The Counterfeit Gentleman (8 page)

Although at the time she had not been able to find any
humor in the situation, Bethia now found the corners of her
mouth turning up of their own accord. “My aunt was like
wise of that opinion and felt it was clearly my duty to ac
cept one or the other of my cousins since their breeding
was impeccable, their manners—at least when she was
present—were beyond reproach, and in addition, I would thereby be keeping my grandfather’s wealth in the family.
Taken together, these were, in her opinion, irrefutable argu
ments in favor of such an auspicious alliance. She did,
however, give me leave to decide for myself which of my
three cousins I would marry. She was quite put out with me
when I insisted upon having a Season first.”

It seemed to Bethia that her ears still rang with her aunt’s
recriminations, which over time had grown from gentle
reprimands to scathing denunciations of Bethia’s character.
“Due to my grandfather’s ill health and then his death, I
was not able to be presented at court until I was nineteen,
and for all of last Season, my cousins paid me such marked
attention, at times it felt more like persecution.”

Turning to look into the fire, which seemed to be radiat
ing less heat than Mr. Rendel, Bethia added, “With the wis
dom of hindsight, I can see that I should never have made it
clear to them at the beginning of
this
Season that I was ab
solutely adamant about refusing them. It would have been
safer to have played them off against each other and kept
all three of them dangling after me until I was of age.”

“And when will that be?”

“Not until the end of September,” Bethia said, her voice
little more than a whisper. Surely he must see how much
she needed him to marry her?

“A good four months,” he replied thoughtfully, and then
his glance caught and held hers, and once more she was un
able to look away.

Could she survive four months without this man beside her? Could she survive a month? A week? Even a day?

Although it had not been mentioned, her proposal of that afternoon hovered between them.
I
think you shall have to
marry me.
Silently, she pleaded with him to take her offer
seriously.

“It was not the punch talking,” she said finally. She knew
she was blushing again, but she met his gaze squarely, try
ing with her eyes to communicate what was so difficult to
say a second time.

When he did not reply, she said, “You yourself pointed
out that the easiest way for me to be safe was to marry.”

“But I was not proposing myself as the bridegroom.”

“But—”

“I cannot marry you,” he said, and his voice carried such
conviction, the room at once became colder and the dark
ness outside the cottage seemed to ooze in through the very stones.

“I s-see,” she said finally, feeling quite sick at heart.
“You are already married. I had not considered that.”

Looking at the entrancingly beautiful young girl standing
so near him, Digory fought a battle with his conscience.
How easy it would be to let the falsehood stand—to let her go on thinking that he was a married man.

It would be even easier to take what Miss Pepperell was
offering—to accept her proposal and thereby acquire a
wellborn wife and a great fortune.

He cared nothing for her grandfather’s money—he had
enough of his own, safely invested in government consols.
But it had felt so right to see her lying in his bed, and he
knew that if he made the slightest effort, he could undoubt
edly turn her gratitude into love.

A few hours ago he had risked his own life to save hers,
and in a few more hours he would do it again. Yet he could
not in all honor claim that she owed him anything.

“I am not married,” he said, knowing that only honesty
was possible between them.

“Betrothed?” she asked, as persistent as a gnat.

“I have no previous attachments,” he said bluntly, and
his honesty was rewarded with a dazzling smile.

“Then why do you say ‘cannot’?” she asked, her voice as low and seductive as that of the most practiced courtesan. How she had managed to arrive at the age of twenty with
out having been married—or seduced—he could not for the life of him fathom.

“Because I am not a gentleman,” he said fiercely, at
tempting to use anger to blunt his growing desire. “I am a
smuggler.” Retired now, but he did not tell her that, knowing it would only serve to weaken his argument. Honesty,
he was coming to realize, was a risky business. While he
could not lie to her directly, it occurred to him that it would be prudent to conceal much of the truth from her.

“Some people call smugglers ‘the gentlemen,
’”
she said
with another of her smiles, this one as innocent as a child’s.

“Only those who are foolishly romantic.”

“I do not see that your occupation should stand between
us. Once we are married, you will be able to give up smug
gling and become a gentleman of leisure.”

It was obvious that he was going to have to tell her the
whole truth—or at least more of the truth—in order to
make her understand why marriage was impossible. “I am
also a bastard, and marrying you will not make that stigma go away.”

Miss Pepperell blanched, as if he had struck her, and
even knowing he’d had no choice, Digory felt pain that it
had to end this way.

But she surprised him yet again. Closing the distance be
tween them, she laid her hand on his cheek and, looking
down into his eyes, said, “I care not whether you are well
born or baseborn. Your actions tell me better than your
words what kind of man you are. I believe you are an hon
orable gentleman, and I find you more to be admired and
trusted than most men who have ancient titles and endless
pedigrees.”

Then she showed herself to be a merciless opponent, for
she bent and brushed her lips gently against his. The scent
of her filled his nostrils, and so difficult was his struggle
not to respond, that he was unable to push her away when
she slid her arms around his neck and settled herself on his
lap.

“I have been alone and frightened for so many weeks,”
Miss Pepperell said, pressing herself so close to Digory that her tears wet both their cheeks. “And I cannot believe
the danger will be over in a few more hours.”

Her fear tore at him, but if he accepted what she was of
fering, he would only pull her down to his level, which
would, in the end, cause her additional pain. Yet despite his
noble resolve, he found himself here and now holding her
close, as if determined that nothing and no one would separate them.

Rocking her back and forth, he tried unsuccessfully to
persuade himself that he was only comforting a hurt child.
But her kiss, innocent though it had been, had heated the
blood in his veins, and her body was too softly curved for
him to succeed in maintaining that illusion. What made it
even more difficult to stay where he was, was the clear
knowledge that she would not offer even a token resistance
if he carried her back to his bed, where he knew he could
take her far away from all her troubles.

But the respite would be temporary. In the end he would
only be adding to her problems. No matter how he might
try to justify it—and he was trying desperately to do so—seducing her was the worst harm he could inflict on her.

“You will be safe soon,” Digory explained with a confi
dence he did not actually feel. “Despite their claims to
being honorable thieves, I am sure that once we have
caught them, it will be easy to persuade those two black
guards to tell us who hired them. With their sworn state
ments we can have your villainous cousin thrown into jail, after which you will be free to marry a proper gentleman.”

He started to lift her back onto her feet, but she immediately tightened her arms around his neck.

“I am sorry,” she said, a world of misery in her voice,
and he knew she was apologizing for being so frightened.
She continued to cling to him, and he did not have the heart to refuse her the little comfort she could find in his arms.

Feeling her terror as if it were his own, a fierce anger
burned in him, and he would have willingly paid out every
penny he had earned smuggling in return for half an hour alone with the man who had driven her to this state—who
had done his best to destroy her.

Realizing that they had only this night to be together, and
accepting that the longer he held her in his arms, the harder
it would be to part with her when the time came, he stayed
where he was and made no further effort to put a safe dis
tance between them.

After what seemed an eternity but was probably only
half an hour or so, he realized she had fallen asleep on his
lap. Carefully, so as not to wake her, he carried her back
into the other room and once again laid her down on his
bed and pulled the covers up around her.

Sleepily she stirred, stretching out her arms as if reaching for him. Knowing she would not object if he crawled under
the covers beside her only made it harder to leave her un
touched.

But he was an honorable man even if he had no right to
call himself a gentleman. He might don the clothes of a
gentleman and provide common clothing for his guest, but
that could not alter the fact that she was a lady and he was a bastard.

What perverse vanity had made him want to have her see him finely dressed? And what twisted desire had made him
want to see her dressed as a woman of his own low social
standing?

Feeling quite disgusted with himself, and knowing how weak was his own resolution where this girl was concerned,
he quickly left the bedroom. This time he closed the door
firmly behind him, but he was quite unable to close his
mind as easily to thoughts of what might have been—and
what could never be.

Despite Miss Pepperell’s fears, by tomorrow night the
identity of her wicked cousin would doubtless be known, and
in two more days, information could be laid against him in
London. Which meant that in less than a sennight, just as
soon as the miscreant was safely incarcerated, Miss Pep
perell would no longer have any need of his protection
...
or
any reason to be sleeping in his bed.

Glancing around the room, he realized that he was not
well equipped for company. With only one bed in the cottage, he had but two options, the floor or the chair. Neither
promised him a good night’s sleep, and his only consola
tion was that he had passed many a night under far worse conditions. At least the cottage had a good roof, and he had ample driftwood for a fire.

In the end he decided upon the chair, but sleep was a
long time in coming and was troubled by unpleasant
dreams, in which he searched in vain for Miss Pepperell,
whom he could hear crying to him for help.

* * * *

Bethia was not sure what woke her early the next morn
ing, but all at once she was wide awake, her ears straining
to hear the slightest sound. Everything was quiet—too
quiet.

Sliding noiselessly out from under the covers, she tiptoed
over to the door, opened it a crack, and peered into the
other room. She fully expected to see Mr. Rendel’s reassuring form, but he was not there.

Immediately the desperate terrors of the day before
flooded back, turning the little cottage into a place of fear
ful danger, of frightening shadows, of unseen perils lurking
in every corner.

The clock on the mantel began to strike the hour. Auto
matically she counted the chimes—five times they
sounded. She had not slept too late and missed the ren
dezvous with the other smugglers, so why then had she
been left alone? Had the murderers returned and done
something horrible to Mr. Rendel?

Frantically Bethia struggled against the waves of panic
that washed over her, threatening to pull her down, to
drown her. Desperately she fought against the desire to let
loose her hold on sanity, to melt away into the darkness, to shrink down into nothingness.