Miss Grantham's One True Sin (The Regency Matchmaker Series Book 2) (24 page)

Her father blustered. "Preposterous! What lies have we told you?"

"From the cradle, you made me believe the
ton
was the only segment of society worth being a part. You instilled in me an innate contempt for all other people. I am just like you. And I am ashamed of myself."

"He has poisoned you," her mother said. "That man has been filling you with nonsense."

Marianna pulled herself up to her full height and faced her mother. "The Viscount Trowbridge has set me free."

She meant it.

Truesdale was right; she
had
been enslaved. She'd never tasted freedom before coming to London. Freedom of will, freedom of movement, freedom of choice—even freedom of thought. Now that she knew what real freedom was, she was unwilling to go back under her parents’ yoke. She could not. She
would
not.

In the face of her parents' anger, Marianna was filled with a strange calm. Suddenly, she knew what she had to do. It would unleash her parents’ fury, not that it mattered. Not anymore.

She looked them in the eyes and set her jaw before she spoke what she knew would be her final words to them.

TRUE HAD BEEN up on the slope in the cornfield with his steward during the morning’s fox hunt, a sport he detested. As soon as he heard the news of Mary's ruination, he galloped his horse down to the manor. Throwing his ribbons to a groom, he had run into the house and taken the stairs four at a time.
Poor Mary
. She would be like a ship on the rocks. He expected to find her huddled on her bed or hearth, sobbing, and it was all his fault.

He should never have suggested to his house party guests that she'd been swimming naked in the first place. And he should never have provoked her. He'd claimed she was timid, that she was unadventurous and un-spontaneous and without a personality of her own. And all the time he knew none of it was true. He should have anticipated she might do something like this. Because of him, because of his foolish provocation, she was ruined—unless he could still talk her into marrying him.

He ran down the hall to her chamber and walked into her room without knocking. He did not care.
Propriety be damned!
Mary needed protection, needed comfort, and he would be the one to give it no matter the circumstances.

Her bedchamber was empty. He stilled. Where else would she be?

With her parents. “
Blast it to bloody hell and back!”
he cried, bounding
out of the room and down the stairs. "Where is Miss Grantham?!" he demanded of a surprised servant.

"The winter parlor, my lord. With her parents," he added, but True was already half-way down the hall, heading for Mary's side. She was in there, and he could guess what she was going through.

She’d been found standing stark naked and soaking wet and standing in a tree. The ton would not be kind, and her parents would be even worse! Poor Mary. She did not deserve their scorn. She was good and kind and intelligent and spirited. She deserved so much more than she had. She deserved a love match. She deserved a husband who would cherish her for the lovely person she was, a husband who would recognize her special gifts and her inner beauty. A man like himself, he realized.

The truth hit him like a wild hurricane.

He loved her. He wanted her. And he would defend her.

He surged down the hall, ready to do just that. More than that. He intended to kneel before her and ask for her hand—not because he needed her gems, but because he, True Sin, had finally found the one thing he could not live without, the one thing he could not scorn. His Mary.

He reached out to yank open the door, but he stilled. He could hear her speaking, loud and clear, through the door. To his shock, Mary's tone was defiant. Laying his hand on the knob, he turned it soundlessly and eased the door open an inch, then two, and looked into the winter parlor. There, Mary stood defiant before her parents. Her tone matched the burning anger in her eyes.

"Trowbridge and I are not betrothed," she said. "We never were."

Her parents opened their mouths, but she raised her voice. "I will never marry him!" she said, her voice hard. "And even if you can still find some title desperate enough for funds to take me, I will refuse. I will return to the school forthwith and teach to support myself. I will never be forced to wed."

True's heart thudded to a stop.

What a fool he had been! He had thought to charge in and rescue the fair damsel, when the fair damsel was already rescuing herself—from him. Her words were clear. She would rather face a life of near-poverty and subservience than marry
him
.

Guilt washed over him. She obviously despised him. And he did not blame her. His seduction of her had ended in her utter ruination. He looked at her, standing so proudly erect before her stony, angry parents.

She had changed.

And, he realized, she was not the only one.

Before she had come into his life, True Sin wouldn't have looked upon her present circumstances with any amount of sympathy. True Sin had believed that the
ton
was flawed and that anyone who aspired to it was beneath him.

The moment stretched into a brittle silence. His heart ached, for he knew she would never accept him now, no matter how he had changed. She would not believe him, and he couldn’t expect her to. He’d been as rigid and as narrow-brained as her parents. He didn't deserve her.

Even though she'd said she would never accept him, True didn't withdraw from the scene. He knew her parents were too cruel or too obtuse—or both—to give Marianna her freedom. She was going to have to fight for it, and, for all her courage, she would need True there.

"Where is our jewelry?" her father demanded.

"Your jewelry?" Marianna asked. "Is it not in your chamber?"

"Do not be stupid, girl," Mrs. Grantham snapped. "He means the jewelry we sent with you to London. It was a large fortune, and you have not worn a bit of it. Did you sell it?"

"Where is the blunt?" Her father curled his lip. "Or have you spent it already? Hand it over—or whatever goods you bought with it—or I swear, by God, that I will call the magistrate and have you taken to Ludgate for theft!"

True stepped into the room affecting a lazy calm he did not feel. All three looked at him in surprise.

"You," he said, looking from Gerald to Violet Grantham, “will both leave Trowbridge. Now. Or I will personally see to it that you are never received in Polite Society. Ever."

"No one has that kind of power," Mrs. Grantham said. "Not even the Prince."

True leaned insolently against the back of the sofa. "Try me. Believe me, I would enjoy the sport."

"Oh, so would I!" Ophelia Robertson’s voice sang from the doorway. She slid onto the seat across from Mrs. Grantham and smiled at her. "Do test it, won't you?"

Mrs. Grantham opened her mouth as though to say something but shut it again. She flicked a glance at her husband but got back nothing but a frown. They were outnumbered and outgunned. They clearly did not know how to proceed, what to say. So they said nothing at all.

Mary looked from True to Ophelia. She could see they were both ready to do battle for her, and she was filled with a strange elation. Tears formed in her eyes. "How could I have ever thought either of you disloyal?" she murmured.

"Because we were," True answered her, his clear, strong voice steady and warm.

OPHELIA’S NODDED, HER expression resolute as she stared the elder Granthams down. The pair looked uncertain, and they seemed smaller of a sudden, as though they had shrunk.

Truesdale gave them a look of distaste and then, appearing to come to some sort of grim decision, drew her father aside and spoke—too softly for Marianna to hear.

"What is he saying, Gerald?" her mother asked sharply.

Ignoring his wife and still listening to Truesdale, Mr. Grantham's eyes went wide. A smile split his features, and he turned to his wife. "Take off your jewels."

Mrs. Grantham's hand went to her throat. "What?"

"Take them off. Now. Give them to the Viscount here."

"I will not!" she sputtered. "What can you possibly mean by this, Mr. Grantham? What did that vile creature say to you? How can you ask me to—"

"Take them off, wife, or so help me I will strike you!"

Mrs. Grantham's mouth dropped open, and she sputtered—but she took off the heavy emerald necklace she wore and laid it on the end table.

"All of it," Truesdale said.

"Do it," Mr. Grantham ordered.

She complied with a growl. Three rings, two bracelets, a brooch, and ear drops joined the necklace on the table, and without a word, Mr. Grantham pushed his sputtering wife through the doorway. To Marianna's astonishment, they didn't go upstairs but walked right out the front door and down the lane.

Marianna turned to Truesdale to ask what he had said to her father, but Ophelia spoke before Marianna could say anything. “Marianna, I have something to confess. And unless I Miss my guess, the Viscount does, too.” She turned to him and he nodded. "Would you like to offer your confession first, or shall I?" Ophelia asked.

Truesdale bowed low. "Forgive me, Mrs. Robertson, but what I have to say to Marianna should be offered privately."

Ophelia inclined her head. "Very well, Trowbridge. I shall speak first, for what I have to say should be said in front of both of you." She gave a tremulous smile, and her hands fluttered nervously. She patted the sofa next to her, and Marianna sat. Truesdale settled, a little reluctantly, it seemed to Marianna, on the sofa opposite theirs.

Ophelia sighed. "I do not know how to say this without being direct." She chuckled. "I do not know how to say
anything
without being direct, it seems." Her eyes held each of their gazes in for a long moment in turn before she spoke again at last

"I ... did not marry Mr. Robertson this past spring, as most of the
ton
thinks I did." She smoothed one parchment hand over her pink feathered gown. "No, I married him thirty years ago. I was ... with child." She looked down at her hands. "The babe was not his, but Mr. Robertson gallantly offered to marry me. Foolishly, I agreed and soon discovered that Mr. Robertson and I did not suit."

She looked down at her lap and a tear rolled down her cheek. She did not bother to wipe it away. "We parted company. I gave my babe to a woman who could have no more children, and then I worked as a companion to a lady who—as all the
ton
knows—left her entire fortune to me. I was rich beyond my dreams. I lived grandly, and for a time I thought I was happy, but the novelty of riches wore thin soon enough. The time came when I realized I could never wed again. I had lost my only child and alienated my husband. I paid dearly for my foolishness!” She dabbed at her face with her sleeve, and Truesdale offered her his handkerchief, which she accepted as though it were made of glass and drew a heavy sigh.

"As my position in Society solidified, I was able to make limited contact with my baby's new mother. She and I even became friends. She needed a friend. Her husband was cruel to her—when he bothered to pay her any attention at all, that is. He was always racing about Town or country with his high-flying set, and he wasn't in attendance at the birth of their baby. He never knew it had died. She'd been too afraid to tell him for fear of his blame and cruelty. She was able to keep the poor babe's death a secret—a fact I was then grateful for, for my own infant was accepted without a wrinkle, and I thought everything would turn out well. I even thought I might have some contact with my child, since his new mother and I had become quite close, but it was not to be, for my friend died, and I was cut off from all contact with the child. When next I saw him, he was grown close to manhood, and I was sick at heart because he had become just like his father and the other men in his family."