, so there would be no doubt of my sincerity.”
She still had plenty of doubt. She studied him, and though she saw no devastating smile, no blithe confidence, she knew he could lie with his heart in his eyes, and she still felt the pain of his deceit.
“Seems like an awful lot of trouble to go to for a charming fortune hunter like you,” she said. “Why don’t you just find yourself another heiress? Lady Alberta Denville would marry you, I’ve no doubt.”
“I don’t want Alberta. I don’t want any other heiress, I don’t want any woman but you. I told you before, I’ve wanted you from the very beginning, ever since I first saw you at that ball, but I was in desperate need of money, and I knew the only way out of that hole was to marry an heiress. When I saw you at the opera, and Cora told me about your inheritance, that was all I needed to hear. From that moment on, the idea of marrying any other woman—heiress or not—never entered my head.”
She sniffed, unimpressed. “I don’t suppose it ever occurred to you to be honest with me about your motives?”
“With your romantic nature, I didn’t want to take the chance. I knew you thought of me as some sort of hero, and I thought wooing you through courtship was a better strategy.”
“Lying is never a better strategy, and you lied.” Prudence held up the paper. “After the things you’ve done, do you think this is all it takes to win me back?”
“No, but I’m hoping the next ten months will be long enough to convince you of my sincerity. I know I’ll never be your hero again—” He broke off and glanced away for a moment, his fist pressed to his mouth. Then he cleared his throat and looked at her again. “I know I’ve ruined any chance of that, but I hope I can at least gain your respect.”
He leaned over the paper and pointed to another paragraph. “This is where I tell everyone I’m going to earn my living from now on. I’ll be writing books for Marlowe Publishing.”
Prudence glanced at Viscount Marlowe, who nodded in confirmation, then she looked back at Rhys. “You’re going to be a writer?”
“Travel guides to Europe. Witty books for aristocrats on how to traverse the globe for no money at all, and serious books on where to go and what to see. A bit like Baedeker, you know. I realize it’s not much of an income,” he added in the wake of her astonished silence, “but it’s the only thing I’m remotely qualified to do, and I hope it will convince the woman I love that I’m more than a worthless lily of the field.”
She swallowed and closed her eyes, remembering when she’d accused him of that, of being worthless. She’d said it to hurt him, to wound him as she had been wounded. He’d deserved it, too, she reminded herself.
“That’s in here, too, by the way,” he said, causing her to open her eyes.
“What’s in here?” she asked. “That you’re a lily of the field?”
“That, and that I love you, not your money. I didn’t love you when we started, true enough, but I love you now, and I will love you until the moment I die. And that if you ever agree to marry me, you will make me the happiest man in the world.”
Prudence looked down at the words printed on the page as he repeated them, and the newsprint began to blur before her eyes. Deep down inside she began to shake, for she could feel a spark of hope that he was speaking the truth, and it frightened her. She was still raw with pain and afraid such hope only made her an even bigger fool.
“How can I marry you?” she cried. “You deceived me so thoroughly, how can I ever be sure you won’t lie to me again if it suits your purpose? How can I ever trust you again?”
A delicate cough interrupted any reply he might have made, and Prudence glanced around, remembering they were not alone. She returned her gaze to his and hardened her resolve. “I want you to leave.”
As if she were speaking to them, her friends all stood up.
“No,” she said in dismay as they began walking toward the door, “I didn’t mean all of you.” She waved a hand in Rhys’s direction. “I meant him.”
Her friends seemed to have gone suddenly deaf, for they continued out the door. Emma, the last one to exit the room, paused and glanced at Rhys. “I am acting as Prudence’s chaperone, St. Cyres. I shall be right outside the door.”
“No, wait!” Prudence cried, but the door swung shut behind her friend, leaving her alone with Rhys. She started to leave as well, but his arm caught her around the waist.
“Prudence, listen to me.” He hauled her back against his chest. “I know you don’t trust me, and you have every right, but other than giving up the money, I don’t know how to regain your trust.” He grasped her arms, turned her around. “Just tell me how.”
She looked up at him, into eyes as silvery green as a Yorkshire meadow in autumn, remembering the man she’d first seen, the man she’d thought him to be. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “You are not the man I thought you were. I don’t know who you are.”
She turned and walked toward the door. This time he didn’t try to stop her. She reached for the handle and turned it.
“My brother killed himself.”
The door handle clicked back into place, and Prudence turned around. “What?”
“He hanged himself from a stair rail at school because my mother was sending him back to Winter Park for a second summer holiday. Alone. She was sending him back alone. He couldn’t bear it.”
Prudence felt that strange eeriness along her spine, just as she had that afternoon in the drawing room at Winter Park. “He didn’t want to go?”
“No.” Rhys tilted his head back and stared at the ceiling. “There are some men, Prudence, who don’t care for women. They have…other tastes. A taste for boys. Evelyn had such tastes.”
“Oh my God.” She felt sick. “No.”
“It was just games at first, then…then other things. We were just boys, but we knew it wasn’t right, and we used to hide in the lavender house. Evelyn hated the place and never went there. But hiding didn’t always work.” He lowered his head and looked at her. “You can’t hide all the time.”
“He hurt your brother.” She swallowed hard, and forced herself to go on. “So, because of what happened to him, your brother killed himself.”
“Yes.”
“What about you?” she whispered. “What happened to you?”
He looked past her, staring at the closed door. “I stabbed Evelyn right through the hand with a fork the first time he touched me. Because of that, he locked me in a room for three days. Afterward, when Thomas told me what happened to him, we ran away, and I managed to get us to Hazelwood. My mother was actually in residence at the time. I tried to tell her what had happened, but—” He stopped and his face twisted, tearing at Prudence’s heart. “She called me a liar.”
Prudence pressed a hand over her mouth, fighting past the sick knot in her stomach.
“She sent Thomas back to Winter Park. She sent him back to that monster. I begged her not to do it. I begged her. She wouldn’t listen.” Rhys raked his hands through his hair and sank into a chair. “Not me. I was sent to friends in the north of Scotland because after what I’d done, Evelyn refused to have me back at Winter Park. I didn’t even have the chance to try to protect Thomas. In the autumn, we had to go to different schools, because I was old enough for Eton. We wrote, but I never saw Thomas again. When spring came and he learned he was going back for another summer at Winter Park, he killed himself. I couldn’t protect him from Evelyn. I tried, but I failed.”
“You were a boy. It is your mother who failed.” She walked over to where he sat and knelt down beside his chair. “Why didn’t you tell me this before, when I asked you about it?”
“How could I?” He sat up with an abrupt move and rubbed his hands over his face. “For God’s sake, Prudence, you’re so innocent. I just couldn’t bear to tell you something so sordid.”
She laid her hand on his knee. “Yet you’re telling me now.”
He looked at her, and there was a spark of anger in his eyes. “I’m not doing it to play on your pity to win you over, if that’s what you’re thinking.” He shoved her hand aside, stood up and walked away. “I haven’t sunk that low, thank heaven.”
“I wasn’t thinking you told me for pity,” she said, and rose to follow him. When he halted by the fireplace, she halted as well. “I simply wanted to know why you are choosing to tell me about this at all. You didn’t have to.”