Regency Innocents (10 page)

It was the one she had been wearing the night he had forced that kiss on her.

Before long, he realised he was not going to be able to relax until he had her on board ship and out into the Channel. While they were in France there were innumerable ways for her to wriggle out of his grasp.

It was a great relief when, about ten miles out of Paris, her head began to droop. She couldn't have slept a wink the night before to be sleeping so soundly in the jolting carriage. She must have been scared stiff of leaving her family and her country behind, and going to live amongst strangers. She made no demur when he tucked her wilting
form against his shoulder, and once he was certain she was fully asleep he took the liberty of putting his arm round her, and settling her into a more comfortable position. She was so tiny, tucked against his heart. So frail a creature.

Surely there must be some way he could get her to see he was not a monster? Just a man who wanted to be her friend and protector. But how? When so far all he had done was bully and frighten her?

She did not wake until well into the afternoon.

‘Where are we?' she yawned, pushing herself upright.

‘Abbeville. Since you were sleeping so soundly, I took the opportunity to press on. We have been able to cover far more ground than if we had needed to keep stopping to see to your comfort.'

His matter-of-fact tone brought her sharply to her senses. For a blissful moment, as she had come awake within the cradle of his powerful arms, she had mistaken the fact that he had allowed her to use his broad chest for her pillow as a mark of tenderness.

‘You will have your own suite of rooms tonight,' he said, plunging her deeper into gloom. Of course he would not want any real intimacy with her. Their marriage was only for public show.

She was not very much surprised when a meal was brought to her own little parlour, or when she ate it alone. He had barely spoken a handful of words to her all day. On seeing the meagre amount of luggage she had packed, instead of appreciating her ability to travel light he had made a sarcastic comment about having to arrange credit at various smart outfitters once they arrived in London. After that Charles had turned from her and gazed fixedly out of the window.

The hotel was naturally first class, and the maid
provided to help her prepare for bed was both efficient and friendly. But Heloise knew she would not sleep a wink, no matter how soft the feather mattress was. She had dozed in her husband's arms nearly all day, and now she was wide awake—and as troubled as she had been the night before.

She had nobody but herself to blame for her predicament. She had approached Charles and offered to be the means by which he could salve his wounded pride. She should not feel offended that he cared so little for her that he would not even fight a duel when she was insulted in a public square. Besides, she had not wanted him to fight a duel. She could not bear to think of him being injured or, worse, killed on her account.

She would not be able to rest properly until he was safely in England, where Du Mauriac would not dare follow, she reflected, chewing at a fingernail.

Anyway, she had worked out, during the long sleepless hours of the previous night, that the quarrel in the Palais Royale had not been about her at all, no matter what words the men had used. Charles had clearly known far more about Du Mauriac than she had told him, else how would he have been able to sneer at his parentage? And another thing—it had only been when she had told him Du Mauriac was the suitor she wished to escape that he had shown any inclination to take her proposition seriously.

She shivered at the cold, calculating way Charles had behaved. He must have studied Du Mauriac closely to have taken the very course which would hurt him most. He had stolen his woman, refused to acknowledge him as a social equal, then knocked him down in a public place, rendering him an object of ridicule.

She drew the coverlet up to her chin, the cold seeping into her very soul. Felice had said he had no heart. He had
warned her himself that his nature was so cold and vengeful he could sever the ties to his own family without a qualm.

No. She shook her head. Felice had been wrong. And when Charles himself had informed her of his nature there had been something in his eyes—almost as though he was taunting her with the description she had heard applied to him so often.

His treatment of Du Mauriac had been cold and vengeful, that was true. But Du Mauriac was a vile man who fully deserved all that Charles had done to him. And as for that business about cutting ties with the family who had raised him … well, yes, that did sound bad. But, knowing what she did of Charles, she would not be a bit surprised to learn that it was they who had done something dreadful, and that rather than expose them he'd let the gossip-mongers make what they would of it all.

She was startled out of her reverie when someone pushed her bedroom door open. This might be a first-class inn, but clearly some people lodging here had no manners. She was just opening her mouth to scream her objection at having her room invaded when she realised it was only Charles, entering not from the corridor but from a connecting door to another bedroom.

‘I am not a monster, Heloise,' he sighed, stalking towards her. ‘You do not need to clutch the sheet up to your chin as though you fear I mean to ravish you. I can assure you, nothing is further from my mind.'

Relief that it was not some stranger about to assault her had her sagging into the pillows. Though his words rankled. Did he think she was a complete fool? She knew all too well that when he wanted a woman he would go to one of his mistresses.

‘I only came to inform you of the fact that I will not be making demands of that nature upon you. I said from the start that you are far too young to be married at all, leave alone face motherhood.' He bent over her and placed a perfunctory kiss on her forehead. ‘Goodnight, Lady Walton,' he said.

‘Goodnight, Charles,' she replied, betraying by only the very slightest quiver in her lower lip her feeling of humiliated rejection.

She would not cry until he had left the room. He detested any display of emotion. She could only imagine how disgusted her complete breakdown the night before must have made him. But it probably accounted for his distant behaviour with her today. She must not make the mistake of showing such lack of breeding again. Even if he never came to care all that much for her, she would do her utmost to be the kind of wife he wanted—compliant and undemonstrative.

To prove that she could do this, she tried a shaky smile. To tell the truth, she did feel a measure of relief. She was totally unprepared for a wedding night with a husband who regarded her as a necessary evil. Or to endure the ordeal of being deflowered by a man who would regard it as a duty to be performed in the cold-blooded way he seemed to live the rest of his life.

Lord Walton ripped off his cravat the moment he entered his room, and flung it aside to land he knew not where. He felt as though he could not breathe. God, how scared of him she had looked! And how relieved when he had told her he had no intentions of claiming his husbandly rights! He strode to the side table and poured a measure of brandy into a tumbler. Then slumped into a chair, staring
into its amber depths. He would find no solace there, he reflected, swirling the liquid round and round, warming it to release its fragrant fumes. The one time he had attempted to use alcohol as an anaesthetic it had failed him miserably. All it had done was make him feel sorry for himself. He had spouted the most maudlin nonsense to a virtual stranger, and woken with a thick head in the morning. He would need a clear head the next morning. If they could make an early enough start they would reach Calais and be sailing for home on the evening tide.

Providing Heloise did not fly from him during the night. Starting to his feet, he crossed to the chamber door. And paused with his hand on the latch.

Perhaps the gentlemanly thing to do would be to let her go.

Heloise deserved a man who could love and nurture her, not scare and bully her.

Dammit, why was it so impossible to behave rationally around her? He ran a hand over his brow.

Seeing her sitting in that bed, chewing her nails like a frightened, lonely child, had made him want to take her in his arms and comfort her. But he knew it would not have worked. He was the last person she would want to seek comfort from. He was the worst of her problems. Besides, the feel of her slight body, snuggled trustingly against his in the coach, had filled him with most unchivalrous longings. Right this moment he wanted her with a ferocity that made him disgusted with himself.

God, what had he done? What was he to do?

Determined to prove she was capable of behaving correctly, Heloise sat bolt upright in the carriage all the way to Calais. In spite of the fact she had spent most of the night
crying into her pillow, she was not going to repeat the mistake of yielding to exhaustion and falling asleep on a husband who seemed to regard any form of touching as an intrusion on his personal dignity.

She had served her purpose—giving him the opportunity to take revenge on Du Mauriac and concealing the chink in his armour that was his love for Felice. And now he did not know quite what to do with her.

He was avoiding her as much as he could. When they got to Calais, he left her in the carriage while he arranged their passage, then installed her in a private parlour to await the sailing while he went off for a walk. On the few occasions when he had deigned to speak to her, he had done so with such icy civility she just knew he regretted giving in to the rash impulse to marry her.

And who could blame him? No one was more unsuitable to be the wife of such a man than she!

By the time he came to inform her it was time to embark, she was trembling so badly she had to cling to his arm for support.

Just as they reached the companionway, a messenger dashed up to them. ‘Countess of Walton? Formerly Mademoiselle Bergeron?' he panted.

When she nodded, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a letter. ‘Thank heaven I reached you in time.' He grinned. ‘Urgent, the sender said it was, that I got this to you before you left France.' His mission complete, the man melted back into the crowd that thronged the quayside.

‘You had better open it at once,' she heard Charles say, and he pulled her slightly to one side, so that they did not impede other passengers from boarding.

‘It is from my mother,' she said, after swiftly scanning the few lines of hastily scrawled script. ‘Du Mauriac is dead.'

Translating for Charles, she read, “‘… the Royalist officials sent to arrest him employed such zeal that many Bonapartists rushed to his aid. In the ensuing brawl, somebody stabbed him. Nobody knows yet who it was …'”

She clutched the letter to her bosom, her eyes closing in relief. Charles was safe.

‘What violent times we live in,' Charles remarked, wondering why it felt as though the dock had lurched beneath his feet.

Heloise had only married him to escape Du Mauriac's clutches. What a pointless gesture she had made. If only she had waited a few days, and not panicked, she would not have had to make that ultimate sacrifice.

‘Dear me,' he observed. ‘You need not have married me after all.'

O
h, poor Charles! He was already smarting from taking on a wife he did not really want, and now he had learned that at least part of his reason for doing so had ceased to exist.

But, instead of betraying his annoyance, he held out his arm and said in an icily polite voice, ‘Will you come aboard now, madam?'

Oh, dear. She gulped. How he must wish he could just leave her on the quayside and go back to England alone. But he was too honourable even to suggest such a thing. Laying her hand upon his sleeve, she followed him up the gangplank, her heart so leaden in her chest she wondered it could keep beating.

He showed her to the cabin he had procured for the voyage, then informed her that he was going on deck. His face was frozen, his posture rigid, and she ached for his misery. It hurt all the more to know she was the cause of it!

Charles hardly dared breathe until the last rope was cast off and the ship began to slide out of the harbour. She had not made a last desperate bid for freedom. Even when
the coast of France was no more than a smudge on the horizon, she remained resolutely belowdecks.

Avoiding him.

He paced restlessly, heedless of the spray which repeatedly scoured the decks.

His conscience was clear. After a night spent wrestling with it, he had deliberately given her several opportunities to give him the slip during the day. Why had she not taken them? She was not staying with him because she was avaricious, nor was she all that impressed by his title.

The only thing that might explain her resolute determination to stick to their bargain was the fact she had given her word. Did it mean so much to her? He pictured her eyes, burning with zeal when she had promised to be the best wife she knew how to be, and accepted that it must.