The Scandals Of An Innocent Page 4
She was always extremely careful of discussing Lydia’s situation. When Lydia had first come to live with her at Spring House the place had been besieged by scandal seekers come to gawk and gossip. Poor Lydia had hidden away in terror and Alice had been appalled by the visitors’ capacity for cruelty. It had been like a freak show with people lining up in the hope of seeing the disgraced, pregnant daughter of the Duke of Cole. These days Lydia seldom went beyond the garden and would sit reading for hours on end, or gazing raptly into space in a way that made Alice feel worried for her sanity. She and Lizzie tried to draw her friend out but sometimes it was as though Lydia inhabited a different world.
Alice threw up the sash on the window and a blast of cold air, directly from the moors, whistled into the room and almost extinguished the fire. “That is much better,” she said with relief, shivering.
Miles raised his brows. “Perhaps you require a drink, Miss Lister. A restorative cup of tea? You will not feel so mortified over your criminal activities once you have had a cup, of that I am sure.”
“I am not a criminal,” Alice said. She slammed the sash closed and spun around. “The only thing that pains me is your presence, Lord Vickery, but if we have resolved the situation with regard to the wedding gown you may be on your way.”
“Of course,” Miles said. He stood up, too, but rather than moving toward the door he walked purposefully toward her instead. Alice’s throat dried. How was it possible to dislike Miles so intensely and yet find his physical presence so overwhelmingly attractive? she wondered desperately. Whatever the reason, it was most uncomfortable.
“There was one other thing,” Miles said softly, when he was close enough to her to revive all the hot shivery feelings that Alice had just banished with a blast of cold winter air. “It concerns my proposal of marriage to you.”
Alice’s heart did another breathless little flip. She felt shocked and dizzy. Then she felt furious, more incensed than she could remember feeling in a very long time. She looked at him. He met her gaze with complete equanimity. So it was true, Alice thought. Miles Vickery did possess the extraordinary arrogance to think he could simply walk in here and resume his courtship where he had left off. He thought he could consign the wager on her virtue, his pursuit of a richer heiress and his affaire with a notorious courtesan to the past, and simply make her an offer.
“You are deluded, my lord,” she said politely, “and your conceit knows no bounds. There is no proposal, nor ever will be. Our previous relationship makes a mockery of such an idea.”
“You concede that we had a relationship, then?” Miles said, brows raised.
Alice made an irritable gesture. She did not understand why he was persisting with this unless it was out of a desire to provoke her. In that he was succeeding admirably.
“We knew each other,” she snapped. “Our…acquaintance…was at an end when you left Yorkshire last time, and I have no desire to revive it.” The anger she had tried so hard to suppress suddenly jetted up. Be damned to restraint and good manners. She was a servant girl not a lady and he deserved a piece of her mind.
“Truly, Lord Vickery,” she said, “do you think I am so poor a creature with so little self-respect as to give myself and my fortune to a man who courted me for my money alone, who made a wager to seduce me into marriage and who subsequently departed for London without so much as a word in order to woo a richer prize? I would rather wed a…a snake than marry you! There is not one honest bone in your body. You will be telling me next that your time in London in the arms of some harlot made you realize just how much you had come to esteem me, and so you hurried back here hotfoot to profess your undying love.”
She stopped, wishing she had not mentioned the episode with the courtesan. She would hate Miles to think that she actually cared about his rakish ways when in fact she detested him.
“I would have told you that,” Miles said, “if I thought for a moment that you would believe me.”
Alice’s feelings felt surprisingly raw to hear him admit it. “I know you would!” she said. “You are ruthlessly manipulative.” She glared at him. “You will say or do whatever is necessary to get you what you want.”
“That is pragmatism,” Miles said.
“It is dishonesty,” Alice said. “You could not tell the truth to save your life!”
There was a brief silence.
“Miss Lister,” Miles said, “you have my measure exactly. So in the spirit of saying-or doing-whatever I have to, in order to get what I want, I am telling you unless you agree to marry me I will tell everyone about your career as a thief.”
Alice’s gaze locked with his. His expression was completely serious. There was a cool, intent look in his eyes, as though he were measuring the odds on a wager. Alice felt her heart start to race. In the early days of their acquaintance she had observed that Miles’s detachment, his air of withdrawal, was part of his attraction. He seemed so cool and aloof. To be able to reach him, to kindle something in him that was more than physical passion, would be the dream of some woman with less common sense than she had now.
“You are seeking to blackmail me into marriage,” she said, trying to match his calmness while her blood thundered in her veins and a part of her mind protested that he simply could not mean to do it, while another part was damned sure that he did.
Miles shrugged easily. “Blackmail is such an ugly word, Miss Lister. I desire to marry you. In fact, it is essential to me that I do marry you. So let us call it a bargain.”
“Why prettify something that is fundamentally unpleasant?” Alice asked steadily. She pressed her hands together. “You propose. I refuse.” Her voice lit with anger. “You are despicable, Lord Vickery.” She examined her feelings and added with some surprise, “In fact, you are even more ruthless and less likable than I had thought you were.”
Miles’s dark brows lifted in mocking amusement. He seemed unmoved by her disapproval, which, Alice thought, was surely further proof of his detestability. “Do you want me to tell everyone that you are a thief?” he asked gently.
“Of course I do not want that,” Alice said. She held his gaze and tried to hold her nerve. “I know you would not really do it.”
Miles laughed. “My dear, you underestimate me. If that is what it takes to gain your hand in marriage-”
“But it will not gain you that.” Alice turned away from him and took a few agitated steps across the room then turned to meet his gaze with unflinching directness. “No one would believe you, my lord. You must be able to see the weaknesses of your position. I could conjure up half a dozen people to say that I was blamelessly at home in bed last night and that you must have made a mistake.”
She saw the flash of calculation in his eyes as he realized that she was not going to surrender easily. The conflict between them tightened a notch, sending the blood buzzing through her veins.
“You would add perjury to your offenses?” Miles asked softly.
“Yes,” Alice said. “If I had to.”
“Even though I have the gown as proof of your theft?”
Alice made a grab for the wedding dress but Miles was too quick for her, holding it up out of her reach.
“I will tell the authorities that I caught you red-handed with this,” Miles said. “You know that the penalty for theft on this scale is death? Even if the courts showed you leniency you would be transported or imprisoned. Are you really prepared to take the risk of being found guilty, Miss Lister? How do you think your mother would feel about that?”
For a moment the black shadows threatened to close in on Alice’s mind and she was afraid she would faint.
Death. Transportation. Imprisonment.
She grabbed the edge of the table to steady herself.
“And then there is Miss Cole,” Miles continued. “What would happen to her if you were sent to jail? Her lover betrayed her, her family has cast her out and she is pregnant and destitute.” His gaze, cool and mocking, rested on Alice’s face. “She would
be utterly without protection.”
Alice pressed a hand to her forehead. “You are despicable!”
Miles laughed. “So you have already told me. It is not in dispute.”
Alice tried to rally herself. Surely he would not, could not, do such a thing. These were only empty threats. All she had to do was to hold her nerve.
“My lord, there is not the remotest chance that I will wed you,” she said, raising her chin stubbornly. “Do not seek to frighten me. The only way in which you are like to succeed in your aim would be for you to abduct me.”
Miles grinned. “My dear Miss Lister, do you know, I had not even thought of that? But now that you have suggested it I think it is an excellent plan.”
Alice chewed her lush lower lip hard. She was furious with herself for making the suggestion. She could feel her temper almost getting the better of her. “Even you would not stoop to that,” she bit out.
Miles laughed. “You know that I would,” he said. “In fact, you seem to understand my character very well. That could be an excellent basis for marriage.”
Alice made a sound like an enraged kitten and flounced away. “If you kidnapped me I would still refuse you,” she said. “You would need to pay a crooked clergyman to ignore my protestations.”
“Another excellent idea,” Miles said. “I will if I must.” He sighed. “But to be quite honest with you, Miss Lister, it is a vast amount of trouble to go to when blackmail is available as an option instead.” He moved a little closer to her. “Think about it,” he said. “Transportation…imprisonment…These are harsh options, Miss Lister. They really would not suit you. You have already scrambled out of poverty once. I am sure that you do not wish to return. And being married to me has its benefits. Your situation in life would improve immeasurably. You would have the title of marchioness-and four strawberry leaves in the coronet, for a start.”
“If you are looking for a woman who wishes for nothing more than to marry a marquis then you should wed my mama rather than me,” Alice snapped. “You are lower than a louse to seek to force me like this.” She gritted her teeth. “You are a worm and a weasel-”
Miles laughed again. “Is a weasel lower than a louse?” He spread his hands wide in a gesture of appeal. “Shall we take your poor opinion of me as read, Miss Lister, and get down to business? Think of your mother. She will be delighted if you accept my proposal. Remember that she wishes you to marry into the aristocracy-not be clapped in Fortune’s Folly jail or dispatched to Australia.”
Alice could feel a headache building behind her eyes. She rubbed her forehead. Think of your mother, Miles had said. She thought of her family and the fragile security that they had achieved since her inheritance. Could she risk losing all that? Her brother, Lowell, had the modern machinery he needed to make the farm profitable now. He was working hard to secure his future but it was not easy for him. Her mother felt safe if not happy as a wealthy matron in country society, but her confidence was so brittle. Any scandal involving Alice would devastate her. Then there was Lydia, pregnant, abandoned and alone, who would lose the roof over her head if anything happened to Alice. She could turn to her cousin, Laura Anstruther, but Laura and Dexter were poor as church mice themselves.
Miles was threatening to take everything away that Alice had worked to build. He was an officer of the Crown, working for Richard Ryder, the Home Secretary, and as such, one word from him could ruin her forever. It would break her mother’s heart, and leave Lydia defenceless. As for a court actually convicting her…her mind reeled in horror at the prospect. For she was guilty as charged. She was totally in his power.
She pressed her fingers to her temples. If only she could negotiate with Miles, make some sort of compromise. That might suffice.
“I will make a bargain with you, my lord,” she said. “I understand that you are deeply in debt and that you must want my fortune, and so, if you do not speak of what happened last night, I will consent to the pretence of a betrothal between us to help you stave off your creditors for a little while-” She stopped, shocked. For a moment there was such a bleak and desolate look in Miles’s eyes that it took her breath away. She had never, ever thought to see an expression like that on his face. And then it was gone, as swiftly as it had come, and she wondered if she had imagined it.
“It is far too late for half measures, Miss Lister,” he said. “The sale of the Drum estate and all the castle contents starts in a couple of weeks.” He smiled faintly. “I am in far deeper debt than you can ever imagine. I have already sold everything I can, and if I do not wed an heiress, and soon, I will be thrown in the Fleet-or be forced to flee the country.” He shifted a little. “That is why I am prepared to do anything to oblige you to marry me, Miss Lister. There will be no compromises. You wed me or you go to jail.”
CHAPTER FOUR
M ILES WATCHED as Alice wrestled with his not in the least romantic proposal. Every expression was written clearly on her face. He could read that she wanted to tell him to go to hell. It was in every defiant line of her body and in the jut of her chin as she stood, hands on hips, staring him down. Miles was accustomed to calculating each cynical risk he took in his life and this was one he knew was a racing certainty. No matter how much she hated him, Alice had too much to lose to refuse him. She would succumb to his blackmail, wed him, and he would have the fortune he craved.
He would have Alice in his bed, as well, and that was beginning to matter as much as the money. Well, not quite. But their sparring had only sharpened his hunger for her. For a moment Miles allowed himself to imagine Alice naked in his arms, the curves and hollows of her skin exposed to his questing hands, the scent of her wrapped about him as it had been the night before.
The arousal ripped through him, startling him in its intensity.
Miles clamped down on his excessive lust. This was not going to help him think straight and he was too calculating to be led astray by his desire. He looked at Alice again and almost forgot the resolution he had just made. She looked slightly flustered, completely defiant and totally irresistible. He wanted to kiss her. He wanted it very much.
Something flickered in Alice’s blue eyes-fury and despair in equal mixture. She was trapped and she knew it but she was not going to break down. Miles felt a sudden admiration for her. Most women would have given in to the vapors by now, or have withdrawn into a strategic swoon. Alice, it seemed, had nerves of steel and a fundamental strength of character he had seldom encountered in a female before, the only other exception being his cousin Laura Anstruther. Miles was not conventional enough to believe that women were the weaker sex-he had seen enough of their strength and courage under duress to know that they had a hardiness that many of his peers would deplore as unfeminine and unbecoming. But Alice had something in addition. She had enormous resolution.
He watched her narrowly as she paced the room. He was accustomed to weighing up his adversaries, assessing their strengths and weaknesses. Before he had gone to work for the Home Secretary he had been in the army and his work had taken him into dark places where he bartered for the lives of prisoners or hostages held by the other side, where he made bargains with men’s lives and futures as though they were no more than pieces on a chessboard, where he had always to consider the greater good and be prepared to sacrifice the individual. Over the years he had abandoned people whose only hope was that he could secure their safety. Always he reminded himself that a few had to suffer for the benefit of the majority. And gradually the choices had become less painful, more calculated, and with each decision another piece of his soul had been lost. He knew this was why he could look at Alice now and feel nothing but a tightening hunger for her and for her money, and a triumph that the game was almost won. He doubted that there was a man alive who was more unfeeling or cynical than he was now, so he felt no compunction about forcing Alice into marriage. She had something that he wanted. He had the means to compel her to his point of view. It was as simple as that.
“Even if I
agreed-” Alice began and Miles’s heart leaped to know that what he desired was so close to being within his grasp “-and I have not said that I will-there is a difficulty.”
“I am sure,” Miles said, “that it is nothing we cannot overcome.”
Alice’s eyes flashed with disdain. “I think it most unlikely you will be able to overcome this particular problem, my lord.” She turned on her heel sharply and walked away from him, the lemon silk skirts of her gown making a soft swishing sound.
“Try me,” Miles said. Now that he was within an ace of winning Alice’s consent he was absolutely determined that nothing would stand in his way. He was aware of tension rippling through all the muscles in his body, and the hairs of the back of his neck standing on end. He only just managed to suppress a shiver.
Alice gestured him to a seat and sat down opposite him. All her movements were very precise, as though she had herself under tight control. She was remarkably self-contained but he could see how much it was costing her in the tense way that she held herself together. Her strain showed in the tight grip of her hands in her lap and in the taut line of her shoulders as she sat up very straight.
“The inheritance of my fortune is not without conditions,” Alice said, breaking the silence between them. She looked at him, her blue eyes fierce, as though she were daring him to challenge her. “My lawyer, Mr. Gaines, will confirm what I am about to tell you, my lord, lest you think this no more than an excuse on my part.” She swallowed hard and took a deliberate breath, meeting his gaze directly.
“The fact is that when she left me her fortune, Lady Membury also laid down a stipulation relating to the man I would marry,” Alice said. “It has to be fulfilled or all my remaining fortune reverts to the charity for the welfare and upkeep of the stray animals of the parish. Lady Membury,” she added sweetly, “was very fond of animals.”
“I can imagine,” Miles said. He had heard a little of the elderly widow who had left her housemaid a vast fortune. It was said she had been completely mad.