A Lord Rotheby's Holiday Bundle (25 page)

Lord Griffin shuffled out of the room,
stuffing his hands into the pockets of his trousers as he went.
Pockets that appeared to be rather overfull with papers. The man
truly ought to hire a secretary to handle his matters. Shoving
papers into one’s pockets seemed a poor way to treat them,
particularly if they held any import.

The entire visit left her unsettled.
She had no acquaintance with the man, so what did he care? Why was
he so concerned? And if he truly was so worried about her, why wait
until they’d been married for so long? Why not try harder to stop
the marriage to begin with? None of it made any sense.

But worrying over that would do her no
good, particularly when she had enough worries of her own already.
Aurora went out to Burton, to have him send in a maid to retrieve
the tea service. Mrs. Gaffee stopped her in the hall to briefly
discuss her plans for decorating the dining room, and then she
returned to her table. A little more writing would do her good. At
least it would calm her nerves.

She opened her journal and her heart
drained itself of blood. Oh, dear good Lord, she was stupid.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Quin would murder her.

He would toss her to the bottom of the
Thames, tied down with weights. He would drag her behind a horse
through all of London, then chop her head off and put it on display
at the Tower. He would tie her to a stake and burn her
alive.

And she would deserve all of that and
more.

Countless pages were gone, torn free
from the middle of her journal.

Her life was over.

Chapter
Fifteen

25 April, 1811

If the world were not
already at an end, if life were not already over, if there were
truly hope that Quin could forgive me for being such an utter and
complete failure as a wife, then perhaps I would not be so
desolate. But he cannot forgive such a sin as allowing these pages
to be taken from our home. He cannot forgive my barrenness. So life
must irrevocably be at an end, and the world will come to a stop
with it. How could it possibly go on, after all that has gone
wrong? I daresay the End Days are upon us. Protect your families.
Flee if you can. No amount of sorrow will be able to change what is
to come.

~From the journal of Lady
Quinton

Quin walked home from Jackson’s with
an ache in his jawbone but a smile on his lips. Truly, spending his
days boxing had proven to be a perfect solution. It kept him away
from Aurora and her lovely little pout all day, and the sparring
provided him with enough distraction to forestall mooning over her
when he couldn’t see her. Too much time in her company or spent
thinking of her, and he’d be in a sorry state, indeed. It was best
to just not care overmuch. Then he couldn’t get hurt.

Well, aside from the obvious physical
aspects, but they didn’t signify.

It didn’t hurt matters, either, that
all his time spent at the boxing salon meant his wife had ample
time on her hands to let her imagination run away with
her.

What an imagination she
proved to have. If he didn’t know just how innocent she’d been when
they married, Quin might suspect she’d spent time in some of his
typical haunts. His
previous
typical haunts, that was. He was a married man,
now. It just wouldn’t do for him to continue his visits to those
lovely establishments.

He was going to have to find ways of
keeping his little bride entertained, though. Clearly, she’d grown
restless. It hadn’t been much of an inconvenience to take her to
the play. Perhaps he could arrange an excursion to Vauxhall. She’d
probably enjoy the fireworks. And maybe he could sneak her off on
one of those dark, winding paths he’d heard so much about and see
what happened.

It was well past dark by the time he
climbed the steps to Number Fourteen. Clouds had started to roll in
that afternoon, too. Looked like the agreeable April weather they’d
been experiencing was soon to come to an end. Pity. Taking Aurora
to Vauxhall for an evening would have to wait, if the stormy sky
was any indication.

“
Good evening, my lord,”
Burton called out as he came through the massive oak doors. “Her
ladyship requests that you go to her at once in your sitting
room.”

Indeed. Quin left his hat and
greatcoat with the butler and took the stairs two at a time. An
evening in might not be so terrible, after all. He could only
wonder at what fanciful method of lovemaking she’d thought up this
time. Perhaps she would be waiting for him in some diaphanous
confection he could rip off her. Or maybe in nothing at
all.

Quin threw open the door to their
shared sitting room, already hard just thinking of all the infinite
possibilities that could await him, ready to toss her into his bed
and sate their needs until the sun came up.

He felt as though he’d run headlong
into a brick wall the moment he saw his wife, however. Aurora sat
on the floor, crying with her head resting in her arms over a Louis
XIV armchair by the window. She didn’t even look up when he came
in.

Good God. Quin could handle many
things. He could spar with the best of them and come away
relatively unscathed. He could convince virtually any woman to lift
her skirts, all with a flash of his teeth and a knowing look in his
eye. He could cheat an experienced cheater at the most notorious
gaming hells and not get caught. He could down a full flask of
brandy and still find his way home before sunrise.

But he hadn’t the slightest inkling of
what to do with a crying woman.

His younger sister must have cried
some when she was growing up, but Mother had always handled Nia’s
problems. Quin was too busy sowing his wild oats—and then some—and
then he had left entirely. He hadn’t seen her in years. Probably
wouldn’t even recognize her if he saw her.

It was better that way. Better for all
of them.

But at the moment, he wished he had
spent more time with his female relatives. Surely then he would
have a clue what to do with Aurora.

Quin closed the door and moved to
stand by her side. He placed an awkward hand on the back of her
head, patting. “There now. Whatever it is, it can’t be so bad as
all of that.” He hoped. He was thoroughly incapable of handling
anything truly deserving of raising such a breeze.

For a brief moment, Aurora
stopped and looked up at him. That only served to increase her
sobs, however. She threw her face against the cushion with such
force, he was aghast that she didn’t have a bloodied nose. Somehow,
he
knew
that he
would be useless in such a scenario.

“
Should I ring for your
maid?” he asked.
Please, God, let her say
yes
. “Or perhaps you would like to speak
with Lady Rebecca? I’d be glad to send for her.”

“
They can’t help me,” came
Aurora’s muffled wail. “No one can help me.” Her voice was more
pitiful than anything he’d ever heard in his life.

He was probably the problem. It had to
be his fault. That was just how his life worked. If only he knew
what he’d done this time. Perhaps he ought to spend more time with
her. Maybe she was feeling neglected. Damned nuisance, figuring out
how to handle a wife.

The crying part only magnified the
nuisance.

Quin sighed and took a seat in the
armchair next to her. “Tell me the problem. I’ll resolve it,
whatever it is.”

She sniffed and looked at him with the
biggest, most forlorn and wounded eyes he’d ever seen—red and
swollen and swimming in an ocean of tears. That expression would be
the death of him. He wanted to grasp whoever had caused her
desolation by the scruff of his neck and cudgel him to a bloody
pulp. At that moment, he would do anything for her.

Damnation, was this normal? Did it
happen to all married men? This was certainly an unexpected effect
of becoming a husband—and not one which would be conducive to
maintaining his sanity. Particularly if Aurora cried like this very
often.

Still, she said nothing—just sat there
looking at him with her sad eyes.

Now was not the time to lose his
patience. Quin counted to twenty to avoid yelling at her. “Tell me.
I can’t help if I don’t know what the problem is.”

Aurora’s lower lip
trembled. “But you
can’t
help,” she wailed. Surprisingly, the fountain
filling her eyes seemed to have stopped. Maybe the worst of it was
past.

He gave her the sternest look he could
muster. “Nonsense. I’m your husband.” Was it not his duty to set
right whatever problems she had? “Tell me.”

Good God. He thought she’d cried
herself dry, but a fresh wave of tears filled her eyes and poured
down her cheeks. If she didn’t stop soon, they’d both
drown.

“
My courses arrived this
morning,” she said with all the overwrought emotion of a whore at
confession.

Her courses. This was all because she
wasn’t with child? Life as he knew it would never be the same
again, if Aurora intended to cry like the world had ended each time
she had her monthly visitor.

Granted, he would have preferred for
her to become pregnant immediately—he’d certainly done his best to
make it happen and would gladly continue his efforts in that arena
with no complaint. It would get Rotheby off his back—but that
wasn’t exactly realistic. They might be lucky if she was
impregnated within the year his grandfather had allowed
them.

“
It’s all right,
love”

“
It’s not,” she said and
cut him off. “It’s not all right. What will happen if I can’t have
a baby, Quin? What will Lord Rotheby do?”

Why did his wife insist on worrying
about things that were none of her concern? “That’s unimportant
right now, Aurora.”

She glared through her tears. “Don’t
lie to me. And don’t brush this off.”

“
I’m not bloody lying to
you,” he all but bellowed. And then winced when she flinched in
reaction. Blast, he had to reclaim control of his temper. “All I’m
saying is that your courses arriving today are not anything to be
overly upset about. So stop crying.”

“
Stop crying? If that were
all there was to it, maybe I could stop. But there’s so much more.”
Aurora lowered her gaze to stare studiously at the floor. “So very
much more.”

“
Such as?” Quin drawled.
Aurora’s dramatics had his nerves wearing thin. She ought to have
pursued a career on the stage. It may not be genteel or well looked
upon by those of Quality, but she put the actress who had played
the shrew at Covent Garden the other evening to shame.

She remained mute.

He’d have to remember in future, when
she came to him with those huge, red eyes, that it was all a show.
All an act. Nothing real for him to get upset about. No reason to
contemplate violence.

Quin stood and stretched. “I’m going
to bed. Feel free to join me when you’ve finished with your crying
jag.” Then he retreated to his chamber and closed the door to his
wife’s hysterics. If only he could always do that—turn off her
emotions by simply closing a door.

His life would be so much less
complicated.

~ * ~

She should have told him. Aurora knew
he would be furious with her either way, but she ought to have told
him.

Quin deserved to know that
she’d made a laughingstock of him before the whole of the
ton
. He had a right to
prepare himself for the scandal set to break out.

But how? How could she
admit to something that was set to tear their lives in two,
particularly when he was already upset with her? And how could she
give him the truth when he baldly and purposefully refused to do
the same for her? Besides, while Lord Griffin may have taken
something from her, if Quin tried to
do
anything about it, Lady Phoebe
would end up being hurt in the bargain. Aurora did not want for
that to happen—not on her account.

So she kept the dilemma of her
journal’s missing pages to herself. Quin would find out soon
enough. She’d have to pay the piper eventually, but there was no
reason to rush matters.

And she cried herself to
sleep.

In her own bed.

~ * ~

Quin woke to the sound of scuffling
feet and raised voices in the hall. “Get out of my way or I’ll
cudgel you over the head with this cane!” Rotheby? What the devil
was he doing here? Quin tossed the counterpane aside and blinked.
The sun was hardly up in the sky. Granted, the clouds would likely
obscure it to the point it would be difficult to see, but darkness
still reigned in his chamber.

He started to snap at Aurora to rise
and cover herself before realizing that she wasn’t there.
Damnation.

He’d barely pulled on a pair of
trousers before the door to his chamber flew open. Rotheby charged
in brandishing a society paper in Quin’s face, with Burton and two
footmen following in his wake.