Twice a Rake (46 page)

“Have you put your name on anyone’s dance card yet?” Quin asked his friend. Jonas had already danced the opening quadrille with Nia, and the supper dance too—a waltz. Quin ought to have voiced a complaint about Nia dancing a waltz, since she wasn’t out yet. She didn’t yet have permission to dance the waltz from one of the patronesses of Almack’s. But his mother had reminded him that they were not in Town. The rules of propriety need not be adhered to quite so strictly in the country. The remainder of the sets he had spread out amongst various ladies from the house party and a few from the town.

Nia hadn’t managed to be quite the wallflower she would have liked, either, with a partner for every set but one, when she instead chose to go for a walk around the kitchen gardens with her father. Quin barely managed to get his name on her card before it was filled, and he knew Aurora would never forgive him if he had not acted the part of the older brother.

Jonas looked across the floor at a grouping of young ladies, refusing to meet Quin’s eyes. “Yes, I’ve made arrangements.”

On the dais, the violinist tapped his bow against the floor, signaling their readiness to begin the final dance. Odd, that Jonas was avoiding giving more answer than that. “I suppose we ought to go and fetch our partners then,” Quin said.

“Indeed we should.” With that, Jonas turned from him and walked away.

There was no time to ponder Jonas’s reaction at the moment, however. Quin must fetch his mother. He’d requested that she waltz with him—something he had never in all his life done.

With her on his arm, they took up their positions on the ballroom floor. Quin looked around to find Nia, to be certain she had a partner for the final dance of the evening. “What the devil?” he said when he finally found her. “Mother, why have you allowed Nia to dance a third set with Jonas tonight? It isn’t proper. They’ll think her fast.”

“I see nothing improper or fast about it. And you really can’t say anything about impropriety, since abandoning me without a word and not writing to me to tell me you were alive for years is hardly proper. Being married for months, without a brief note to inform me of such is hardly proper.” His mother frowned up at him as the music started and they began to dance. “A third dance with a gentleman who is virtually family, at a country ball no less, is perfectly fine.”

As usual, Mother’s tone brooked no argument. Quin had to chuckle. Despite his thirty-two years, she could put him in his place in the span of a moment—without even batting an eye. “You are right, of course.”

“Of course I am. I’m always right. You ought to have learned that by now.”

“Consider the lesson complete,” Quin said.

Mother raised a single eyebrow. “And you ought to also realize that the same goes for Aurora, too. She is always right. You’ll save yourself years of heartache if you learn that one simple fact right in this moment.”

Apparently it was a lesson Sir Augustus had learned many years before. The man did seem to let his wife take the reins far more often than was Quin’s inclination—but he also seemed to have far less conflict within his marriage.

Damnation.

They finished the dance, keeping up their playful banter as they did. Then Quin saw his guests out to their conveyances. Most of the house party seemed inclined to stay up enjoying themselves a while longer in the salon. That was more than all right. It was the final night of the house party, after all.

But he missed his wife.

After he’d seen to their comforts and made certain the staff would not work too late into the night, Quin excused himself and went up to their chamber. He half expected to find Aurora asleep on a settee in their sitting room, as had been her habit for the majority of their marriage. But she was not there.

Then he went into her chamber, thinking she might have been too exhausted and fallen asleep in her own bed. Again, she was not to be found.

Finally, Quin went to his own chamber. Instead of his wife, however, he found her journal. It lay carefully positioned on his pillow, open to a certain page a little past the halfway point. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he took the journal into his hands gingerly, almost as though it would disappear in the same manner Aurora seemed to have done. He held it to the candlelight and read.

We, neither one of us, wanted what we now have: a marriage full of more silence than laughter, of more pain than joy, of more secrets than truths. Even just tonight, I learned yet another truth that has been hidden away from me for these last months
—
the truth of why you refused to honor your agreement with Lady Phoebe.

Which led me to another truth: no matter how much I may wish otherwise, no matter how much I love you and want the best for you, no matter how many years have passed, you are still the boy whose father beat him when he couldn’t handle his own grief. Perhaps you will always be that child
—
lost and hurt and seemingly alone in the world.

There is a truth about me which you should know. However much you believe yourself to be like your father (and mayhap you’re right), that is also how much I am like my mother. I had hoped this would not be the case
—
that her problems with bearing healthy, living children would be hers alone and would not pass down to the next generation. Alas, they are not. Her problems are now my problems.

Which means, as my husband, they are yours as well.

The babe I carried is gone. Indeed, it is doubtful I can ever carry a child long enough for it to survive. Out of my mother’s countless attempts, I was her only success. And what a success I have been, earning the scorn of the
ton
, whilst failing in the one task you had set for me.

I cannot bear the thought of continuing along my mother’s path
—
of trying and failing again and again until all that is left of my soul is an empty shell, all that is left of our marriage is the memory of love with the reality of heartache. And if there is one thing I have learned about myself through our marriage, it is that I am, generally, a selfish person. I wish for what is best for me, rather than what is best for my acquaintances. I wish for what is best for me, rather than what is best for my dearest friend. I wish for what is best for me, rather than what is best for you, my husband. I had thought I might change, but now I am not so sure.

What is best for me right now is to be alone.

By the time Quin came to the end, he was baffled. The baby was gone.
Aurora
was gone. But where could she have gotten off to? Mrs. Marshall hadn’t said anything about Aurora leaving, so she must still be in the abbey somewhere.

He had to find her. He couldn’t allow her to be alone. Not now. Not after losing the baby. She needed comfort. She needed to know that he loved her, regardless of whether they had a baby or not. That he didn’t care about Rotheby’s blasted edicts. That he needed her more than brandy, more than gambling or boxing or any of his other pursuits, even more than air.

Quin rushed from his chamber down to the salon. “She’s gone,” he said as he burst through the door. “Aurora is gone. She’s lost the baby and she is gone.”

The house guests leapt to their feet, all talking at once.

“The baby? What baby?”

“Where on earth could she have gone?”

“It’s the middle of the night. Surely she couldn’t have gone far.”

Quin shook his head. “There’s no time for explanations. We have to find her.” He sat in the nearest chair, eyes wide, with Aurora’s journal still in his hands.

“Let’s all work together,” Jonas called out over the general commotion. Every eye turned to him, including Quin. “We’ll break into pairs to search the abbey and the grounds. The servants are still setting things to rights after the ball, so we will gain their assistance as well. Question everyone—Cook, the grooms in the stables—everyone you run across. Find out if they’ve seen her this evening. We will all report back here, to the salon, in thirty minute increments as to where we’ve searched and what we’ve learned. Lady Aylesbury and Lord Rotheby will remain here to keep track of our efforts.”

Thank God for Jonas. Lord knew Quin’s head was anything but level at that precise point in time.

Within moments, pairs formed and cleared out of the salon, beginning their search.

Quin left alone. He couldn’t sit and wait for someone to find her. He couldn’t bear the thought of anything happening to her when she was alone, when he wasn’t there to protect her.

He had to find her.

~ * ~

Zeus hadn’t stopped licking Aurora’s face since they had arrived at the hermitage hours before, other than a brief stint where the pup was too tired to keep his eyes open and he fell asleep on her lap where she sat in the leather chair. But then her sobbing had started anew, and Zeus returned to his vigil.

She oughtn’t to have brought him with her. She ought to have left him at the abbey, where he could be petted and played with and loved by all the young ladies after the ball had finished.

But as was her wont, Aurora had taken the self-serving path.

Zeus had just moved to lick dry the salty tears on the other side of her face when the hermitage’s door flew open with Quin on the other side of the threshold. He stood there gasping for breath, with his eyes ablaze and hair flowing free about his shoulders, unmoving.

For long moments, they merely stared at each other. Why had he come? There was nothing he could do, nothing that could repair what had been lost.

Zeus left her and waddled over to Quin’s feet, barking and jumping up for affection. How lovely it must be to be a dog. They were always free to show their love, leaping into a lap or licking a face whenever the mood struck. A simple nudge or a bark was all it took to receive love.

How much more complicated to be a man or a woman.

Quin reached down and scratched behind Zeus’s ears. “I wondered if you might come here,” he said into the stillness.

With each word, another piece of her heart broke off.

“Everyone has been looking for you, you know. You’ve given us all quite a fright.”

Aurora nodded. She couldn’t trust her voice yet, couldn’t speak without fear of falling completely apart at his feet. That just would not do. She could not become a weak ninny, crying and begging him to love her despite her failings.

When Zeus wouldn’t stop stretching up Quin’s long legs to nudge his hand with his wet nose, Quin finally reached down to scoop the pup into his arms. “May I come in?” he asked. His voice was calm. Measured.

Again, Aurora nodded.

He stepped into the hermitage, his massive frame nearly filling the small room, and took a seat in the chair opposite her.

“I love you,” he said. “I love you more than I know how to”

Aurora raised a hand to stop him. Tears welled in her eyes again. She couldn’t listen to this—couldn’t bear knowing how much pain he was in. Her own pain was more than she was prepared to carry. The added weight of his would suffocate her.

Taking her hand into his own, he lowered it to her lap. “Yes, I have to tell you this. And you have to listen.” Quin closed his eyes and inhaled sharply. “I love you more than I know how to handle, and I can’t live without you. I can’t
exist
without you. Do you realize what you’ve done for me? I have a reason to enjoy life again—a reason to be the man my father never managed to be.”

It wasn’t enough, though. It could never be enough, as long as she couldn’t give him the heir that his grandfather required. “But Lord Rotheby”