A Not So Respectable Gentleman?

But he persisted. ‘What hold does Kellford have over you? Has he compromised you?’

She swung back. ‘Compromised me!’ The thought was appalling.

‘Has he forced himself on you? Is that why?’ He blanched. ‘Good God. Has he gotten you—?’

‘No!’ She held up a hand. ‘Do not insult me. Do you think I would tolerate his touch?’

His expression turned grim. ‘I think him quite capable of forcing himself on you. If it is not that, then tell me what it is. You said you must marry him. Tell me the reason.’

Her anger flared. ‘I cannot tell you, Leo. You know I cannot.’

‘Whatever it is, I can help you.’ His gaze remained steady. ‘I have ways.’

This was so much like the Leo she once knew, the young man who believed they could create a bright future together. She wanted to shake her head lest he be an apparition.

But she could not let him hurt her again. Trust in him? Impossible. ‘You once made promises to me, Leo. We both know what happened to those promises.’

He was opening the old wounds, wounds she’d been able to ignore even if they’d never healed.

‘Mariel.’ His voice turned tight. ‘You broke those promises.’

‘I broke them?’ It had been devastation when she’d heard nothing from him. ‘You left me!’

‘What did you expect? You were marrying Ashworth. You chose a title over a bastard. What happened to that plan, by the way?’

‘Ashworth again. Why do you persist in saying I would marry Ashworth? I was betrothed to you.’ She felt as if she were bleeding inside once again.

‘Your father—’ he began, but did not finish.

The blood drained from her face. Had her father sent Leo away? ‘Do you mean you spoke to my father?’

‘You know I did. You set the appointment.’ He clenched his jaw. ‘Surely you have not forgotten that we planned for me to speak with your father. He told me you had chosen Ashworth.’

‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘You never kept that appointment. I assumed it was because of the fire. My father said you didn’t keep it.’

‘Your father said that?’ A look of realisation came over his face.

Her father. She felt the blood drain from her. Her father had been manipulating her even then. ‘Tell me what my father said to you.’

‘That you chose Ashworth over me, because I was a bastard with nothing to offer you. Since my stables had just burned down, he was essentially correct.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Were you at Ashworth’s estate that day?’

‘At Ashworth’s estate?’ She felt cold inside. ‘No. I was in Bath. With my mother. She wanted to take the waters.’

They sat close to each other, so close their faces were inches apart. She could see the shadow of a beard on his chin, the lines at the corners of his eyes, the shadows within him that spoke of his own pain.

‘He told me you chose Ashworth because of his title,’ he went on, speaking as much to himself as to her. ‘Because he was respectable.’

She almost weakened, almost transferred her anger to her father, who owned plenty of it already. But Leo was not wholly innocent in this.

She lifted her chin. ‘You believed those things mattered to me? Titles and such? Is that what you thought of me? Why did you not speak with me yourself, Leo? You left without a word. Without a word. At first I thought it was because of the fire, but even then it shocked me that you would not come to me so we could plan what to do together. It took me months and months to realise that you had no intention of returning to me.’ She felt as if she were bleeding inside.

His face turned stony, but she sensed turbulent emotions inside him. ‘I was convinced you did not want me.’

‘You were easily convinced, apparently. Did you think so little of me, Leo?’ She slid away from him and crossed her arms over her chest as if this would protect her heart. ‘Even if you thought all that nonsense about Ashworth was true, you did not try to fight for me, did you? Or try to make me change my mind? You never gave me a chance. You just took it upon yourself to run off.’

Her words wounded him, she could tell by his face, but they were true.

He spoke quietly. ‘I am not running away now. I want to help you.’

She desperately wanted help, but not from him. The pain of his leaving her still hurt too much.

Her own father had manoeuvred the situation, true—she must deal with that later—but it was Leo who’d chosen to leave.

She stood and tied her mask back on. ‘I want to go back.’

He rose and donned his mask, as well.

They entered the crosswalk that led back to the other side of the gardens. She took long deep breaths, trying to calm herself lest tears dampen her mask and give away her emotions. The closer they came to the supper boxes, the more she cringed at having to return to Kellford’s side and to pretend to her father that he had not set about the destruction of her happiness two years before this. At the moment, though, it was worse to be with Leo. She was enraged at him—and perilously close to falling into his arms.

He’d held her many times when they’d discussed marrying, when they declared their love, said they would overcome all obstacles together.

She remembered when she’d learned his stables had burned down and most of his horses were lost. She’d read it in the newspapers. When her father told her Leo never showed up for his appointment, she’d imagined it had been because of the fire. She waited and waited until days stretched into weeks and weeks into months. She waited even after learning Leo had left the country. He would send for her, she’d thought.

But he never did.

He’d promised he would marry her, and now he promised he would find a way to prevent her marriage. It was too late to believe in him. It hurt too much to be wrong.

She walked at his side, not touching him, her cape wrapped around her like a shield against him.

One good thing about his sudden appearance in her life was she now felt roused to battle harder against this forced marriage. She did not need him for it. All she needed was to remain single for two more years and her inheritance would be hers, free and clear. No man could use it to rule her life. No man could keep her from protecting her mother and sisters.

Her father told her he owed Kellford a large gambling debt, one so large that their family would be ruined if he did not pay. Apparently Mariel was payment of the debt. Or rather, her fortune was. How much of that was a lie, like the lies he told her about Leo? She wanted the truth.

Then she would know what to do.

It was a start. A plan. And her time was better spent dwelling on how to escape this dreadful marriage than on fantasies and regrets about Leo Fitzmanning.

They reached the arches; the supper boxes were just on the other side.

‘Do not remain with me,’ she demanded of Leo.

He seized her arm before she could leave him. ‘I cannot let you go until you tell me what hold Kellford has over you.’

This was becoming tedious. Why not tell him? Perhaps he would leave her alone if she did.

She turned so she could look directly into his eyes. ‘Kellford threatens my family. He has the power to ruin my father, my mother, my sisters.’ She spoke the words slowly so he would not miss their importance.

‘Mariel—’ he began.