“Very well, then,” James snapped. “I’ll decide for you.” And then, without further ado, he grabbed Elizabeth around the waist, threw her over his shoulder, and hauled her out of the room.
Blake, who had been watching the unfolding drama with an amused smile on his face, turned to his wife and said, “Actually, darling, I’d have to disagree. All things considered, I think he handled that rather well.”
Chapter 21
By the time James had her out the front door, she was wiggling like an eel. An angry eel. But James had been modest when he’d described his pugilistic pursuits; his experience was extensive, and he’d had considerably more than a “few lessons.” When in London, he made daily excursions to Gentleman Jackson’s Boxing Establishment, and when out of London, he frequently alarmed and amused his servants by hopping gracefully from foot to foot and punching at bales of hay. As a result, his arm was strong, his body was hard, and Elizabeth, for all her squirming, wasn’t going anywhere.
“Put me down!” she squealed.
He saw no reason to reply.
“My lord!” she said in protest.
“James,” he snapped, widening their distance from the cottage with long, purposeful strides. “You’ve used my given name often enough.”
“That was when I thought you were Mr. Siddons,” she shot back. “And put me down.”
James kept walking, his arm a vise under her ribs.
“James!”
He grunted. “That’s more like it.”
Elizabeth bucked a little harder, forcing him to wrap a second arm around her. She stilled almost immediately.
“You finally realize that escape is impossible?” James asked mildly.
She scowled at him.
“I’ll interpret that as a yes.”
Finally, after another minute of silent journey, he set her down near an enormous tree. Her back was to the trunk, and her feet were boxed in by thick, gnarled roots. James stood in front of her, his stance wide and his arms crossed.
Elizabeth glared up at him and crossed her arms in return. She was perched on the raised ground that sloped into the tree trunk, so the difference between their heights was not as great as usual.
James shifted his weight slightly but did not say anything.
Elizabeth jutted her chin forward and tightened her jaw.
James raised a brow.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake!” Elizabeth burst out. “Just say what you came here to say.”
“Yesterday,” he said, “I asked you to marry me.”
She swallowed. “Yesterday I refused.”
“And today?”
It was on the tip of her tongue to say, “You haven’t asked me today,” but the words died before they could cross her lips. That was the sort of remark she might have made to the man she’d known as James Siddons. This man—this marquis—was someone else entirely, and she had no idea how she was meant to act around him. It wasn’t that she was unfamiliar with the idiosyncrasies of the nobility; she’d spent years in the company of Lady Danbury, after all.
She felt as if she were trapped in some strange little farce, and she didn’t know the rules. All her life she’d been taught how to behave; every gently bred English girl was taught such things. But no one had ever told her what to do when one fell in love with a man who changed identities the way other people changed their clothes.
After a long minute of silence, she said, “You shouldn’t have sent that bank draft.”
He winced. “It arrived?”
“Last night.”
He swore under his breath, muttering something about “bloody bad timing.”
Elizabeth blinked back the moisture forming in her eyes. “Why would you do such a thing? Did you think I wanted charity? That I was some pathetic, helpless—”
“I thought,” he cut in forcefully, “that it was a crime you should have to marry some gout-ridden old lecher to support your siblings. Futhermore, it nearly broke my heart watching you bend over backwards to try to live up to Mrs. Seeton’s vision of womanhood.”
“I don’t want your pity,” she said in a low voice.
“This isn’t pity, Elizabeth. You don’t need those damned edicts. All they did was smother your spirit.” He raked a weary hand through his hair. “I couldn’t bear it if you lost that spark that makes you so special. That quiet fire in your eyes or the secret smile when you’re amused—she would have beaten that out of you, and I couldn’t watch.”
She swallowed, uncomfortable with the kindness of his words.
He stepped forward, halving the distance between them. “What I did, I did out of friendship.”
“Then why the secrecy?” she whispered.
His brows lifted over a doubtful stare. “Are you telling me you would have accepted?” He waited only a second before adding, “I thought not. Besides, I was still supposed to be James Siddons. Where was an estate manager meant to find that sort of money?”
“James, do you have any idea how demeaned I felt last night? When I came home, after all that had happened, to find an anonymous bank draft?”
“And how,” he countered, “would you have felt if it had arrived two days earlier? Before you knew who I was. Before you had any reason to suspect I might have sent it.”
She bit her lip. She probably would have been suspicious, but also elated. And she certainly would have accepted the gift. Pride was pride, but her siblings needed to eat. And Lucas needed to go to school. And if she accepted James’s proposal…
“Do you have any idea how selfish you are?” he demanded, thankfully cutting into her thoughts, which were leading her in a most dangerous direction.
“Don’t you dare,” she shot back, her voice shaking with rage. “Don’t you dare call me that. I’ll accept other insults as possibly true, but not that.”
“Why, because you’ve spent the past five years slaving away for your family’s well-being? Because you’ve passed every windfall on to them and taken nothing for yourself?”
His voice was mocking, and Elizabeth was too furious to reply.
“Oh, you’ve done all that,” he said with cruel grandeur, “but the one chance you have to truly better your situation, the single opportunity to end your worries and give them the life I know you think they deserve, you throw it all away.”
“I have my pride,” she ground out.
James laughed harshly. “Yes, you do. And it’s quite clear that you value it more than you do the well-being of your family.”
She raised her hand to slap him, but he caught it easily. “Even if you didn’t marry me,” he said, trying to ignore the slash of pain that simple sentence struck in his chest. “Even if you didn’t marry me, you could have taken the money and locked me out of your life.”
She shook her head. “You would have had too much control over me.”
“How? The money was yours. A bank draft. I had no way to take it back.”
“You would have punished me for taking it,” she whispered. “For taking it and not marrying you.”
He felt something in his heart turn cold. “Is that the sort of man you think I am?”
“I don’t know what sort of man you are!” she burst out. “How could I possibly? I don’t even know who you are.”
“Everything you need to know about the sort of man I am and the husband I’d be, you know already.” He touched her cheek, allowing every emotion, every last bit of love to rise to the surface. His soul was laid bare in his eyes, and he knew it. “You know me better than anyone, Elizabeth.”
He saw her hesitation, and in that instant, he hated her for it. He’d offered her everything, every shred of his heart, and all she could do was hesitate?
He swore under his breath and turned to leave. But he’d only taken two steps when he heard Elizabeth call out, “Wait!”
Slowly, he turned around.
“I’ll marry you,” she blurted out.
His eyes narrowed. “Why?”
“Why?” she echoe
d dumbly. “Why?”
“You’ve refused me repeatedly for two days,” he pointed out. “Why the change of heart?”
Elizabeth’s lips parted, and she felt her throat close up in panic. She couldn’t get a word out, couldn’t even form a thought. Of all things, she’d never expected him to question her acceptance.
He moved forward, the heat and strength of his body overwhelming even though he made no move to touch her. Elizabeth found herself backed up against the tree, breathless as she stared up into his dark eyes, which were gleaming with anger.
“You—you asked me,” she just barely managed to say. “You asked me and I said yes. Isn’t that what you wanted?”
He shook his head slowly and leaned his hands against the tree, one on her left, one on her right. “Tell me why you accepted.”
Elizabeth tried to sink farther into the tree trunk. Something about his quiet, deadly resolve terrified her. If he’d been yelling, or scolding, or anything else she might have known what to do. But this calm fury was unnerving, and the tight prison made by his arms and the tree made her blood burn in her veins.
She felt her eyes widen, and knew that the expression he must see there would brand her a coward. “You—you made some very good arguments,” she said, trying to hold on to her pride—the one emotion he accused her of overindulging. “I—I can’t give my siblings the life they deserve, and you can, and I was going to have to marry, anyway, and it might as well be someone I—”
“Forget it,” he spat out. “The offer is rescinded.”
The breath left her body in a short, violent whoosh. “Rescinded?”
“I won’t have you that way.”
Her ankles grew wobbly, and she held on to the wide trunk of the tree behind her for support. “I don’t understand,” she whispered.
“I won’t be married for my money,” he vowed.
“Oh!” she burst out, her energy and outrage returning in full force. “Now who is the hypocrite? First you tutor me so that I might marry some other poor, unsuspecting fool for his money, then you berate me for not using your money to support my siblings. And now…now you have the gall to rescind your offer of marriage—a highly ungentlemanly act, I might add—because I had the honesty to say that I need your wealth and position for my family. Which,” she bit off, “is exactly what you’ve been using to try to get me to marry you in the first place!”
“Are you done?” he asked in an insolent voice.
“No,” she retorted. She was angry and hurt, and she wanted him to hurt, too. “You were going to be married for your money eventually. Isn’t that the way things work among your set?”
“Yes,” he said with chilling softness, “I was probably always destined for a marriage of fortunes. It’s what my parents had, and theirs before them, and theirs before them. I can tolerate a cold marriage based on pound notes. I’ve been bred for it.” He leaned forward until his lips were just a breath away from hers. “But I can’t tolerate one like that with you.”
“Why not?” she whispered, unable to pull her eyes from his.
“Because we have this.”
He moved quickly, his large hand cupping the back of her head as his lips found hers. In her last coherent second before he crushed her against him, she thought that this would be a kiss of anger, a furious embrace. But even though his arms held her tightly in place, his mouth moved across hers with stunning, melting gentleness.
It was the kind of kiss a woman died for, the sort that one wouldn’t break if the flames of hell were licking at one’s feet. Elizabeth felt her insides quicken, and her arms tore from his firm grasp to wrap around his body. She touched his arms, his shoulders, and his neck, her hands finally coming to rest in his thick hair.
James whispered words of love and desire across her cheek until he reached her ear. He tickled the lobe, murmuring his satisfaction as her head lolled back, revealing the long, elegant arch of her throat. There was something about a woman’s neck, about the way her hair drew softly from her skin, that had never failed to arouse him.
But this was Elizabeth, and she was different, and James was completely undone. Her hair was so blond that it seemed almost invisible where it met her skin. And the scent of her was tantalizing, a gentle mix of soap and roses, and something else—something that was uniquely this woman.
He trailed his mouth down the neck, stopping to pay homage to the delicate line of her collarbone. The top buttons of her frock were undone; he had no memory of slipping them open, but he must have, and he reveled in the small strip of skin that was bared to him.
He heard her breathing, felt it whisper across his hair as he moved back up to kiss the underside of her chin. She was gasping now, moaning between breaths, and James’s body tightened even more at the evidence of her desire. She wanted him. She wanted him more than she could ever understand, but he knew the truth. This was one thing she could not hide.
Reluctantly, he pulled away, forcing himself to set a foot of space between them even as his hands rested on her shoulders. They were both shaking, breathing hard, and still needed the support of each other. James wasn’t certain he trusted his own balance, and she looked no better.
His eyes raked over her, taking in every inch of her dishevelment. Her hair had escaped the confines of her bun, and each strand seemed to tease him, begging to be drawn over his lips. His body was drawn into a tight coil, and it took every ounce of James’s control not to pull her back against him.
He wanted to tear the clothes from her body, lay her down on the soft grass, and claim her as his own in the most primitive way possible. And then when he was done, when she could have no doubt that she belonged completely and irrevocably to him, he wanted to do it again, this time slowly, exploring every inch of her with his hands, and then with his lips, and then, when she was hot and arching with need—
Abruptly, he yanked his hands away from her shoulders. He couldn’t touch her when his mind was racing into such dangerous territory.
Elizabeth sagged against the tree, raising huge blue eyes to meet his. Her tongue darted out to wet her lips, and James felt that little flick straight in his gut.
He took another step away. With each move she made, each tiny, barely audible breath, he lost another piece of his control. He no longer trusted his hands; they itched to reach for her.
“When you admit that this is why you want me,” he bit off, his voice hot and intense, “then I’ll marry you.”
Two days later, the memory of that last kiss still made Elizabeth shake. She had stood by the tree, dazed and stunned, and watched him walk away. Then she had remained in place for another ten minutes, her eyes fixed on the horizon, staring blankly at the last spot where she’d seen him. And then, when her mind had finally woken from the passionate shock of his touch, she had sat down and cried.
She had been dishonest when she had tried to convince herself that she wanted to marry him because he was a wealthy marquis. It was ironic, really. She’d spent the last month resigning herself to the fate of marrying for money, and now she’d fallen in love, and he was wealthy enough to give her family a better life, but everything was all wrong.
She loved him. Or rather, she loved a man who looked just like him. Elizabeth didn’t care what Lady Danbury or the Ravenscrofts told her; humble James Siddons could not be the same man inside as the lofty Marquis of Riverdale. It simply wasn’t possible. Everyone had his place in British society; this was something people were taught early, especially people like Elizabeth, daughters of minor gentry who lived on the fringes of the ton.
It seemed that she could solve all of her problems by going to him and telling him she wanted him, not his money. She’d be married to the man she loved, with ample resources to support her family. But she could not shake the nagging suspicion that she did not know him.
The pragmatist inside reminded her that she probably wouldn’t know any man she chose to marry, or at least that she would not know him well. Men and women rarely conducted cour
tships beyond the most superficial of levels.
But with James, it was different. Just as he said he could not tolerate a marriage of convenience with her, she did not think she could withstand a union without trust. Maybe with someone else, but not with him.
Elizabeth squeezed her eyes shut and lay back upon her bed. She’d spent much of the past few days holed up in her room. After the first few attempts, her siblings had given up on trying to talk with her and had taken to leaving trays of food outside her door. Susan had prepared all of Elizabeth’s favorite dishes, but most of the food had gone untouched. Heartbreak, apparently, did little to build an appetite.
A tentative knock sounded at the door, and Elizabeth turned her head to look out the window. Judging from the level of the sun, it was about the right time for the evening meal. If she ignored the knock, they would just leave the tray and go away.
But the knock persisted, and so Elizabeth sighed and forced herself to her feet. She crossed the small room in three steps and pulled open the door, revealing all three younger Hotchkisses.
“This came for you,” Susan said, holding out a creamy envelope. “It’s from Lady Danbury. She wants to see you.”
Elizabeth raised a brow. “You’ve taken to reading my correspondence?”
“Of course not! The footman she sent over told me.”
“It’s true,” Jane put in. “I was there.”
Elizabeth reached out and took the envelope. She looked at her siblings. They looked back.
“Aren’t you going to read it?” Lucas finally said.
Jane nudged her brother in the ribs. “Lucas, don’t be rude.” She glanced up at Elizabeth. “Are you?”
“Now who’s being rude?” Elizabeth countered.
“You might as well open it,” Susan said. “If nothing else, it will take your mind off of—”
“Don’t say it,” Elizabeth warned.
“Well, you certainly cannot wallow in self-pity forever.”
Elizabeth made a sheeshing sound on top of a sigh. “Aren’t I entitled to at least a day or two?”
“Of course,” Susan said conciliatorily. “But even by that schedule, your time is up.”