My Reckless Surrender (26 page)

Once he discovered the truth, he wouldn't want to marry her. That sweet leap her heart had given at his proposal would never recur.

She closed her eyes and summoned a prayer for Ashcroft. Her soul was too weighted with sin to form the words. She wasn't such a hypocrite, she imagined God would pardon her and listen to her entreaties.

Not even the promise of Cranston Abbey compensated for the damage she'd done to herself, her father, and, most of all, Ashcroft.

“The lady can speak for herself,” Ashcroft snapped, as she opened her eyes.

“As her betrothed, I speak for her. Perhaps you didn't hear me. Mrs. Carrick is the next Marchioness of Burnley, and she bears my heir.”

In spite of Ashcroft's efforts to appear unmoved, Diana saw the color drain from his face. She couldn't mistake his pain. And she inflicted it. She deserved to suffer the torments of the damned for this.

The eyes he turned on her flared with accusation. “What's this about, Diana?”

She felt utterly sick. “Ashcroft, I told you I couldn't marry you. I told you to leave. You don't…”

Burnley stepped forward, leaning on his stick but looking heartier than he had for months. Clearly trouncing the earl so thoroughly improved his health. That and the news that she was pregnant.

She wasn't sure yet, but her cycle was regular, and she was a week overdue. Her deepest instincts insisted the breathtaking passion she'd shared with Ashcroft bore fruit.

“No need to spare the fellow's feelings, sweeting.”

Diana shuddered at the endearment. Burnley had never called her anything remotely affectionate in all their long acquaintance. She didn't like it.

She cast a pleading glance at Ashcroft. “For the love of heaven, go, Ashcroft.”

“I agree with Mrs. Carrick.” Satisfaction dripped from Burnley's words. “You've made your ridiculous marriage proposal. She's refused. Any man with a modicum of backbone would remove himself to lick his wounds. You're just like your mother, victim to sickly sentiment when everything indicates your attentions are unwelcome.”

Burnley must have eavesdropped for a while. Diana's soul cringed at how Ashcroft would feel knowing such a private, vulnerable moment had a witness. A witness who felt only contempt for him.

“Ashcroft, you don't need to hear this.” She reached out, but he shook her off as though she didn't exist. She deserved the dismissal, but it still stung.

“What's that about my mother?” Ashcroft asked sharply, stepping toward Burnley. His eyes were the same pale green as the famous celadon porcelain at Cranston Abbey. The inhuman coldness made her shiver.

Burnley's mouth flattened. “Your mother was a brainless slut.”

Diana gasped even as Ashcroft stiffened. “You knew her?”

“Of course I did.” Burnley's voice vibrated with derision. “All prim propriety and virtue until I tumbled her into bed. Stupid little jade. She gulled herself into thinking she was in love, and that excused anything she did. God knows why her husband took her back.”

“My father didn't take her back.” Ashcroft's voice retained that unearthly calm.

His gaze didn't waver from the old man who visibly relished his rival's humiliation. Because, Diana realized with nausea, that's what Burnley had always considered Ashcroft. A younger, more virile version of himself over whom he must prove his superiority.

“He did the first time she kicked over the traces. Your mother was such a martyr to love, she didn't stay. Not once she'd pupped you. Moronic bitch imagined I'd find a way to marry her.”

“Ashcroft, go, please,” Diana said brokenly, grabbing his hand.

He didn't glance at her although his hand curled around hers so hard it hurt. All his attention fixed on the marquess. His expression was tight with abhorrence. And dawning understanding.

Burnley hardly needed to speak the next words. “Because of course I'm your father.”

A
shcroft stared at this smug, evil old man, waiting for disbelief to overwhelm him. It didn't. Burnley's statement had a grim, inevitable air of truth.

He wasn't a fool. He'd always suspected he might be a bastard. It explained so much about how his family treated him, as if he had no right to his place as head of the Vales. As if he was responsible for his father's early death. As if his mother's sins were visited on his head. He doubted details of his parentage were familiar to the wider family, but his aunts and uncles must know, and their dislike carried into the next generation.

“Tarquin, what does it matter?” Diana's voice lowered to broken pleading. “You've lived your whole life without knowing he's your father. It doesn't make any difference to the man you are. He's just out to score points against you. If you leave, you'll deprive him of the pleasure.”

She clutched his hand as though she sought to bolster his courage. He hadn't noticed until now. Briefly, he turned and looked into her beautiful, troubled face. She looked agitated. She looked frightened. One thing she didn't look was surprised.

He ignored Burnley, who was incandescent with triumph. “You knew.”

She flinched as if he hit her, although he'd spoken calmly. She bit her lip, a sure sign of nervousness, and nodded reluctantly. “Yes, I knew.”

She sounded bitterly ashamed, and her shoulders slumped in misery. She wasn't crying anymore, although the sticky trails on her cheeks testified to her distress. His brain stirred from its shock and sluggishly pieced together clues, hints that had kept his suspicions alive no matter how she lulled him into a sensual daze.

“This should prove entertaining,” Burnley said with relish.

The old man shuffled across to lean against a tree. He looked like he settled in for an evening at the theater. Ashcroft supposed for someone of his twisted tastes, this counted as rich diversion indeed.

“Lord Burnley, please leave us alone,” Diana said with a sudden show of defiance.

Briefly, she was the bold, adventurous woman who'd insisted she belonged in Ashcroft's bed. The woman he'd trusted. The woman he'd liked and respected.

That woman was illusion.

“I wouldn't dream of it, my dear.”

Ashcroft noticed the frozen expression that crossed her face at the endearment. She clearly knew exactly what Burnley was like, which made her betrayal even more heinous. The bitch deserved her fate, marrying this monster. She'd find no joy in her nuptials. Burnley would freeze her into solid ice within weeks of the wedding, wring all the spirit from her.

She'd pay for what she'd done.

He wished the knowledge made him feel one iota less like she'd dug out his guts with a rusty spoon. The powerful mixture of rage and anguish threatened to strangle him. Desperately, he beat it back.

Think, man, think.

More connections set up in Ashcroft's mind. Once he knew about his parentage and the collusion between Diana and Burnley, the essentials of the vile plot unraveled like a ball of wool.

Burnley lost his family in the fire, then…

He stiffened with horror. Burnley's heirs had been his half brothers, his nieces and nephews. He'd only known them at a distance—political allegiance made friendship with anyone called Fanshawe untenable—now he'd never know them as people who shared his blood.

“It was all about the baby, wasn't it?” he asked Diana in a cold voice, as if the old man hadn't spoken, as if she hadn't begged Burnley to leave them alone.

How bizarre, how humiliating to admit this poorly dressed, inexperienced widow had made a fool of him. He who had kept his head with London's greatest courtesans and the wildest members of the ton.

He fought back his pain. His scientific curiosity was like a lid on top of a volcano, but at least it let him retain a shred of pride. Revelation had piled on revelation today. If he surrendered to his emotions, he'd drown.

“No, it wasn't all about the baby.” When she met his eyes, she appeared sincere. What an actress. “Not all of it. Whatever else you believe, I beg you to believe that.”

“I wouldn't believe you if you told me the sky was blue.” He'd have a confession from her before he left. He deserved that much. “At least let us have honesty. Tell me about the plan. You may as well. I've worked most of it out.”

She tugged free. He waited for her to weep and beg forgiveness and pretend innocence, but she straightened her shoulders and sent him an unwavering stare. He admired her courage, much as he wished he didn't. That at least wasn't false, even if everything else was.

How unfair that she still struck him as breathtakingly beautiful. The most beautiful woman he'd ever seen. His
new knowledge of her should turn her into a foul hag in his eyes.

As he studied Diana's exquisite features, he tried desperately to hate her. Instead he hated that he couldn't find it in himself to despise her.

Perhaps he would in time. He prayed he would. The agony of knowing what she'd done without the anodyne of detesting her was like being skinned alive.

“Oh, for God's sake, this becomes tiresome,” Burnley snapped. “Yes, the wench tricked you into making her pregnant. I'm delighted a child of my blood will carry on the name. Now all I need is a boy.”

“What a pity I couldn't ensure that outcome,” Ashcroft said sarcastically, his attention not shifting from Diana's stricken face.

He had a sudden urge to injure her the way she'd injured him. Although even here she had the upper hand. His feelings were engaged, and all she wanted was to become a bloody marchioness.

His voice lowered into silky derision. “Perhaps we can arrange a repeat performance. The lady is impressively enthusiastic. She's to be commended for her devotion to your causes.”

Diana looked devastated. What a pity he couldn't trust that her pain was real. He tried to find refuge in cynicism, but her betrayal cut too deep.

“Your offer is noted.” Burnley sounded as uninvolved as if he decided whether to repair a tenant's house with thatch or slate.

“Always glad to be of service. I find myself asking why you didn't fuck her yourself,” Ashcroft demanded with sudden heat, battling the urge to smash his fist into Burnley's face.

Diana gasped as though he wounded her physically. He shouldn't care. He should consign the slut to hell.

Burnley gave a soft chuckle. Ashcroft hated that this man
lorded it over him. His father? He'd prefer to think pond scum had spawned him.

“You had the advantage of youth and vigor.”

Aha, that didn't sound like Burnley. Burnley never surrendered the smallest quotient of power. Siring his heir definitely counted as power.

Ashcroft surveyed his father. The man seemed twenty years older than when he'd last appeared in Parliament. Right now, triumph lent Burnley energy, but long illness and exhaustion marked that sharp-boned face.

Only one explanation made sense. It was harsh but fitting.

Papa must be impotent.

Satisfaction surged. How it must smart to know the marquess's only chance of continuing his line was via the bastard he scorned.

For the first time since Burnley had interrupted his embarrassing marriage proposal, Ashcroft felt a smile curve his lips. “I should thank you for the pleasure you've given me in the last weeks. How sad that you'll never find out just what pleasure, Papa.” He injected a world of derision into the last word. “The trull's a fine ride. One of the best I've had.”

The best he'd ever had, but he denied Diana the reward of knowing she was unforgettable, and not just because she'd led him down the garden path.

Great Jehovah, he was a dolt. Even now, after all he'd discovered, the misery in her expression made him want to reassure her, to take her in his arms and protect her.

What from? She got just what she wanted, the faithless jade.

He had to forget those transcendent hours at Perry's mansion. They'd been lies, with no more substance than soap bubbles blown from a child's pipe.

Lies, lies, lies. Every single instant she'd spent with him.

The repetition didn't convince his heart.

Damn his heart. His heart had led him disastrously wrong, and he intended to treat it as a stranger from now on.

Diana shifted closer. For a forbidden instant, he closed his eyes as the sweet, fresh scent of apples flooded his senses. She didn't smell like evil and betrayal. He wished to Hades she did.

She curled her hand around his arm and bent her head after casting a surreptitious glance at Burnley. Her voice shook with remorse. False remorse, of course. “I'm sorry you had to find out this way. I'm sorry you had to learn such a man is your father.”

“I'll survive,” he said dryly. “I've lived till now without dear Papa's loving care. I'm sure I'll continue to thrive. You're the one marrying the toad.”

“What are you talking about?” Burnley called rudely.

Diana ignored him, which said a great deal for her bravery. Once she married Burnley, she'd be at his mercy, and he was a man who didn't know the meaning of the word. Ashcroft bit back sick fury at all her lush, passionate femininity allied to this dry, vicious old man.

Oh, let me hate her. Dear God, let me hate her.

“You can't despise me more than I despise myself.” She sounded like regret scalded her. If only he believed her. “When you hear why I cheated you, you'll hate me even more.”

“Highly unlikely.” He wished she wouldn't sound as if his bad opinion was a tragedy. She must know he was awake to her machinations. He drew her farther away from Burnley and kept his voice down, although she didn't warrant such consideration.

She spoke in a muffled whisper. “I'm marrying him for the house.”

“The house?” He frowned in confusion. Did Burnley threaten to turn her and her father out of their home? Then he realized what she meant, and he sucked in a shocked breath. “You want Cranston Abbey.”

His voice was rough with contempt. Briefly, stupidly, he'd imagined she offered a valid excuse for inflicting this excruciating punishment.

“Yes.” She raised her chin and stared directly at him, owning her sins without prevarication.

He bared his teeth in a sardonic smile although he didn't feel remotely amused. “Three weeks in my bed in return for the richest acres in England? You're one pricey whore.”

She recoiled before a proud mask fell over her pale face. “I've loved the estate since I was a child. I've run it for years. I'm chatelaine in all but name.”

“Bravo,” he said ironically. “It's still not yours.”

Her lips flattened at his jibe. “It will be.”

“He's sick, dying, isn't he?”

She cast another glance at Burnley, who looked increasingly irritated. “Yes. And he's…”

“Impotent. I'm his only chance of a child in the direct line. Because of the fire at Deshayes.”

She looked like he tortured her. Ridiculous, really, when all her dreams came true, and he was the one on the rack. “I'm sorry, Ashcroft. You'll never know how sorry. I was wrong to involve you. By the time I realized how wrong I was, it was too late.”

“Yes, clearly you couldn't tell me,” he said scathingly. “In all those hours we spent together, you found no opportunity for confession.”

“Don't…” She drew a shuddering breath. “By then I'd lost my honor. I couldn't go back to what I was. And you'd have tossed me out on my ear if you had known the truth.”

Would he? He didn't know. What he did know was that finding out this way was worse than having his flesh sliced away inch by inch.

“I'd probably have fucked you one last time,” he said snidely because he was just so damned angry with her. Even as he ached to sweep her into his arms and carry her far away and pretend she was the woman he wanted her to be.

Her lips thinned as if she held back pain. “Stop saying that…that word.”

“Why? It's something short and sharp and animal to match what we did. I can't conjure a more suitable term.”

“It wasn't like that for me.” She flushed but stared at him squarely. “Naturally, none of that matters. You hate me, and you never want to see me again. I understand that. It's how anyone would feel. I tried to save you from finding out, but it was cowardly. I should have told you when you came to Chelsea.”

“You should have told me long before that.”

“No, I should never have started this.”

He gathered courage to ask the question burning on his tongue since his world had fractured. “Are you pregnant?”

She released him. He tried not to miss her touch. Her touch lied. It always had. “I don't know. It's too early.”

A nice, sensible answer, except he could see she believed she was. The wave of possessiveness was an unwelcome revelation. He summoned rage as his only defense. When it was already far too late to raise bulwarks against this ruthless, beautiful invader.

“How do you know the child is a Fanshawe? Was I your only lover?”

Her eyes darkened with what he could only read as hurt. Oh, cruel and clever jade to make him feel the villain. “I didn't lie about everything, Ashcroft. Although I can't blame you for thinking I did. You are my only lover since my husband's death eight years ago. Trust me or not, but it's the truth.”

He almost believed her, even if that made him the biggest numbskull in Creation. “You're not Burnley's mistress?”

“I told you…”

“He hasn't always been impotent.”

She spoke through stiff lips. “No, I've never shared Lord Burnley's bed.”

“How can you be sure I'm his son?” He'd already accepted his heritage. It was like a part of him had known before Burnley told him.

“Your birthmark,” she said reluctantly.