The Viscount's Counterfeit Wife (52 page)

“Not that you have
any choice, but... it’s a little late, isn’t it?” His mocking
laughter had a nasty bite to it. He had a look of disbelief and
disillusionment… or was that disgust?... on his face. “How
convenient,” there was derision in every syllable. His scorn made
her face burn. “Confess
after
I tell you I’ve recovered my memory.”

He was furious,
frightening her a bit.

Of course he’s angry,
you ninny! She’d allowed him to believe someone else had shot him.
She’d let him think they were married.

“Why didn’t you
tell me sooner?” His stern tone held no forgiveness, no
understanding.

“I… I… I’ve
been trying to tell you for the past two days, but you’ve been
avoiding me.” Incensed, suddenly, that he was making her feel like
a sinner, she said through clenched teeth, “I wasn’t the one who
was climbing through a strange woman’s bedroom window in the middle
of the night.”

“
My
bedroom window.”

How caustic his tone
was!

“I know that now.”
Had he no sympathy for her dilemma? “But I only found that out
today, at the lawyers’ office.”

“Why did you do it?”

She shivered at the ice
in his voice. “Shoot you? I was scared and was trying to protect
myself.”

“No, not that.
Although at times it hurts like hell, the shooting I can understand.”

She felt weak with
relief. That had been her worst fear; that he would want to punish
her, drag her in front of the law courts.

“I meant why did you
pretend we were married?”

“Oh.” Her heart did
a crazy flip. “Doctor Graham jumped to that conclusion on the first
night and you followed his example. Then, when I explained that you
were a stranger, he bade me not to tell you. He said it could ruin
your chances of ever regaining your memory.” She paused, searching
for the right words. “He insisted.”

“Surely you can find
a better excuse than blaming the doctor!” he jeered.

“I’m telling you
exactly what happened.” He had always seemed so fair. It surprised
her that he wouldn’t listen to her explanation. “He assumed you
were my husband and called you Mr. Leighton. I wanted to correct him
immediately, but... you seemed so relieved, I didn’t have the heart
to do it. And later, once we left your bedroom, when I told him I
didn’t know you, he remained adamant you shouldn’t be told.

He hissed with
annoyance.

“I wanted to tell
you, but he said it could do irreparable harm. You might never get
your memory back. I was torn. But you were so lost without your
memory, I reluctantly agreed. It didn’t seem right to risk my need
to be honest against your chance of a full recovery.”

She saw she was finally
getting through to him. “If you need proof, go ask the doctor. He
will support my story.”

“Because of your
beautiful brown eyes?” he taunted. “Or because he is involved in
this deception with you?”

“I’m glad you think
my eyes are beautiful,” she retorted. “But why would the doctor
want to deceive you?” She was getting angry now. “I’ve courted
ruin trying to do the right thing by you. I certainly don’t deserve
your mockery.”

“I’m sure you
thought the reward would be worth it.”

“What reward?” Had
she missed something? “If you mean a heavenly one when I meet my
maker, you’ll have to forgive me for hoping that recompense is too
far off to be of much comfort now.” If she’d been less upset, she
might have laughed at the idea. She began heading for the door,
anxious now to get away from this fuming, sneering man she’d
thought she’d come to know and love.

“I mean the one where
you get to marry a future Earl and become a countess.”

He must be joking! But
he sounded too serious for that to be the case. She halted. Keeping
her back to him, she said, “Because that is what you think will
happen now?”

“Well, isn’t it?
Isn’t this where you insist that you’ve been compromised? Where
you tell me you’ll go to my father and threaten to ruin the family
name if I don’t wed you.”

She shook her head
sadly. So this was how it was going to end?

Her silence seemed to
anger him more. “Or do I have it wrong? It’s the other way round.
My father is the one who set you up here. To trap me into marrying
you,”

Maybe it was better
this way. This spiteful, nasty-tongued Reed was not the one she’d
learned to admire. If he could believe this of her, she had no
business caring for him. She didn’t bother trying to defend
herself. She continued moving toward the door. “Believe what you
will, but there was no plot to deceive you. I never met the doctor
prior to that night, nor have I met him since,” she said. “If you
ask him, he’ll tell you the truth. He has no reason not to.” She
shrugged. “Although, I never told him you had climbed in the window
or he might have reacted differently.”

“Why? How do you
think he would have reacted?”

She turned around. She
wanted to see his reaction. “He said that if I didn’t keep you,
your fate that night would be an asylum for the indigent and insane.”

At his grimace, she
nodded. “If I’d told him you’d climbed in my window and I
feared it was to kill me, I have no doubt he would have ensured that
was where you ended up.”

He gazed back at her in
thoughtful silence. Was it only wishful hoping that made her think he
might be softening a little?

“I maintained that
“lie” for your benefit and for your benefit only,” she said.
“And at great risk to my reputation.”

“And you’ve
received no reward for it, no advantage?”

He couldn’t seem to
let his bitterness go.

“None…” she had
to be honest, “other than a credible story for my living in the
same house with an unmarried man. Which wouldn’t have been the case
had you not lost your memory.” She reached the door and turned
around. “Would you have preferred I threw you out on the street, as
Foster urged?”

That wiped the smile
off his face. She thought he might have blanched a little at the
notion. He didn’t speak and she realized he was sifting through her
words, searching for their truth.

Now that she had the
floor, she made full use of it. “What could I hope to gain?”

“Now you’re being
naive. Isn’t it many a young lady’s dream to marry a wealthy
Viscount?”

Tally had been under
constant strain for weeks now, ever since she’d arrived in London.
She’d done her best to cope calmly with all the confusing and
frightening circumstances life had thrown her. Right now, in this
instant, she’d had enough. She tore back across the room to stand
in front of him.

So forceful was her
advance, he took a couple of steps back.

“Do you know how
arrogant and insufferable that sounds?” She poked her finger in his
chest. “I had no idea who you were! We thought you were a thief or
worse, a rapist or killer. It was only because Foster found your
pocket watch that we called you Reed. Foster thought you might have
stolen the watch, but I needed to give you a name, so you became
Reed.”

He tried to say
something but she was just getting started.

“How dare you stand
there and point your supercilious, condescending, egotistical finger
at me!” His eyes flared and she realized her fist was aiming for
his chin. She thrust it behind her back.

All of a sudden her
anger was gone. Her shoulders slumped. She was exhausted. “Do you
have any idea the trouble you’ve caused? The lies I’ve had to
tell everyone, to my sisters, my grandmother…?” Her voice tapered
off and began to quaver.

A final spurt of anger
hardened her attitude again. “And let me assure you that getting
married to
any
man
has
never
been a
dream of mine. I’ve been rejecting proposal after proposal from
Spence and, then again today, from Victor. And you think I am looking
for marriage!”

He mumbled something
about catching a bigger fish.

“Yes, I suppose
you’ve been brought up to view marriage that way. Whereas I’ve
been conditioned to–” she stopped abruptly. Her temper had her
saying things she’d never meant to reveal.

She backed toward the
door. “For all I know, you are already married!”

Reed was surprised at
that. He’d assumed she’d known all about him. He found himself
trying to assure her he wasn’t, but she wasn’t listening.

“Now if you’re
quite through sharpening your wit on me, I’m going next door, where
I should have been in the first place. I only returned tonight to
explain why you must remain here. So it’s rather convenient that
your memory has come back just in time, isn’t it?” She spun
around to make her exit.

He was about to call
out to her, to stop her from leaving, when she whirled back to face
him.

“One last thing.
Exactly when did you recover your memory?”

“It’s been coming
back in bits and pieces since I was attacked in that lane,” Reed
admitted, “but all of it snapped into place this morning.”

“I see.” Her tone
spoke volumes and her expressive eyes left him in no doubt of her
disappointment in him.

“You have to
understand how confusing it was when the memories began to return.”
He sounded like he was making excuses. How had she managed to put him
on the defensive? He felt like a snake in the grass. This discussion
wasn’t going at all the way he’d anticipated. He hadn’t
expected to understand her reasons for claiming him as husband.

She went out into the
hall. “Luckily, no harm has been done.” She strode down the
hallway to reach the back door. He followed along behind her. “Now
I have to go. It’s late and Foster won’t sleep until I’m back.
Besides, Grandma is living with us now. She’d frown upon my being
here alone with you.”

Reed debated telling
her that her dear grandparent might not be that averse to the idea of
them being compromised! That Lady Lawton knew very well who he was,
but he saw she was holding herself together by a thread.
Nevertheless, he couldn’t help asking, “And that’s all you have
to say on the matter?”

By now, Tally was
feeling teary, so she merely nodded her head.

He must have sensed her
mood because he came up and put his arms around her from behind. His
anger seemed to have abated. He was trying to comfort her. “I don’t
want you to go. I’ve become accustomed to sleeping across the hall
from you, to hearing your soft footsteps tiptoe past my door at
night, to inhaling the gentle scent of lavender each time you enter a
room, to seeing your beautiful brown eyes smiling at me.”

A tear seeped from
under her closed eyelid and trickled down her cheek.
Please
don’t be nice
, she begged silently. She was too tired to
resist.

He surprised her.
“Recovering my memory has been confusing.,” he admitted. “I
need time to sort things out, to absorb both the loss of my memory
and its sudden return.” His head leaned down close and he rubbed
his cheek softly against hers. He must have felt the dampness on hers
because he lifted a finger to wipe away a tear sliding down her face.

“Can we agree to put
aside our differences for now? There’s something I must do first,
that can’t wait to be cleared up. Afterwards, we’ll find out
where Monsieur is. Then we can talk?”

She nodded again.

He hugged her and
whispered, “Goodnight,
wife of
mine.
He placed a soft kiss on the back of her neck. “Stay
well.” Then he opened his arms and let her go.

She stood frozen for
several emotionally charged moments, torn at the thought of leaving.

“Goodnight then.”
She stepped outside and he followed her. They didn’t speak as he
accompanied her to her back door. Still wordless, she went inside but
just before closing the door, she said, “You’ll be sure to keep
the wound clean, won’t you?”

* * *

Tally was on her way
upstairs to her new studio when she heard his deep voice greeting
Foster the next day. They chatted easily as Foster led him to the
drawing room to wait for her. She hadn’t realized they’d become
so friendly.

She didn’t want to
argue with him again. It had ended rather nicely last night. Now,
he’d probably recalled some further grievance against her. She
continued upwards.

She’d saved the man’s
life! Couldn’t he accept that and leave her in peace?

“Missy. Yer…” He
stopped abruptly, then opted for, “Yon… Mr. Gordon’s here.”

“Viscount Selwich,
Foster. We’d better start calling the man by his correct name.”
She began setting up her easel.

“Don’t seem right,
somehow.” His tone was truculent.

“Tell him I’m not
able to see him at the moment.”

“He said to tell you
that he’d come right on up if you didn’t agree to see him.”

“Isn’t Grandma
around?”

“She fled back to her
room the minute she heard his voice at the door”

“That’s strange.
Usually she’s the first one to greet company.” Indeed, she’d
been counting on her grandparent to act as a shield if people dropped
by.

“Perhaps it depends
on who the company is,” Foster suggested slyly.

“But how could she
have known who it was before he came in.”

“Who else knows
you’ve moved next door?”

He was always so
sensible. “Yes, of course.” She pondered that. “Why do you
think she’d want to avoid him?”

“Could she have
recognized him the other day?”

“Surely not. She’d
have said something!” She hesitated, uncertain now. “Wouldn’t
she?”

“And make you realize
you were living with a Viscount?” He snickered. “She must have
known you’d never have done that knowingly.”

“No, that wouldn’t
have served her purpose, would it?” She did some fast thinking. “So
you think she’s already planning my marriage to him?”