The Unthinkable (16 page)

Despite the warning in his tone, Genie bristled at his audacity.
His
child! Of all the unbelievable gall. He’d forsaken that claim long ago. She could laugh like a madwoman.

Furious by his rough handling of her person after his brutish behavior the night before, Genie said scornfully, “A strange question, Your Grace, to pose to such an inconsequential, ‘passing acquaintance.’”

“I was trying to do you a favor. Would you have me tell her the truth?”

“I’d rather you hadn’t brought our previous association up at all.”

“You made that impossible by running away from me last night. I’ll have my answer,” he hissed. “Now.” His mouth threateningly close to her ear.

Genie’s lips pressed into a flat line. She wrenched her arm free from his grasp. She wouldn’t be manhandled—even by him. “Your boorish behavior grows tiresome, Your Grace. Kindly refrain from such improper displays of familiarity. Your touch, in all of its forms, is repugnant to me. Nor do I appreciate an armful of bruises.”

He glanced at her arm, obviously shocked to realize that he’d been hurting her. His hands fell to his side. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize…” He raked his fingers through his oh-so-charmingly disheveled hair. One heavy lock immediately fell back across his forehead. Genie felt a momentary pang. A flashback of lying in the grass along a bucolic riverbank mesmerized by that errant lock made warm and shiny in the bright autumn sun.

Would she never escape the past? she thought hopelessly.

Just as quickly, the unbidden recollection hardened her heart. She owed him nothing. Not even kindness. She yearned to hurt him as much as she’d been hurt. “
Your
child, Your Grace, lies at the bottom of the sea.”

It took a moment for the words to sink in. “Dead?” he posited inanely. The finality of the word hung between them for a long, agonizing moment.

The haunted, vacant look in her eyes returned. All the fight seemed to seep out of her. She nodded then sighed deeply and said in a much softer voice, “He never had a chance to live.”

Huntingdon felt like he’d been knifed in the gut. “He?” his voice strangled with emotion. The anxiety he’d experienced all night wondering whether he had a child was replaced by the sudden knowledge that he did not. And the impossible knowledge of what might have been had he acted with honor. He would pay with guilt for the rest of his life with that knowledge.

She nodded. Her mouth quivered, and her eyes filled with tears. She looked away.

“I didn’t know,” he said hoarsely.

“Neither did I. If I had, nothing would have persuaded me to leave. Not even your formidable mother or the possible disgrace of my family.”

Huntingdon grimaced. But he understood. His mother had relayed the entirety of her ugly threat.

“Why didn’t you send word when you discovered you were with child?”

“To what purpose? The babe was lost at sea. There was no way to reach you, no passing ship on which to send a message. Afterward, I was too ill—” She stopped herself, cleared her throat and said, “There was no reason. If you recall, I had sent you a note before. You had made your choice plain enough.”

“I regretted that letter immediately and came to see you, but you had disappeared. I had no idea what my mother had done. It was only last year that she confided her part in your disappearance and where she’d sent you. Before that I never thought to look as far away as America. I was furious when the prince wouldn’t let me leave, which is why I sent Hawk in my stead. If it is any consolation, my mother has paid many times over for her actions. I’ll never forgive her interference.”

Genie shrugged indifferently. “It doesn’t matter. Hers was not the only blame,” she pointed out.

“No. You’re right. I let you down. I let our child down.”

She wobbled a little. He reached out to steady her, but stopped himself before touching her, remembering her request. She dropped to the seat vacated by the countess. Composing herself, she folded her hands in her lap and serenely met his gaze. “Now that you have your answer, I trust you will leave me in peace.”

Now that he had his answer, he didn’t know if he could. The guilt for not honoring his unspoken promise to marry her was dwarfed in comparison to the knowledge that he’d failed her when she’d been with child. Instead, he asked, “Why didn’t you return to England?”
To me
.

“My circumstances changed rather suddenly,” she said carefully. “And as I said before, you had made your intentions very clear.”

“You refer to your marriage.” He could barely say the word, the thought alone so distasteful.

She looked puzzled. “No.” Suddenly, she caught herself. “I mean yes, of course, my marriage.”

She sat still, too still, waiting for him to say something. Huntingdon noticed the nervous twisting of her hands in her lap. She noticed the direction of his gaze and her hands clenched the fabric of her skirt.

Though she’d tried to cover it up, he’d heard her mention that she’d been ill after she’d lost the child. Now she forgets her husband. Something about this was not right. “I would like to hear more about your husband. When did you first meet?”

She stood up and moved to the window overlooking the garden, avoiding his eyes. “Why is this important to you? What reason could you possibly have for being interested in a common soldier?”

He moved beside her, careful not to get too close. Her face looked pale, even under the warming glow of sunlight. Her bottom lip trembled ever so slightly.

“I’m curious about the man to whom you would give your heart. About the man who did what I have regretted not doing for five years,” he said quietly.

She stood perfectly still. He could tell that she was engaged in a fierce battle to control her emotions. What he didn’t know was what she was trying to hide: sadness at the memory of her dead husband or at him for his betrayal.

She lifted her chin defiantly. “It’s easy to make such claims now.”

“No,” he said with a crooked smile. “It isn’t.” She looked so vulnerable, he ached to reach out and touch her. But he didn’t, knowing it would not help his cause. “My conduct back then is not something I’m proud of and not something I like to remember. But neither can I forget. You see, inexplicably, I find myself very curious about one thing.”

She turned to face him, eyeing him cagily. “Yes?”

“If you loved me, how could you have married someone else within weeks of leaving England?”

Genie didn’t know what to say. She hadn’t married someone else, but she could hardly tell him that. It was a foolish mistake to claim she’d married so quickly, but he’d made her so angry, she hadn’t been able to resist. It was clear that he questioned the ardency of her affection. She’d laugh if it wasn’t so painful. If he only knew how long she’d held out hope.

No, the constancy of her heart was never the issue.

She’d desperately wanted to return to her family, but she’d been left utterly destitute by the treachery of her borrowed maid.

Rather than answer the question, she hedged. “People marry for many reasons, most of which have nothing to do with love.”

“So, you didn’t love him?”
Or you didn’t love me?
She heard the unspoken question.

“I didn’t say—” She stopped. “Perhaps I married him for money?” she said provokingly, noticing the erratic pulse in his jaw. She held his gaze. “Or perhaps to give a child the protection of a name.” He flinched at that and Genie suddenly felt cruel. She didn’t want to get into this. Accusations, drama, emotion. She wanted to stay comfortably detached. “And what of yourself, Your Grace? Surely, a man of your position must have been tempted to take a wife?”

White lines appeared around his mouth. “No,” he replied stonily.

Genie remained silent.

He stood so close she could hear the harsh unevenness of his breathing. Gazing out the window, warmed from the gentle heat of sunlight, she could smell the faint hint of sandalwood that lingered from his soap.

His voice deepened. “I was tempted… once.”

A pit dropped in her stomach. “Oh?” She hadn’t been expecting that. She should have, but hadn’t nonetheless. Sadness swept over her. A dull ache resounded in her chest, born of disappointment and something else. Jealousy. Why? It shouldn’t matter. She was marrying someone else, wasn’t she? But it did. Matter, that is.

“What happened?” she found herself asking.

He thought for a moment. “I was a cad and a fool. I promised to marry her, I wanted to marry her, but in the end I betrayed her. She went to America and she didn’t come back.”

Me. He means me
. She relaxed her shoulders, not realizing that she’d been holding her breath. Relief filled her chest. He hadn’t wished to marry someone else. She hadn’t been completely wrong in his intentions all those years ago. Possibly he had even loved her…

But not enough, she reminded herself.

Genie couldn’t stand this anymore. Couldn’t stand the feeling he was arousing in her. The awareness of him that she’d tried to snuff out, but which apparently would never be completely extinguished. Huntingdon the man was infinitely more dangerous than he’d been in his youth. Without the carefree charm to moderate his pursuit, he attacked with a fierce single-mindedness, with such forthright determination that it was difficult to withstand the onslaught. She’d successfully put the past behind her, but he wanted to force her to remember. To reopen a part of herself that had been locked away for a very long time.

She looked down at her hands, curled into tight fists at her side. “Why are you speaking like this? Why tell me this now? After what I just told you, surely you understand that it is far too late—I would never wish to relive the past, even if it were possible.”

Slowly, so slow that she could stop him if she wanted to, he brought his fingers to her chin and gently tilted her face up to meet his gaze. She read the turmoil there that surely matched her own. Possibly, he was just as confused as she by the heavy fog of emotion that seemed to encircle them.

“If I could, Genie, I would do it differently. I’d do anything to make it up to you.” His callused thumb swept the side of her cheek in a heart stopping, loving caress. Her heart skipped unwillingly. “Are you sure that it is too late?” he asked.

Her skin tingled under the gentle stroke of his fingers. His question echoed in her head. Was it too late? She studied his face. Older, harder, but still incredibly handsome. The blue eyes, straight nose, square jaw, wide sensual mouth. Handsome enough to plummet her to the deepest bowels of hell again. If she were fool enough to let him.

“Yes,” she said adamantly. “I’m sure. If you truly wish to make amends, leave me be,” she pleaded. “Allow me to marry Edmund in peace. Your pointed interest in me has drawn enough speculation. Someone is bound to put it together.”

He hesitated.

She could tell he was not ready to give up. She sensed a dogged determination in him that would never let go if she gave him reason to hope.

Genie debated her next move. She knew that he had political aspirations, a cabinet post according to Edmund, and that she could threaten him with scandal—ruin worked both ways. Though he would not suffer as much as she, it would not be pleasant for him. But somehow she sensed that such a threat might have the opposite effect with Huntingdon. No, she’d discovered his weakness. If he agreed, it would be from guilt.

“You owe me,” she whispered. It wasn’t necessary to mention their lost child. “Stand aside and pay the debt you owe me.” He understood what she meant.

His expression shuttered. His fingers fell from her chin, leaving her cold. The tiny, cruel lines around his mouth became more pronounced. “Very well, Mrs. Preston. You shall have your wish.”

And with that, he turned on his heel and was gone. Leaving Genie feeling emptier and more desolate than she had in years.

This time, Huntingdon kept his word. And his distance. Genie no longer felt the heat of his predatory gaze stalking her around London’s ballrooms. Although she’d seen him arrive at Almack’s that night, after a polite nod to her and Edmund, he’d completely ignored her. As he’d done every time their paths happened to cross since the emotional confrontation in Lady Hawkesbury’s drawing room one short week ago.

Genie was relieved, but not as much as she should have been. She’d achieved her goal: He would not reopen the past by recalling Genie Prescott, parson’s daughter from Thornbury, to the ton. The questions that could tumble her into ruin and disgrace—about his prior courting of her, her sudden unexplained disappearance, the dead husband—had been avoided. In keeping his distance, he’d given her a chance.

You got what you wanted, she told herself. Peace. Acceptance.

Why then did she feel such disquiet? Restless and on edge, she navigated the treacherous path of high society night after night with a brittle smile forced on her face and an anxious ache in her heart.

She should be ecstatic. It was clear she had been accepted, welcomed even, by the all-important “grande dames” of the beau monde. Even the formidable Lady Jersey had pronounced her “beautiful” and “charming,” notwithstanding her lack of fortune and “misfortune” of birth.

No one had connected the former Genie Prescott with Mrs. Preston, soldier’s widow. She and Edmund could announce their engagement without fear of reprisal. Though there might be rumblings and murmurings about her lack of rank and fortune, Edmund could be excused because of his superior wealth and her exceptional beauty. The ton would forgive much for a fat purse and pretty face.

Scandal had been averted.

She’d triumphed. She would have wealth beyond her imagination and security for the rest of her life. She could return to her family without shame.

Why then did she feel like she’d failed? Memories constantly accosted her, stirring feelings and emotions that she’d thought long buried. No more so than when she noticed Huntingdon dance twice with a beautiful dark-haired woman who effortlessly teased a smile from his grim countenance.

And why did her nerves prickle with apprehension as the date for Lady Hawkesbury’s ball approached? The much-anticipated night when she and Edmund had agreed to formally announce their betrothal.