The Wedding Duel (The Dueling Pistols Series) (41 page)

"Keene doesn't know how good he had it." Victor's voice was laced with venom. "He could have been raised by the man who sired him, but hardly knew his son existed, who forgot to see that there was food on the table or decent clothes to wear. He could have watched his mother languish and rot from neglect, knowing that her husband had fathered a half dozen by-blows among her friends. Some not so willing to participate in the conception."

Keene folded his arms across his chest and looked down.

Victor swiveled and faced him. "No, he has no idea what it is like to envy a half brother who has a parent who sees to his needs. He may have felt the lack of love, but he never curbed his behavior to meet the expectations of the man who raised him. He never had to doubt that his basic needs would be met, that his inheritance would be more than a pile of moldering rocks and nothing left of the estate to maintain it, no farms to raise food, nothing but a mass of ruinous debts."

Sophie's gaze darted to Keene. He could set Victor straight and explain that he wasn't to inherit the bulk of his father's estate, but he remained silent. He watched Victor steadily.

"No, our father was an unforgivable bastard, and you don't know how lucky you had it. Would that I could as easily give my wife total control of her assets and inheritances."

Total control? What was he talking about?
Victor's gaze swept over her.

Victor slumped as if the wind had dropped from his sails. He covered his face with his hand. "Now that I have made a complete fool of myself, perhaps we should go, Mary Frances."

But Mary Frances didn't step forward. Instead, Victor crossed to her and bent down and kissed the child's forehead. He turned toward George. "You will do as good a job as anyone can, perhaps a better job than I could. I don't even know her name."

"Regina Victoria Kendra Keeting," supplied Amelia.

Victor's countenance crumbled.

Sophie placed her hand on his shoulder. He patted her hand and whispered to Mary Frances.

She shook her head. "I can't go home. It is too late."

"Then it is off to Gretna Green, and I shall have to rely on your father's reasonableness."

Mary Frances bit her lip.

"He can be reasonable, can't he?"

"Occasionally."

"For a countess, perhaps."

Victor raised Sophie's hand to his lips. He leaned forward and whispered, "I hope you are all right, and we have done no harm to your baby."

What baby?

"There isn't any baby." Keene stepped forward.

Sophie stared at him and cast a questioning glance in Victor's direction.

Victor seemed incredulous. "There isn't?"

"Not unless she has just conceived my child."

"How do you know?" Victor frowned at Keene.

Keene's lips curled in a wry half smile. His eyes held Sophie's. "I believe there was only one immaculate conception."

Sophie took a step back. "You thought I was with child?"

Keene stepped toward her. "Your parents told me you were."

"How could they have thought that?" Disbelief stunned her. She shook her head. "They didn't say that."

"Something about seeing you in a man's bedroom, and of course the fainting," supplied Victor. "Your father did say it. I overheard."

Keene gave him a nasty look.

Sophie thought back to when she had gone to Sir Gresham's room to calm him in the midst of his nightmares. "Oh, there was that time I—"

"It hardly matters," interrupted Keene.

"Oh, good grief, Sophie, your fall from Grace—the horse named Grace," supplied Mary Frances. "She had a concussion. You did say you landed on your head.

Sophie nodded. How could he have thought she was pregnant?

"Algany drugged us both at Almack's, didn't he?" Amelia added.

"He tried to do it again at the opera, but I switched the glasses, and just to be sure, I accidentally on purpose dumped mine out. When he refilled it, I slipped most of it into his glass."

Mary Frances giggled. "When I first met you I thought you were Victor's mistress."

"Quite a few people thought you were Victor's mistress," said Keene.

"But I never . . . except that one time I thought he was you."

Keene drew in a stiff breath, his nostrils flaring. He turned toward Victor.

Victor threw up his hands and backed away. "I never laid a hand on her. Family loyalty and all that."

Keene winced. "Are you sure of it? Your father . . . ?

"No, I am not sure, but all my life I have been mistaken for you. Even at Eton, they would see me and call out your name, the students, the instructors, the mistresses. I'd say it is rather likely."

"You do look alike," said Sophie.

Keene's attention riveted on her. "I want to speak to you alone."

"I'm leaving." Sophie took a step toward the door. "Amelia, are you staying here?"

"That's up to George."

"Lud, he isn't the one to make any decisions right now. I'm sure he's three sheets to the wind." Impatience tempered Sophie's voice. She didn't want to speak with Keene alone, yet she owed him a private account of her decision to leave him.

"I have been drinking," said George solemnly. "I believe I should never touch the stuff again. I'm not quite in my right mind when I have imbibed too freely."

"You're right. I'm staying here, George. This is my home and my daughter's home, and I won't be parted from her again."

"Ah, but how else could George insure your return?" asked Victor facetiously.

"You held Regina hostage for my return?" She pressed her lips together and lowered her head. "I wanted nothing more than to come home to you, but I won't tolerate such use of my child ever again."

George stood. "She should be abed. If she is kept up too long she will be quite out of sorts tomorrow, poor tyke."

Amelia gathered the infant from Mary Frances's arms, and they walked to the door as a family, George's arm around his wife.

Victor turned toward Mary Frances. "If we're going to Gretna we should be off, but we need a bit of blunt to see us there."

Mary Frances opened the reticule she had dangling from her wrist. She pulled out a wad of banknotes. "Will this be enough? I do have this brooch we might sell, and of course, some of your fobs might fetch a pretty penny."

Victor's eyes nearly popped out of his sockets. "Lord, I had no idea you were wearing such enchanting stuff." He bowed to Keene. "I trust you shall look in on George a time or two."

"Perhaps I shouldn't. I am very near to killing him for putting Sophie at risk."

Victor shook his head and led Mary Frances to the door.

Keene pushed the door shut behind them. Sophie stood in front of the window with her back to him. When he had crashed into the small salon earlier he had wanted nothing more than to hold her and comfort her, but she was in Victor's arms and a jealous rage overtook his reason.

He moved across the floor to stand behind her. He leaned forward to kiss her shoulder. "I believe we were interrupted at a most inopportune moment before."

She stepped away. "I don't believe the servants will be able to get everything inside before it is saturated. Did Amelia give you your jacket?"

His damp shirt suddenly chilled him. He reached out and wrapped his arms around Sophie. He wanted to continue what he started to say before Victor burst in on them, to tell her that he loved her. He found her hands and turned them over so he could see her palms. The red abrasions across her fingers and palms made his heart race from remembered fear. "I've never been more frightened in my life."

She pulled out of his embrace. "Don't lecture me, Keene."

His hands dropped uselessly to his sides. "I'm not lecturing you. I'm telling you how very scared I was." Didn't she understand how hard it was for him to admit to fear, no, terror? "I should have died if you fell."

She shook her head and walked across the floor toward the table that had been knocked over earlier and leaned over to right it. She stood, folded her arms across her chest and looked at him, her head cocked sideways. "I've decided to go home."

His world dropped out from under him. "You can't."

"I thought you told me when I asked about the marriage settlement that I could go home anytime I wanted."

"Why? You like London, the dancing, the amusements . . ." The expression on her face made his voice trail off.

"I do like the dancing and the company, but Amelia hates every minute she is away from her daughter. Mary Frances sees the parties as a means to an end." Sophie shrugged. "It's all so empty and meaningless without sharing the pleasures with those you love. I want to go home to my parents."

Was she simply homesick? "For a visit?"

She shook her head.

With each turn of her head another shard of stunned dismay sliced through him. Facing losing her twice in the space of an hour tore him to shreds. "I can't let you go."

"Didn't we just go through this?" She gestured toward the ceiling.

He was still reeling from Victor's revelation; this was too much for him to handle. He dropped to a settee and stared at her. Half a second later he sprang to his feet and crossed the room. He grabbed her shoulders. "You can't leave me."

"You don't want me here, and I'm not happy."

The protest that rose to his lips died at her statement of unhappiness. He stared into her blue eyes and wondered where he had gone so wrong. "Is it because I am not my father's son?"

She snorted in impatience. "As if that should change who you are."

"What, then, Sophie? Forgive me for being so selfish earlier this evening, for I shall make it up to you. I want nothing more than to finish making love to you."

A softness washed over her face and her voice grew husky. "What more was there?"

"There was this." He kissed her.

She shook him off. He could see the resolution in her squared shoulders. "I believe we did that already."

"Ah, but there is more I have to show you." The heightened cadence of her breathing gave him hope. She wasn't adverse to him. "Sophie, my pet, I want to hold you and touch you and make you feel as wonderful as you made me feel."

She pulled away, and he stared at her as she crossed the room, one hand holding her other elbow. "I still think I should return home."

He swallowed hard. "If you should be happier at your parents' house, then we shall both go there."

She swiveled around. "But your political designs."

He stepped toward her. "I daresay the world shall survive without my machinations."

Her lip quivered. "Why should you torture us both with your presence? You should be happier here."

"I shall be happier with you."

"You avoid me like the plague."

"And more the fool I, because there is no place I'd rather be than in your arms." He took a step toward her. Would she keep running from him?

"I would rather leave alone."

She walked to the door and his soul ripped out as she reached for the doorknob.

"Don't leave me, Sophie. Everyone I have ever loved has left me."

She hesitated with her back to him. "That's not true."

He stepped closer to her. What did he have to lose? If she left, he would be nothing. "My mother, my brother."

"They didn't leave you. They died."

"And you throw yourself into danger at every turn. I dread your reckless disregard of your person. I would have no reason to live if you had fallen to the street."

"Keene, you avoid me at every turn."

His stupid belief that she was pregnant. "Because I could hardly bear to see you and not make you my wife. Bloody hell, Sophie, I waited as long as I could, only to learn it was for naught. There was never a reason to wait."

Her hand dropped off the doorknob, and she slowly turned around. "Why the wait?"

"Because I thought you carried another man's child."

He could see her protest before it left her lips. He held up his hand.

"I didn't care that you carried another man's child. I only wanted you to tell me, to not deceive me. I didn't want to give you the ammunition to pretend your unborn babe was mine. I love you. I've always loved you."

She stared at him, her lovely blue eyes filling with tears. "But I came to you."

He took a step forward, holding out his arms. "Not a moment too soon. I had been to your room earlier, but you weren't there."

She looked less than half convinced.

His arms remained empty, a gaping chasm between them. "I think my father must have realized how I felt about you. He forced my hand, but marriage wasn't my only option. I've managed to get by all of my adult life without his assistance. I'd often thought I could go to India and make my own way in the world, but it was marriage to you he offered me." His voice broke. "I wanted that more than I—"