Author: Anne Stuart

He stared at her. It would make life so much simpler if he wasn't so damned beautiful, she thought. She was really pathetically shallow, because looking at him made her heart melt. Her only choice was to close her eyes as she repudiated him, but that made the room swim, and she decided she really didn't want to faint after all. She summoned up a suitably truculent expression, glowering at him.

"You're bleeding. Goddamn it, Charlotte, the bastard shot you.”

"Oh," she said faintly. In that case it was perfectly all right to swoon. It would have been nice if she'd known mat a little sooner and avoided having to tell him she loved him. But at least she needn't say anything more.

And she happily slipped into darkness.

25

As if things weren't bad enough, Adrian thought, facing the tribunal that sat across from him in Montague's library. Even Monty seemed to have rallied enough to be carried in, though Adrian suspected he'd come more for amusement's sake than anything else.

He'd been carrying Charlotte's bleeding, unconscious body toward the landing when he saw them running toward him: Pagett, Dodson, half a dozen footmen and, to his utter and complete horror, his father. He hadn't wanted to let go of Charlotte's limp body, cradling her tightly in the boat as Pagett ripped away the sleeve of her dress to expose what was, in fact, nothing but a graze. If his father hadn't been watching him out of cool, assessing eyes he might have started crying. Instead he just held her closely, letting her bleed all over him as they made it back to estate.

They were wailing for her with a litter, and by this point he relinquished her. He knew when she'd regained consciousness—sometime in the boat—but she'd elected not to let anyone know. He couldn't blame her. If he could manage to fate a fainting spell he would, anything to avoid his father's icy rage.

Even now she was tucked up into bed, a hot-water bottle at her feet, his mother sitting in a chair beside her. At least she wasn't here in the library, ready to have his liver served up to the wolves.

He surveyed the grim-faced row of judges. The only one who terrified him more than his father was Lady Whitmore, who would have most definitely gutted him on the spot if she could. She was sitting as far away from the vicar as she possibly could, which didn't fool most of the people there. Monty was right—they wanted to shag each other silly, and he wondered if he could deflect attention from his own transgressions by pointing this out, then thought better of it.

“What do you have to say for yourself, Adrian?" His father was quite a remarkable old man, considering he'd spent a life of debauchery that presumably put Adrian's career in the shade. Adrian could thank his godfather for his parents' unwanted appearance. No sooner had Adrian taken off with his special license in hand, when the bishop had sent a message out to Dorset, informing his parents of their son and heir's upcoming nuptials. He should never have told his godfather where he was going, but he'd just escaped from Etienne's paid assassins, and he wasn't thinking too clearly.

"If I'm supposed to apologize for blowing Etienne's head off then you'll have to excuse me," he said stiffly. Never in his life had he wanted a drink more, but no one seemed to be offering.

"You didn't blow his head off with that tiny peashooter," his father said with a genteel snort.

“Well, I'm sorry that I didn't have a bigger gun," Adrian retorted.

“I'm sorry you didn't as well. I regret even more that you didn't listen when I warned you about him," the marquess said in icy tones. "If you had kept your distance in the first place this might never have happened.”

"If you've brought me in here to say 'I told you so' then I have more important things to do," Adrian said, starting to rise.

His father didn't need to say a word, he simply looked at him, and Adrian sat back, restless. He hadn't seen Charlotte since the doctor had patched up her shoulder and pronounced her fit and pregnant. His mother had taken over from Lady Whitmore, and he'd been shut out, away from her, with no chance to hold her as he so desperately needed to do, to assure himself she was safe.

He needed to tell her the truth, that he was a worthless idiot, blind and stupid and shallow, but that despite all that he loved her.

They wouldn't let him.

It was a conspiracy, he thought grimly. He was going to have to take his punishment before they'd let him go to her.

"I want to know what you intend to do about the situation."

He deliberately chose to misunderstand. "About your cousin, sir?" He let the deliberate emphasis be his one form of fighting back. "I'll have to deal with the local magistrate, I expect."

"I'm the local magistrate," Montague said with a trace of his old energy. The doctor hadn't wanted to leave him, but Montague had sent him away with a querulous wave of his bony hand. "I declare you innocent of any wrongdoing. As for de Giverney, I imagine there's space in the village graveyard to dump him.”

"Presumably he's Catholic," the vicar said. "If he's buried in Protestant ground he'll go to hell."

"Oh, let's, then," said Lady Whitmore. "I'll be happy to help dig."

"I mean, what's to be done with the young woman you ruined?"

With anyone else Adrian might have taken issue with the term ruined. Ruined her for any other man, perhaps, which was just what he wanted. "In case the others haven't told you, I've been trying to get her to agree to marry me. You know that I have the special license, and Pagett there could perform the ceremony. But she won’t agree.”

"And who could blame her?" Lady Whitmore said. "With the idiotic way you asked her. Would you believe, Lord Haverstoke, that he told Charlotte that he was willing to marry her, and that he had no intention of keeping his marriage vows?"

"I said no such thing," Adrian protested. "I simply told her that once the...er...passion faded from our union she would be free to find other amusement, as would I. It's what everyone in society does."

"Your mother would take exception to that. In fact, I believe you just slandered her." His father rose to his still-impressive height.

But Adrian stood his ground. "You could hardly convince me that your marriage is in any way indicative of what usually goes on. Your devotion to each other is so extreme that it's almost bad ton."

There was a dangerous glint in the marquess's hard blue eyes, so like his son's. "Tread carefully, boy."

"You could hardly expect me to duplicate your good fortune in marriage.”

"And why not? While it's true that no woman could ever equal your mother, I trust you have the good taste to come close. And as appalling a reprobate as you are, you're merely a child when compared to my reputation.”

“Then I would think you'd appreciate how I got in this situation." Adrian fired back, unwisely.

"No, I do not. I never seduced an innocent of good family."

"Except for my mother."

The marquess's eyes narrowed, but Pagett hastily interceded. "I think we need to look at the situation calmly," he said in his measured voice. "I believe we're all agreed that our most pressing concern is Miss Spenser."

"She's my only concern," Lady Whitmore snapped. "I suppose you think she's a strumpet who should go into a home for fallen women."

The vicar looked at her with cool dislike, but there was fire simmering beneath it. "Hardly a strumpet. Lady Whitmore. Even you don't deserve that term." Before she had a chance to fire back, he continued. "I believe the best outcome would be for her to marry Lord Rohan, which is why I agreed to perform the ceremony. The church in the village stands at the ready. But I also believe that Miss Spenser's wishes should come first, and being shackled to a man of Lord Rohan's reprehensible character might be too unpleasant for her to contemplate."

"I beg your pardon!" Adrian protested.

"Adrian's not reprehensible," Monty said in his faint voice. "The rest of you have hardly lived more stellar lives. I do believe Charlotte will be the making of him.

So, in fact, did he, Adrian thought, wondering how far he'd get if he simply walked out. He needed to see her.

"She doesn't have to waste her life on him," Lady Whitmore said. "She and I can live very happily together. I've grown quite weary of society, and a life in the country will suit both of us very well."

"I would prefer her to join our family in Dorset," his father said. "I agree—she doesn't need to marry Adrian. We can find a way to work around it."

"She is welcome to stay here for as long as I live," Montague said. "After that it's up to my brother."

"She will always have a home here," Simon Pagett said.

Everyone turned to look at him in surprise. Lady Whitmore with slowly kindling wrath.

"Good for you," Monty said faintly. "I knew I could count on you after I'm gone."

"Your brother?" Lady Whitmore demanded, incensed.

"Half brother," Montague clarified. "And heir. I wish he wouldn't insist on remaining a damned parson, but there's nothing I can do about him choosing a 'respectable' life. You'll marry her, won't you, Simon?”

The two brothers' eyes met, a look of silent understanding moving between them. And then Simon smiled ruefully. "You know me too well, brother. Of course I will.”

Lady Whitmore was on her feet, pale and shaking. For a woman so adept at hiding her feelings she looked quite devastated. At least everyone's attention was off him, Adrian thought, wondering if he could slip out.

''You're not going to marry Charlotte!" she cried.

The vicar looted back at her, and they might have been the only two in the room. "Of course I'm not. That is, I'll perform the ceremony for her, but she's not the woman I'm going to marry."