Forbidden Lord (25 page)

‘And is that how Godfrey came by his riches?' She laughed when William cocked a quizzical eyebrow. ‘The manner in which he flaunts his riches, one cannot help but notice and question as to how he came by them. And he never was your servant, was he, William?'

‘Godfrey is his own man, Eleanor, and, contrary to what everyone believes, he is not my servant—oddly, that's the impression he likes to give, which I always find amusing, but that's the way he is. We became close on board ship. Ours is an easy friendship not often met.'

‘William, if it was not Catherine that brought you back to London from Staxton Hall, then what was it?'

‘A ship called
Resolve
.'

‘Why? What does that ship mean to you?'

‘When I was beaten and bundled aboard the
George
, Atwood was behind it, that I do know, but I want to know who he paid to do it.'

‘And where does the
Resolve
come in to it?'

‘The
Resolve
and the
George
sailed together. When I left London for Staxton Hall, I left instructions that I was to be informed as soon as the
Resolve
was sighted in the Thames. The captain of the
Resolve
, I feel sure, knows who took me on board.'

‘And if you find out who it was?'

‘He'll regret ever being born.'

‘Have you any notion as to who it might be?'

His eyes narrowed and glittered. ‘I have my suspicions.'

‘Will you share them with me?'

‘I'd rather wait until I'm certain.'

‘Very well,' she said, leaning towards him and brushing his lips with her own. ‘And now I must go. I will have been missed. I must have been gone over two hours.'

William's dark brows drew together. ‘Go?' A small voice deep inside him began to gnaw at him.

‘I have to. Martin is bound to question me about my absence.'

William's face whitened, the rush of furious blood under his skin draining away at the implication of her statement. ‘I doubt he will have noticed. Besides, he is no longer important.'

‘He is still my husband, William—despite what we have just done. It is a dangerous game we play.'

‘This is no game I play, Eleanor.'

She sighed deeply, drawing away from him. ‘We must wait.' She was aware that William was not a patient man and that he would not be stopped when his mind was set on something, and he was set on having her and his child, which was what she also wanted more than anything in the world, but she couldn't just leave Martin.

‘Wait? Eleanor, stop this, stop it at once.' His voice was a snarl of jealous outrage. He was a virile man and extremely
masculine. Before he had made love to her she had been untouched and pure, a woman who had never known a lover's touch, and he was as certain as he could be that Martin Taverner had not even looked at her with the same desire that he had—a desire that could melt the bones and the flesh and cause all coherent thought to take flight.

‘God in heaven!' he said, flinging himself off the bed. ‘Can't you understand that I want you with me, that I want to protect you?'

‘Who from? Martin? He won't hurt me.' Getting off the bed, she began struggling into her clothes.

Grudgingly, William went to help her, and when she was fully clothed he placed his hands on her upper arms and looked deep into her troubled eyes. ‘Eleanor, you are mine,' he said with great gravity, ‘and so is the child you carry. I mean to have you both. I will not allow what we have to be forced into a corner that no one must see. I am not a man to accept it.'

‘I don't expect you to,' she whispered. ‘I am only asking that you be patient a while longer.'

Cupping her face between his hands, he began to kiss it, placing his tender lips on her cheeks, her eyelids, her brow, her mouth. ‘You know about desire, Eleanor,' he murmured huskily, his warm breath mingling with her own. ‘I have shown you, and how much I desire you. What you and Martin Taverner have has nothing to do with it. Your marriage is ridiculous, an absurdity. He must be told.'

‘I know.'

‘We will tell him together.'

Before Eleanor could prepare herself for his next onslaught, he had pulled her to him. His mouth fell savagely on hers, crushing her lips so fiercely she could swear she could taste blood. Once again she felt the strength of him. Her heart was pounding, her body pliant, unresisting, straining against him, his breath sweet and warm. Sagging against him, she felt the woman in her respond to his maleness.

William sensed the change in her and his lips softened, moving along her jawline to the fleshy lobe of her ear, which his teeth nibbled gently before his mouth found hers once more.

‘You don't want to go back to him, do you, Eleanor?' His arms loosened and he looked down at her passion-filled face. ‘To that sham of a marriage?'

She was dazed, her eyes unfocused. ‘You know I don't, but for now I have to,' she whispered, drawing away from him. ‘We must consider Martin's position in all this. Think how humbling it will be to him if everyone thinks I have left him for you, and that I married him while carrying another man's child. I must show some loyalty. I owe him that at least.'

‘I can see it's a difficult moral dilemma for you,' William said drily, ‘but in this case I find my loyalties are entirely with you.'

‘Please don't try and stop me going back to him, William. We will work it out somehow, I promise.'

He felt some reluctance in letting her go, but he could scarcely keep her with him just now. She would be safe enough, he thought, with a husband who had no mind to bed his wife.

Eleanor's eyes rested on the exposed part of his shoulder for a moment, at the small knot of puckered scar tissue that seemed to have crept up from his back, but she showed no sign of disgust or any further curiosity, nor did she when she pressed herself against him for one last kiss and snaked her arms around him and placed her hands on his back when she bade him goodbye, though William knew she must feel the healed welts beneath his robe with her fingers.

‘You're right, you'll have to go back—for now,' he said, brushing her hair out of his face.

‘And we will sort this out, won't we, William?'

He didn't answer right away, but bent his head. Eleanor could feel the tension of his body knotted in the joints, rigid in his bones.

‘I hadn't thought ever to be jealous of a man like Martin Taverner—a man who has no use for women—for which I
thank God,' he whispered at last. ‘I wouldn't have thought it possible until I learned that you had married him.' His fingers touched the softness of her cheek. ‘One way or another I will get you back, but until I do, the thought of you as that man's wife will be like a worm eating away inside me.'

Eleanor gathered him tight against herself, placing her head against his chest where his heart was beating furiously. ‘Then console yourself with the knowledge that because of how he is, he will not touch me, and in that I am protected.'

When she left him she felt as if she were walking on air and a smile would settle on her lips, a smile that told her she loved him—and, oh, yes, love him she did, with her whole heart. This she did not deny.

 

Martin, in a happy mood as he sauntered along the dim corridors of the Palace, was unprepared for what was about to happen to him when a tall man stepped out of the shadows.

‘Traitor,' Richard Grey hissed, feeling for his dagger, smiling unpleasantly, and without uttering another word he swung his fighting arm up in the air. The blade rose in an arc like a bright streak and he plunged it in four heart thrusts.

U
nable to find Martin when she returned to the revelries, Eleanor left for home. Having dismissed her maid, she was about to go to bed when a messenger from Whitehall Palace came to inform both her and Lord Taverner that Martin was dead. When the details of the crime were made clear to her, Eleanor was deeply shocked.

That night was one of anguish and weeping. While she had been making love with William, Martin was being stabbed to death. She knew who had done it, that Richard Grey was responsible, and she was appalled by the knowledge that her conversation with that man had brought about her husband's death. Oh, why hadn't she warned him like she'd intended? Why had she allowed William to distract her with his warm lips and strong arms and powerful body?

That short time, that rapturous, insane time had killed not only Martin but William too, for he was as dead to her as Martin. What was it about her that she brought ill luck to those close to her? First there was Uncle John and now Martin. She had killed Martin and her love for William with her wickedness, her wantonness, and she must live with it and suffer the fortunes of the damned until the end of her days, which was
no more than she deserved, but in the meantime she must think of her child and find some way to live with what she had done.

She blamed herself for what had happened, blamed herself for telling Richard Grey about the child, for taunting him and wrongly letting him believe the child was Martin's. The way Martin had died—stabbed repeatedly by his lover in a dark corner of Whitehall Palace—filled her with horror and remorse. Jealousy may have led Sir Richard astray but, apart from being besotted by the man wielding the knife, Martin had done no wrong.

 

The following day, one by one visitors arrived at the house, their lips expressing their sympathy for her loss. Lord Taverner accepted Martin's death calmly, seemingly unmoved by the news that his eldest son had been murdered, and it was this callousness that so embittered Eleanor, for she genuinely mourned her young husband. She missed his gentleness, his friendship and the brightness of him. Her sorrow defied release. It hid itself in a hollow place in her heart. And so, stunned and enclosed in a curtain of shock she kept to her room, save for the occasional trips downstairs to eat with Lord Taverner.

The questions had started as a hunt for the murderer began. Eleanor knew the culprit, but she did not have the courage to point the finger publicly at Sir Richard Grey, and, according to her father-in-law, Sir Richard had left the Court, shocked and grief-stricken by Martin's death.

 

Eleanor pushed away her dinner, feeling sickly as she toyed with the greasy lamb on her plate.

Lord Taverner looked across the table at her, his eyes narrowed and steady. Almost idly he asked, ‘Is there something wrong with the food?'

Though her insides were trembling, Eleanor knew that the time to tell her father-in-law about the child had arrived. The
longer she waited, the more pressure would build and the more difficult it would be.

‘No, the food is as delicious as always—only—I'm not hungry—in fact I am feeling somewhat queasy. Lord Taverner—I—I think you should know that I am with child.' She spoke plainly for there was no other way to tell him. That she had been able to do it surprised even her. But it was said now and so much the better.

Lord Taverner began to smile, a smile that was a mixture of appalled disbelief and hideous amusement. Pushing back his chair, he stood up and walked round the table towards her, his eyes never leaving her face.

‘Whose is it?' He smiled thinly. ‘Who's the father? Because if you intend passing it off as my son's you can think again. Do you take me for an idiot—when the world and its neighbours know the two of you rarely occupied the same house, never mind slept in the same bedchamber?'

‘I am sorry,' she whispered. He was furious, of course, and she didn't blame him.

‘Did he know?' he asked her harshly, adding emphasis to his sternest countenance to the question that was more like a command.

‘Yes, I told him.'

‘And?'

‘He—he was prepared to accept the child—to bring it up as his own,' Eleanor answered lamely. ‘At first he was angry, of course, but the more he thought about it, the more excited he became.'

‘Like hell he was,' her father-in-law erupted, his face flamed with anger. When he next spoke his voice was low and horribly calm. ‘And did he think I would be so besotted at the prospect of his producing a child—when all the odds were stacked against it—considering his aversion to your sex—that I would not find out the truth—that I would be none the wiser when I looked into my grandchild's face? I have another son
who is not so bad for my health who will inherit the Taverner estate, not your bastard, madam.'

Eleanor's face drained. Gripping her hands together in her lap, she sat mute and unmoving as his harsh words whipped her.

Lord Taverner moved closer, his eyes black pinpoints boring into hers. ‘So you are to bear the child of a man who used you for his own convenience and then deserted you, a man who spiked you and then spurned you, and you thought to foist his leavings on to my son.' He laughed mockingly. ‘What other way is there for a woman alone with a bastard—prey to a pitiless society.'

Eleanor bowed her head before his hard, condemning face. He was right. Society believed that the sin was all the woman's fault, that the blame for her conduct was all hers, that she had brought it on herself and the child.

‘It wasn't like that. I swear it wasn't. I didn't know myself until after we were wed. Had I known, I would never have married Martin.'

‘But you agreed to go along with this—this charade?'

She nodded.

‘I was suspicious from the beginning. Little wonder your aunt wanted to get you married off—and who better than to Martin, too simple minded to notice.' Every trace of emotion left his face. When he next spoke his voice was as cold and as devoid of feeling as a wind blowing over an empty landscape. ‘I want you out of my house. Pack your bags and get out. I shall lock the door as soon as you have gone. That is my final word.'

He turned his back on her and not until the door had thudded closed did Eleanor let out her breath. The silence became a living shroud. The problem of what she would do, where she would go, was a sad and frightening burden.

 

The day was hot and the Palace stuffy. William went outside, hoping the fresh air would dispel his headache, which
had been with him on waking. As the day progressed it became worse. Feeling restless, he rode to Chelsea to see Godfrey, where he had been staying with Catherine ever since they had become enamoured of each other.

Despite his infernal headache, which showed no sign of letting up, a slight smile quirked his lips. Who would have thought it? Godfrey and Catherine—Catherine with her often spiteful, manipulating ways. Godfrey had laughed uproariously when William had shown an interest in his affair with his new love, saying they bothered him not at all, that he'd looked beyond that, that Catherine was beautiful, proud and stubborn beyond belief, but she was also vulnerable and wounded, having suffered much under her father's rule, which she tried to hide, but he could see it in her eyes.

William had cocked a sardonic brow at his friend as he waxed lyrical. Wounded? Vulnerable? He wondered how these creditable traits of Catherine's had escaped him, although when he'd first met her he'd admired her intelligence and her honesty, and if at times she had seemed petulant and sullen, he had believed that might have had something to do with her father and that marriage would dispel her disagreeable moods.

The previous day had found him at Gravesend to see the captain of the ship
Resolve
, his enquiries having revealed that the fever had abated on the vessel with no further deaths for two weeks. Believing the danger past, he had gone on board. The one thing that had kept him alive during those dark days on board the
George
had been revenge. Someone must pay.

The name of Atwood's accomplice the captain of
Resolve
had made known to him for a price—a price worth paying, for the captain had confirmed his own suspicion that the man who had hired men to beat him to a pulp was Richard Grey.

The journey to Chelsea was arduous. There seemed to be too many people, too much traffic, too much dust, and the noise of the streets was deafening. Sweat soaked his body and the heat drained his energy, making it difficult for him to
breath. Three times he had to stop to overcome a wave of dizziness. He had not eaten—the thought of food made him nauseous—and his headache was worse, blinding.

By the time he reached the house in Chelsea he could hardly stay in the saddle. His strength was gone and he felt as weak and helpless as a babe. There was no use pretending about it. He'd got the fever. The door opened and, sliding off his horse, he collapsed on to the hall floor. Dimly he heard someone shriek for help and the next thing a pair of massive arms hoisted him up and carried him upstairs and laid him on a bed.

In a moment free from delirium, he stared into Godfrey's worried face. ‘That damned ship,' he gasped, licking his dry lips. ‘The fever—I thought it had gone.'

‘You were a fool to venture on board,' Godfrey growled with harsh reproach. ‘I told you to wait, but you always were the impatient one.'

‘It's infectious. You might catch it—and Catherine. Keep out, Godfrey, and let it run its course.'

‘If it's the fever, I'll take care of you, so lie still.'

‘Eleanor,' William said, his voice thick and hoarse, the words slurring one over the other, ‘don't tell her—she mustn't know, not yet.'

‘And you mustn't fret,' a worried-looking Catherine said, flanking Godfrey.

William glared at her, his eyes red and glittering. ‘What are you doing here? Godfrey—for God's sake, get her out.'

Godfrey turned to her with concern. ‘He's right, Catherine. Go and get him some tea and herbs—whatever you give for a fever—and send the servants home until it's safe for them to return.' When she'd gone, he turned back to his friend. ‘You'll get well. You've suffered worse.'

William closed his heavy lids. Yes, he'd suffered worse, much worse, and he'd recovered, he'd overcome and he would overcome this time. But then he might not. Immediately his eyes flew open and he gripped Godfrey's hand.

‘If I don't pull through,' he gasped, ‘promise me you will take care of Eleanor—take her to Staxton Hall—where she belongs. Promise me.'

‘I promise. Now rest, William. Rest. You'll feel better after a good night's sleep.'

William's mind tumbled in an eddy of confusion. A vision of Eleanor drifted into his shadowy world—Eleanor, lovely, beautiful Eleanor. His feverish mind raged in delirium, wandering restlessly through a haze of shifting shade, of days and nights darkly shrouded. The intense fire holding his mind and body in a sweltering heat made him toss and turn and fling off the heavy covers that held him down.

At times he felt someone lift his head and force cold water through his parched lips, commanding him to drink, and in his ravings broken and abusive words spilled from his lips. When the effort of swallowing proved too much, his head would fall back on to the pillows.

 

Coming awake in the dimly lit room, his body felt weak and helpless, and when he tried to raise his arm it felt like a lead weight. Roused to awareness, the first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was Godfrey bending over him.

William moved his lips and the hoarse croak bore no resemblance to his voice. ‘How long have I…?'

‘Five days,' Godfrey told him, thankful to see William's eyes were clear and no longer bloodshot with fever. With his black hair stuck to his damp forehead, he was pale as wax and two deep grey shadows ran from his nostrils down to the corners of his mouth, but he had pulled through, even though it had been touch and go for a time and Godfrey had thought he might not make it. ‘Thank God the fever's left you.'

‘You've been very sick,' Catherine said, coming into the room with a bowl and some cloths draped over her arm.

‘I must have been.' Reality gradually came to stay and yet William's mind was a tangle of confusion and he could make
no sense of what had happened. ‘I can't remember a damned thing—apart from leaving Whitehall and collapsing here at your house.'

‘So you won't remember abusing me every time I tried to make you drink,' Godfrey accused with a touch of humour.

‘Really?' William said, his eyebrow tilted sardonically and his mouth curved in a disbelieving smile. ‘Was it bad?'

‘In your delirium you certainly had a most ungentlemanly turn of phrase,' Godfrey chuckled, casually draping an arm over Catherine's shoulders.

‘And if you hadn't been at death's door, I would have been thoroughly entertained,' she laughed.

William frowned, looking concernedly at them both. ‘I hope I haven't exposed either of you to the fever. I asked you to stay away from me, Catherine. Clearly you ignored my request.'

‘You were in no position to object—and Godfrey got tired of trying to keep me out. Now don't try to speak anymore—you'll tire yourself.'

Godfrey held a goblet of water to his lips. The cool water was welcome and made him feel a little better.

‘Eleanor! I have to see her.'

Godfrey shook his head. ‘Patience, William. You will do yourself no good in trying to rush things. You have to get your strength back and be completely free of the fever. For the time being you must stay here. It wouldn't do to infect her—not in her condition now, would it?'

‘You're right, I suppose,' he grumbled, ‘but don't expect me to be staying too long. I have things to do that can't wait.'

William's head fell back on the pillows. What Godfrey said made sense so he would have to bide his time, but he prayed Eleanor was all right and that she didn't think he'd abandoned her.