had never intended to admit it. She had made him a laughingstock in the ton, the rich, handsome duke who could not hold on to his mistress and was in danger of making as much of a fool of himself over a woman as his father had done before him. He had looked everywhere for her in such a fever that he could not tell anger, fear and desperation apart; he had inquired everywhere but found no trace of her so that in the end he had been forced to accept that she did not want to be found, that maybe she had gone abroad, that he would never see her again.
“I am sorry.” Again her words dropped softly into the silence. She sounded indifferent, as though she were apologizing for stepping on his foot. Her apparent coldness, her pity, when his feelings for her were still so strong, was intolerable. His anger broke through five years of restraint. He grabbed her upper arms. The cerise wrap slipped from her shoulders to puddle on the carriage floor.
“Did it really mean so little to you, Eve?” he said fiercely. “After all we had shared could you really walk away from me so easily?”
The fury inside him was volcanic in its power. He wanted to shake her. He wanted to kiss her, to ravish her, to make her his once more and claim her with all the passion and anger within him. He pulled her close and she closed her eyes, her lashes spiky sharp against the pale curve of her cheek, as though she were warding off the fury in him, trying to defend herself. Her expression was stark in its misery and Rowarth felt in that instant, with a sudden, terrifying conviction that whatever she claimed, she had not left him by choice. Something terrible had happened to her, something she had felt unable to tell him, something that still pierced her soul. All the evidence supported it. Her false claim that she had left him for another man, the fact that she had left behind all her money and jewelry when she could have taken it and lived in luxury, the fact that she had hidden herself away in this little backwater… Whatever she had told him she had not run because she had been unhappy as his mistress. There had to be something else…
All the rage left him then, banished by the misery he could see in her face and feel in every line of her body. He picked up the wrap and placed it gently about her shoulders, wanting to draw her close, shaken by the instinct he felt to comfort her. But again she drew away from him, lonely but indomitable in her strength.
“Do not pursue this, Rowarth,” she said. He could see her hands shaking as she wrapped the shawl about herself. “It was a long time ago.”
Frustration and determination gripped him in equal measure. Pride and anger prompted him to let the matter drop and yet he found he could not.
“I don’t believe you,” he said brutally. “I don’t believe that you left me through choice, Eve. You must tell me what happened.”
For a brief moment she looked him directly in the eyes. “Nothing happened,” she said. Her voice was cool and light again, devoid of emotion. It was as though the unhappiness he was sure he had seen in her only a moment before had never existed.
“You mistake,” she said. “I appreciate that it must be difficult for you to accept, but I am afraid that I discovered that the role of your mistress was not one that suited me. So I left. That is all.”
Rowarth swore. “So you preferred to go back to an existence where you struggled to hold body and soul together as you had done once before?” he challenged. “You ask too much if you expect me to believe that, sweetheart.”
“I never wanted you for your money and status.” There was a thread of anger in her voice now. At last he had provoked her out of her self-control. She had always had a temper. “Oh, it was nice to be rich—” she invested the word with scorn “—but it was never really my money, was it?” She sighed. “I wanted respect,” she said. “Self-respect I had earned. I did not have that as a courtesan, using my body to buy survival.”
Again Rowarth thought she was dealing in half-truths. He knew how fiercely she hated the depths to which poverty and desperation made men sink and that she had deplored the necessity of selling her body in order to save her life. But he had also thought that between them there had surely been mutual respect and trust.
“You had my respect,” he said. “I wanted to marry you.”
Again she was silent for a moment, biting her lip. “I did not wish to be a duchess.”
“No,” Rowarth said. “Apparently you wished to be a pawnbroker.”
Again she showed a flash of temper. “Is it inconceivable that I might want an honest trade?”
“Rather than be a duchess?” Rowarth drawled. “Frankly, my dear, it is. And besides, pawnbroking is not generally considered to be an honest profession.”
She looked furious. “Enough,” she said. She turned her shoulder to him. “I am afraid that you will simply have to accept that I left you because I did not wish to be with you. There is no point in discussing the matter further.”
The carriage had drawn up in front of the steps of Sampson’s mansion and a liveried footman opened the door. Rowarth descended and held out a hand to help Eve down. Her face was serene again, concealing any emotion she might feel inside, but he felt her fingers tremble a little in his.
You will simply have to accept that I left you because I did not wish to be with you…
The words echoed in Rowarth’s head as he guided her into the entrance hall. So be it. Eve had made her feelings clear. His instinct that there was more to her betrayal than met the eye was clearly wrong and he would be a fool to pursue it further. She had wanted to be free of him. There was no more to be said.
The hallway at Juniper Hill was a riot of bad taste. Eve’s fascinated gaze was drawn upward to the ceiling where naked painted cherubs romped amidst fluffy blue clouds. In the alcoves were statues of hugely endowed Greek gods and artfully draped goddesses, whose state of undress was only equalled by the scandalous deshabillée of Warren Sampson’s female guests. Those invited tonight were not the respectable citizens of Fortune’s Folly but those of the local gentry who hunted hard, especially when it came to women, plus some actresses from the theaters of York and Harrogate, a smattering of Sampson’s business associates and those of their wives bold enough to attend.
Servants were circulating with trays of champagne. In the center of the hall was a gigantic ice sculpture of a naked, rampant god Poseidon, his icy erection almost as enormous as the trident in his hand. It rather spelled out the point of the entertainment, Eve thought. And in the middle of all this splendid ostentation was Warren Sampson himself, preening in peacock blue, expansive and vulgar and most frightfully proud, as far as Eve could see, of displaying his money in such an opulent style. He was surrounded by a positive plethora of hangers-on, including the squire’s brother Tom Fortune, who smiled very suggestively as Eve approached. As she and Rowarth stepped forward Eve registered the sudden excitement that ran through the ranks of Sampson’s guests. The men raised their quizzing glasses and looked Eve up and down from the diamond clasp in her red curls to the tips of her red satin slippers, lingering on the bodice of her gown where her abundant charms were so amply displayed. The women cast glances of lascivious greed at Rowarth who was looking exceptionally elegant in his austere black-and-white evening dress.
A frisson of nerves ran through Eve as Sampson’s gaze fell on them and he came forward to greet them, his eyes lighting with self-congratulation to have caught so eminent a guest as the Duke of Welburn.
“My dear fellow…” He stretched out a hand to Rowarth, his voice unctuous. “I am charmed that you have been able to join us tonight.”
Not by a flicker of expression did Rowarth give away any emotion other than an apparent delight to be there. The perfect courtesy bred in an English gentleman evidently made him able to carry off such a meeting, Eve thought. In contrast, her skin was crawling simply at being in close proximity with Warren Sampson. There was something unwholesome about the man and when he turned his gaze on her she felt a sense of revulsion she was afraid might be almost too strong to conceal.
“Mrs.…Nightingale, is it not?” Sampson was working hard to cover his astonishment at seeing her, but could not quite hide his feelings. Eve could not be sure whether his surprise arose from the unexpected appearance of his unwitting stooge or simply from shock at seeing a lady he had previously thought irreproachably respectable flaunting herself in such a shocking gown. His eyes lit with a predatory gleam as his gaze lingered on the swell of her breasts. Eve felt Rowarth stiffen almost imperceptibly beside her but when she flicked a glance up at his face his expression was quite smooth. His hand was in the small of her back, pushing her forward a little so that she could not avoid Sampson’s appreciative appraisal. She felt a bitter taste in her mouth, as though Rowarth was whoring her out, which of course, he was. And she had only herself to blame. When he had started to question her on the past in the intimate darkness of the carriage she had lied to him because it was the only way to keep her secrets and to keep the horrible memories of her miscarriage and loss locked away in the dark where it belonged. But she knew that she could not now complain if Rowarth despised her. She had deliberately pushed him away. Even so, a sliver of misery like a lump of ice wedged itself in her heart.
“Mr. Sampson.” She forced a smile. “It is such a pleasure to attend one of your parties. Your hospitality is legendary.”
Sampson laughed, showing his teeth. “My dear Mrs. Nightingale, had I known of your interest I would have invited you sooner.” He took her hand, his touch suggestive, and pressed his lips wetly to her fingers. Eve suppressed a shudder. Sampson’s predatory gaze went from her to Rowarth.