Her Notorious Viscount (26 page)

Jane nodded, though in her heart she couldn’t imagine she would feel any different in a week or in a year. Marcus would still be dead. And the one man she had trusted more than any other, the one man she loved…he would still be a liar.

And hating himself.

“I’m sorry to disturb you, sir, but Lord Fenton has returned,” his butler said, almost gently.

Nicholas sat up and stared. “Fenton is here?”

Gladwell nodded. “Yes. And he refuses to leave until he has an audience. He seems very upset, my lord.”

“He should get in line,” Nicholas said, snorting out a humorless laugh.

He swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He was still fully clothed in the shirt and trousers he’d been wearing when Jane stormed out of his life and his home…probably for good. The scent of her perfume clung to them, and he was loath to remove them and lose that final part of her.

If Gladwell was surprised that he was lying abed fully clothed, he said nothing about it. Instead, he murmured, “I will tell him you will be down in a moment, my lord, and put him in the south parlor.”

“Thank you.”

He expected his servant to go, but instead, Gladwell hesitated at the door.

“What is it?” Nicholas asked, his nerves frayed to a near breaking point.

“Sir, the servants all love Miss Jane,” Gladwell offered. “Henderson was her driver last night and noticed she was quite upset when she departed here. Is there anything any of us can do for her…or for you?”

Nicholas stared at the man. Jane told him the gruff, judgmental man loved him, but he hadn’t believed her. Now Gladwell was looking at Nicholas with pity and understanding.

“I’m afraid not, my friend,” Nicholas said softly, bracing his arms on the dressing table and examining his haggerd face in the mirror. “There is nothing that can be done, I don’t think.”

“I’ve never approved of fisticuffs…especially in my sitting rooms, but it seems that you are a fighter, sir, in more ways than one. Perhaps one thing you could do is fight.”

Nicholas jolted at his servant’s observation and turned his gaze on Gladwell. He stared back evenly and nodded before he stepped into the hallway and left Nicholas alone.

As he quickly tidied his hair and girded himself in preparation for facing off with an apparently angry Patrick Fenton, he thought of what the butler had said. When it came to the fisticuffs his servant didn’t approve of, Nicholas was prepared. As he was for cards or knife fights or any other kind of illicit activity that required cunning and skill.

But when it came to Jane, he was uncertain. Robbed of his normal weapons. Left bereft.

He strode downstairs and drew a deep breath before he entered the parlor. Patrick Fenton was standing at the window as he entered, his broad back stiff with anger as he stared out over the street below. Nicholas sighed and closed the door behind him.

The second the click of the latch echoed in the room, Fenton turned. He glared at Nicholas, then made his way across the room in several long strides. Nicholas could tell the other man was going to hit him. He knew the signs after so many fights. He could have blocked it, dodged it, even thrown his own punch first.

But he didn’t. He stood stock-still and let the man swing.

The punch connected squarely with his eye and he staggered back, but kept his feet.

“Impressive,” he said as he lifted his hand to his blurry eye. That was going to blacken later, even if he got ice.

Fenton stepped back. It didn’t seem as if he was going to swing again, and Nicholas found himself a little disappointed. At least the throbbing physical pain made him forget, even for a second, the circumstances that brought Jane’s cousin here.

“You bastard,” the other man said with a disgusted shake of his head. “You were supposed to tell her gently.”

“Like you and her father did, you mean?” Nicholas snapped. “How did you find out?”

Patrick paced away and flopped into the nearest cushioned chair. “She came to me at three in the morning, practically hysterical. She choked out the whole story.”

Nicholas pursed his lips as he took his own seat across from Fenton. Somehow he didn’t like it that Jane had gone to this man after she left him.

“It wasn’t meant to happen this way,” he explained.

Fenton shook his head. “I assume not. But she’s brokenhearted nonetheless. Not only does she have to face her brother’s death, but she is twisting herself in knots over the fact that the man she loves lied to her.”

“Loved,” Nicholas corrected as he shot to his feet and made for the liquor cabinet. It didn’t matter that it was the ungodly hour of seven in the morning. He needed whiskey. “She told me last night that she ‘loved’ me. Not loves me.”

“Pour me one of those and stop being an idiot,” Fenton said. “She loves you. Present tense. But she’s so jumbled and hurt right now that she is willing to do anything to push that feeling away.”

Nicholas handed him the drink, and Fenton glared at him.

“I told her that since she has been compromised, probably
many
times, that she must marry. But she is very resistant.”

Those words were like a vise around Nicholas’s heart.

Fenton frowned. “Do you love her?”

Nicholas set his drink down. That was the question he’d been trying to avoid. Love wasn’t something he had envisioned for himself. It was a luxury he hadn’t been able to afford in the dangerous underground. And when he returned to Society he hadn’t been able to imagine himself
liking
, let alone loving the kind of women he saw flirting behind fans and playing coquettish games.

But Jane was different. In every way. She had been his teacher, his friend, his lover, his partner. When he closed his eyes, it was easy to imagine a future with her. A family with her.

“If it takes you this long to answer,” Fenton said coldly, “then perhaps that says it all. She deserves someone who will love her, Stoneworth. And if that isn’t you, then I will offer my hand to her again.”

Nicholas sucked in a breath. “What?”

“Someone
must
marry her,” the other man said. “In case there is a child. And at least I know I shall treat her well. I shall love her if you cannot.”

“If there is a child, then it is mine to protect. Mine to legitimize,” Nicholas snapped, unable to stop himself from picturing Jane holding a baby in her arms. His baby.

Fenton shook his head. “But do you love her?”

Nicholas swallowed hard. The idea of losing Jane was akin to pulling his heart from his chest. The idea of her marrying another man was even worse.

Did he love her? Did thinking of her every day, wishing to be near her, wanting to talk to her, equal
love
?

It did. He realized it in a flash, but then perhaps he had always known it but denied it. He loved Jane. He loved her passionate and brave nature. He loved her acceptance and defense of him, with all his flaws. He loved her laughter. He loved her touch, her taste, her smell.

And he didn’t want to lose that. He
wouldn’t
lose that. Gladwell had been right. This was the fight of Nicholas’s life. And he had no intention of losing.

“I love Jane,” he said. “More than my life. But winning her, especially in the state she is in currently, isn’t going to be easy. But nothing worth having ever is.”

“Indeed. And if that is the case, then I think I know a way to help you.”

Fenton looked away, and Nicholas pitied and respected him. He was willing to give Jane up in order to ensure her happiness. Nicholas couldn’t imagine the loss and hoped he wouldn’t have to face it himself before this was through.

Clearing his throat, Nicholas said, “What is your plan?”

Jane sat in Lady Ridgefield’s parlor, staring at the fire as it slowly ate away at a log. Around her, Lady Ridgefield and a few of her companions were chatting, but Jane hardly heard their talk. She was too wrapped up in her own thoughts, her own memories, her own tangled emotions.

“Jane?” Lady Ridgefield said so that no one else would hear. She set a hand over hers and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Are you well, dear? You have been so quiet.”

Jane shook off her tangled emotions and smiled. “I’m so sorry, my lady. I am woolgathering. I’m afraid I did not get much sleep last night and I am tired.”

And that was utterly true. By the time she snuck back into the house it had been almost dawn. And then she had lain in her bed, thinking about Marcus, thinking about Patrick…and thinking about Nicholas. So much about Nicholas and his proposal and the fact that he had lied to her when she had believed, so strongly, that he never would.

She sighed.

“You do look tired, my dear,” Lady Ridgefield said. “Perhaps when your cousin arrives, we should send him away, rather than have you go riding with him.”

“My cousin?” Jane said, wrinkling her brow. “Patrick is coming today?”

“Yes, my dear. I mentioned it at breakfast, did you not hear me?”

Jane dipped her chin with embarrassment. At breakfast she had been completely in her own world as she fingered her late brother’s ring beneath the table and thought of the one Nicholas had offered her. She couldn’t remember anything about the meal. She might have agreed to invade Spain, for all she knew.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “I will be more attentive.”

Lady Ridgefield laughed softly. “My goodness, Jane, you never have need to apologize to me. But yes, your cousin is coming today, in fact he should be arriving any moment. I must say I am very happy to hear that you two have repaired the breach between you. Families should be together.”

Jane bit her lip. She and Patrick
were
on their way to repairing the rift that had developed between them. She owed him a great many apologies for her deplorable treatment of him. And he owed her the same for keeping her father’s secrets. But they would forgive each other.

So why couldn’t she forgive Nicholas, too?

Jane squeezed her eyes shut, ignoring the little voice that kept asking her that question. She was too raw to answer it.

“The air might do me good,” she said, giving Lady Ridgefield a smile. “I think I shall go riding with my cousin when he comes, after all.”

She was certain Patrick had an agenda in mind for their outing. Probably further insistence that she marry someone to solve the problem of her ruination.

Marry Nicholas
. That was the thought that kept echoing in her mind. And it was getting harder and harder to silence it.

Lady Ridgefield’s butler stepped into the parlor and cleared his throat. “My lady, Lord Fenton has arrived.”

The feminine sounds of pleasure that filled the room made Jane look at the women in her company. Two of them were close in age to her, and they were blushing and giggling like girls at the thought of seeing Patrick. She smiled. He
was
handsome, of course. She had just never really considered him as a
man
.

Obviously, these women did.

“Send him in,” Lady Ridgefield said as everyone in the party got to her feet, including Jane.

She forced another smile and hoped she would not blush as her cousin stepped into the room. He did not look any worse for wear after their long night, though when his green gaze fell on hers, she felt his lingering concern move through her. She was both embarrassed by and appreciative of it.

“Good afternoon, ladies,” Patrick said with a smile and a bow for the room. “How fine to find such a lovely group here.”

The ladies twittered, and for a brief moment there was conversation and flirtation. Jane smiled through it all, but her thoughts wandered again, only to be brought back when her cousin said, “Well, Jane. Would you care to come riding with me? We could go to Hyde Park and take a turn around the lake.”

She nodded. “Of course, Patrick.”

Saying her farewells to the ladies in her company, including the very disappointed younger ones, she took her cousin’s extended arm and allowed him to lead her out the front door. As they moved to the drive, she frowned.

“You brought your carriage, rather than your phaeton?” she asked as she looked at the enclosed boxy vehicle parked on the crunchy gravel.

He shrugged as he moved to open the door. “It could rain.”

As she stepped inside, Jane was about to point out the cloudless sky, but before she could, her cousin abruptly shut the door to the vehicle and rapped on the wall outside. The carriage began to move.

Jane moved to grab the door handle, but before she could grasp it, a hand darted out of the darkness in the corner of the seat and caught her wrist.

She cried out in surprise as she looked down at the imprisoning hand. Before she even peered through the dark, she knew who her companion was. After so many days and nights, she recognized the scarred, pronounced knuckles.

“Nicholas,” she hissed as her eyes finally adjusted and she could see him.

He smiled, but the expression was tight. “Hello, Jane.”

Although she couldn’t deny how much she liked the brush of his skin on hers, Jane still tried to shake his fingers from her wrist. He held fast.

“Why don’t you sit back?” he asked, his voice low and calm. “We’re driving quickly now. I wouldn’t want you to be hurt.”