Heartless (2 page)

He didn't ask where she'd heard the tales. It was common knowledge in the village that over the years the earl had kept a number of young women as his mistresses.

“What exactly are you asking me, Ariel?”

“I was hopin' maybe you and me could make some sorta bargain.”

“What sort of bargain?”

It all rushed out in a single long breath, as if a dam had suddenly broken. “I wanna be a lady, milord—more than anything in the world. I want to learn to read and write. I wanna learn to speak right and wear pretty clothes—and put up me hair.” She swept the long mass up on her head to demonstrate her words. When she released it, it tumbled back down past her waist. “If you would send me to school so's I could learn all those things … if I could go to one of those fancy finishin' schools where they teach you to be a lady, then I'd be willin' to be one of yer girls.”

She watched the surprise in his eyes turn to speculation, rather an unholy gleam, she thought, and felt the first faint stirrings of trepidation.

“You want me to pay for your education—is that what you're saying?”

“Aye, milord.”

“And in return, you would be willing to become my mistress.”

She swallowed. “Aye.”

“Do you understand what that word means?”

A beet red flush stole into her cheeks, as she knew it meant sleeping in the same bed with the man. What else it might entail she wasn't completely sure, but it didn't really matter. She was willing to pay whatever price it took to escape her father and her wretched life on the farm. “Mostly, milord.”

He studied her again, his pale eyes raking her from head to foot. She felt as if he were stripping away her clothes piece by piece, felt the ridiculous urge to fling her arms up to cover herself. Instead, she endured his scrutiny and stoically lifted her chin.

“That's a very interesting proposal,” he said. “There is your father to consider, of course, but knowing him as I do, perhaps something might be arranged that he would find satisfactory.” He reached down and caught her chin, turned her face from side to side, studying the hollows beneath her cheekbones, the slight indentation in her chin. He traced a finger over the curve of her lips, then nodded as if in approval.

“Yes … an interesting proposal indeed. You shall hear from me soon, my dear Ariel. Until then, I suggest you keep this conversation between the two of us.”

“Aye, milord. That I will.” She watched him climb into his carriage, watched him slap the reins against the backs of his glossy black horses. Her heart was beating fiercely, her palms slightly damp.

Excitement pumped through her, the knowledge that her plan might actually succeed. Uncertainty followed close on its heels. Ariel couldn't help fearing that in return for the chance at a better life she might have just traded her soul.

C
HAPTER
T
WO

L
ONDON
, E
NGLAND
, 1802

“He is arrived, my lord. Shall I see him in?” Stoop-shouldered and gray-haired, the butler, Harold Perkins, stood just inside the door of the Earl of Greville's massive bedchamber in his country estate, Greville Hall.

“Yes, with all haste, if you please.” Edmund struggled to sit up a little straighter in the bed, reached out a shaking hand to grip the glass of water sitting on the nightstand. Water slopped over the edge and onto his bed jacket as he worked to carry it to his lips, and a footman who stood nearby hurried over to help him.

He took a drink and waved man and glass away just as the door swung open and Justin Bedford Ross, his newly adopted son and heir, ducked his head beneath the jamb and stepped across the threshold of the room.

“You wished to see me?” The deep, penetrating voice had an eerily familiar ring. Justin didn't approach the bed, just stood at the foot looking tall and dark and completely forbidding. There was no doubt the man was his son. He had the same high cheekbones, the same lean, broad-shouldered build as Edmund's own, the same long-lashed, black-fringed eyes, though Justin's were a darker gray, without a hint of his mother's pale blue.

“The paperwork has been … completed,” Edmund told him. “You are now legally … my son and heir. In a very short time … so the physicians tell me … you will become the next Earl of Greville.”

The bitter thought sent a spasm of pain coursing through him. Edmund bent forward, coughing fiercely into the handkerchief he pressed against his trembling lips. He wiped away a trace of saliva mixed with a pink tinge of blood. By God, he never thought it would come to this, that he would be forced to pass his fortune, his legacy, to the man who hated him beyond all reason.

Then again, he hadn't expected to die for at least a dozen more years.

Justin said nothing, just stared at him from behind the blank, unreadable mask of his coldly handsome face.

Edmund drew in a shaky breath. “I called you here because there is some … unfinished business I wished to discuss. A personal matter.…”

A finely arched black brow went up. “Personal? Interesting.… I would presume, since we both know your penchant for the fairer sex, that you are speaking of a woman.”

Edmund refused to look away from that penetrating stare. “Not exactly, though she will become one soon enough.” He coughed again, a racking spasm that made the veins stand out on his forehead. Silently he damned the lung disease that was slowly but surely killing him. Recovering himself, he lay back against the pillows, his face the same white hue. “She is my … ward, of sorts.”

Edmund motioned to the footman, who stepped forward to place a bundle of letters within his reach. Edmund rested the stack on his chest, lifted the one on top with an unsteady hand, and gave it over to Justin.

Long dark fingers opened the sheet of foolscap, and Justin scanned the letter, putting to use the expensive Oxford education Edmund had paid for. He might not have claimed the boy until he'd been forced to, hadn't given the lad the slightest thought over the years, but had never abandoned his financial obligations to the child or its mother.

Justin glanced up. “You are seeing to the girl's education?”

He nodded. “And anything else she needs.”

Justin's smile was hard and mocking. “I never realized what a benevolent soul you were.”

Edmund ignored the sarcasm. “We had a bargain of sorts.” He went on to explain the pact the two of them had made, sparing no detail, forcing himself to meet the disdain in his son's iron gray eyes. “Ariel was fourteen when she went away to school. She is sixteen now. Her father was a tenant of mine. He drank himself to death last year.” He sucked in a breath of air, let it wheeze out of his lungs. “I leave it to you … what to do with her.”

Justin stared down at the letter, what appeared to be the first of a series the girl had written. The letterhead stated simply: “The Thornton School for Girls.”

Lord Edmund Ross, Earl of Greville

Dear Lord Greville,

I send to you my good wishes. As this is my furst attempt at penning a letter, I hope that you will overlook any mistakes I make. I would have writtin sooner, but I have only just learnt enough to attempt the task. Still, from this day forward, at least once each week, I shall take pen in hand and do my best to relay my acheevements.

Justin read the balance of the letter and handed it back to him. Edmund studied his face but couldn't discern a single trace of what his son might be thinking. “What will you do?” he asked.

Justin gave a noncommittal shrug, lifting those broad shoulders so much like his own. He was dressed in a black coat and dark gray breeches, the white of his fine lawn shirt a stark contrast to the darkness of his skin. “You gave your word. If I am earl, I will respect your pledge.”

Edmund just nodded. For some strange reason, a feeling of peace crept over him, and he settled more comfortably against the pillows. Unconsciously his hand came to rest on the stack of letters. He had read each one a half-dozen times.

He hadn't seen the girl in more than two years, had never really known her. And yet he felt close to her in a way he couldn't explain. When had Ariel Summer become so important to him? How had he grown so fond of her? It was the letters, he knew. Each week, he found himself looking forward to them. He had never answered even one of them, wouldn't have had the slightest notion what to say. Yet as he had fallen more and more gravely ill, they had brought a bit of sunshine into his fading world.

Perhaps making Justin his heir had been the right thing to do after all. At least his Ariel would be protected. His son might despise the father he had never known, but Justin was a man of his word. The lad had graduated from Oxford with the highest marks. Since he had reached his majority, he had prospered in the world of business, and though he had a reputation for being ruthless in his dealings, he never made a pledge he didn't keep.

“Will that be all?” Those cool dark eyes found his. Though Edmund lay dying, there wasn't a trace of pity in their chilling depths.

“Yes.… Thank you … for coming.”

Justin made a slight bow of his head, turned, and started for the door, his elegant long-legged strides carrying him away without a moment's hesitation.

A shudder slid through the earl's pain-racked body. He might have made the girl his mistress, but he would never have mistreated her. He strained to listen to the hollow, echoing footsteps retreating down the hall.

For the first time, it occurred to him that the bargain he had made with Ariel Summers might also appeal to his coldhearted son.

C
HAPTER
T
HREE

L
ONDON
, E
NGLAND
, 1804

Lord Edmund Ross, Earl of Greville

Dear Lord Greville,

It is a fine day here in the Sussex countryside. The trees have leafed out and the sky is the clearest, most startling color of blue. Unfortunately, by necessity, most of my time is spent indoors. The tutors you have arranged are very fine indeed, though they are difficult taskmasters. Still, I am determined. I study late into the evening, then rise several hours early to begin anew the following day. Reading has become my favorite pastime. In the beginning, it was difficult, but oh, what wonderful doors it has opened! There are novels and plays, incredible poems and sonnets.

I vow, such a gift is, in itself, worth the price of our bargain.

Justin Bedford Ross, Fifth Earl of Greville, read the letter he had pulled from the stack he kept locked in the bottom drawer of the desk in his study. He had read them all more than once, some with faint amusement, others with a trace of pity, an emotion he rarely felt.

After his father's death, from the day Justin had moved into the old stone mansion in Brook Street, he had been inexplicably drawn to the innocent ramblings of the young woman his lecherous father had intended to make his whore.

Justin's jaw tightened at the image of the earl that rose into his mind, a licentious, arrogant man who thought only of his own selfish needs. He couldn't help feeling a shot of satisfaction at the odd turn of fate that had made him his father's heir. For most of his twenty-eight years, his father had ignored him. As far as Edmund Ross was concerned, Justin Bedford was simply a costly mistake, a bastard spawned off one of his numerous whores.

Two years ago, gravely ill and dying, he had sent for Justin and offered him the single thing the earl could give him that he could not refuse.

The legitimacy of his name.

Even the lure of the Greville fortune and the power and prestige of an earldom would not have been enough to entice him. It was the name that he had wanted, the name he had yearned for since he was a boy. Justin had accepted his father's offer of adoption, becoming Justin Bedford Ross, because he would no longer be the bastard son who had been laughed at and scorned for as long as he could remember.

He leafed through the stack of letters, drew out another, and scanned the page:

My studies continue. By necessity, before I left my home in Ewhurst, I had learned to work a bit with numbers, enough to help my father sell his crops and livestock at market. Here I have studied at length the
Young Ladies New Guide to Arithmetic
and have become quite accomplished at mathematics. History is another subject I enjoy, especially learning about the ancient Egyptians, Romans, and Greeks. I can't believe the women actually went about half-naked!

His mouth edged up. Justin folded and replaced the letter in its proper order in the stack. As he had promised, he had kept his father's bargain, struck with Ariel Summers more than four years ago. The girl was now beyond eighteen and ready to leave Mrs. Penworthy's School of Feminine Deportment, the expensive finishing school he had arranged for her to attend.

A thousand times since he'd become earl, he had tried to imagine what she looked like. Beautiful, he was sure. His father had always had exquisite taste in women. He wondered if she was dark or fair, tall or short. He hadn't the slightest notion about her appearance, and yet, through her letters, he felt he knew her better than anyone he had ever met.

He wasn't sure what he would do about her, now that her education was complete, but the girl was an innocent, someone his father had taken unfair advantage of, and he felt responsible for her in some way. She had no family, no one to see to her needs. Whatever decision he made, he wouldn't do as his father had done to him and abandon her.

Reaching out, he picked up the white-plumed pen on his desk, dipped it into the inkwell, and scratched out the first words he had ever written to her, instructions for her to follow when she departed the school.

He would send the Greville carriage to transport her to his house in London. He had business to attend to in Liverpool that could last as long as several weeks, but upon his return they would discuss the future. He signed it simply:
“Regards, the Earl of Greville.”