Chapter Thirteen
A little over an hour later, Daphne rode with ease beside Georgiana as they trotted along Rotten Row. There were hardly any other riders in Hyde Park, and Daphne found she quite enjoyed the serenity of the late evening. They halted their horses and dismounted, trusting the hovering grooms to see to their horses’ needs.
“My husband made the arrangements for you. Here is the address,” Georgiana said, discreetly handing Daphne a small sheet of paper.
She unfolded it. Audley Street. “And what is here?”
Her friend sent her a chiding glance. “The scandal you are pursuing.”
She glanced at the note once more. The place of her ruination and freedom. Except she was not entirely confident that was the path forward anymore. “I declare I never expected to feel this jolt of anxiety,” she said softly. “But I mustn’t be deterred from my heart’s wishes.” Though she still had a week left for their bargain to be completed.
“You could give Carrington another chance.”
Daphne wanted an esteem that knew no bounds and could weather any storm. “He has not spoken of love or any tender sentiments, despite the wonderful times we’ve been having. What we now have is friendship and passion, which is more than most genteel marriages have. I should be contented.” There was a part of her that would throw away all fear and caution and remain with Sylvester at all cost if he promised more. “I’m dreadfully sorry to have put you through all this trouble to arrange a clandestine meeting. He…he has vowed to set me free if after trying I am still unhappy.”
“And are you?” Georgiana asked gently, her blue eyes soft with concern.
Daphne pressed a hand to her chest, aware of the quiet ache that burned in her heart. “I have experienced contentment I never knew possible,” Daphne confessed. “But there is still an emptiness inside. I told him I’ve always loved him, and he displayed no tender feelings. My heart grows heavier. I find that I wonder often if our marriage will once again return to a state of icy civility once I have borne my earl his heir.”
Mayhap she should give them more time, and perhaps in time affection and trust would develop between her and the earl.
Georgiana smiled. “I will respect whatever decision you make. There is something else,” she said, reaching into the pockets of her riding habit to withdraw a larger folded paper.
“What is it?”
“I believe it to be your husband’s secrets.”
Daphne’s heart jolted, and her hands trembled as she took the papers.
Georgiana sighed. “The only reason my husband gave me this is because I asked for it, and he knows how much I love you. He told me that your father held a very damning scandal over your earl, and while he did not confide in me the nature of the scandal, Rhys told me of the terrible consequences to Lord Carrington’s family.”
“What consequences?”
“Around the time your father was blackmailing Carrington, his sister tried to take her life.”
Shock and sorrow darted through Daphne. “Your husband is certain of this?” she asked hoarsely. Now she understood the rage and pain her husband had breathed with on their wedding night. His cruel words had cloaked his agony.
Concern flashed in Georgiana’s eyes. “He is. When I asked him about Carrington’s secrets, my husband revealed your father had traded for similar information years ago, over six precisely. Rhys did say he had destroyed the copy of the letters he had provided to your father and he would not revive an investigation into Carrington because he respected him. Is all well? You’ve gone terribly pale.”
“No,” Daphne whispered, tears burning her eyes. “Did you read this report?” Suddenly and inexplicably, she wanted to protect her husband from further harm more than she wanted her next breath.
“That would be a dreadfully encroaching thing to do. I would never intrude in such a manner.”
“Is it possible this information could be wrong?” The very notion her father could have acted with such callous disregard for someone made her feel ill.
“My husband trades and barters secrets,” Georgiana said without any hint of shame that her husband was so dastardly. “If there is any scandal, he has the uncanny ability to unearth it. Servants talk, people gossip, there is always a thread to follow is how he describes it.”
Daphne tore up the paper into tiny pieces and stuffed them in her pocket. “After our wedding, Sylvester made me painfully aware he had been forced to wed me and that no other sentiments had moved him when he made his offer. But I did not know how my father persuaded him. Papa wouldn’t tell me, and Carrington made no allowance for my ignorance,” she whispered. “I am the cause of his family’s pain. How could he touch me with such passion when he has no affection for me? Simply because he needs an heir? Has that all the past weeks have been about?”
It was evident why no sentiments had been whispered from his lips, even when he pleasured her with such wicked passion. In his heart, she was just as guilty as her father, and Sylvester would never need more from her than an heir and an agreeable marriage. How she now hated the word agreeable and the lack of complexity and heart it implied in a union. So many emotions and memories tumbled through her—it was now clear why Sylvester had not even attended her father’s small funeral for the sake of propriety.
She hadn’t understood and had resented him even more for it. But this…
The foundations of her anger and bitterness and her determination to flee her wretched marriage had been dealt a heart-wrenching blow. How could I have been so self-absorbed in my pain? She had a cousin living in the vicinity of Bath, and she was tempted to flee there for a few days, or weeks, perhaps months while she gathered her wits.
Then the fierce need to see Sylvester rushed through her. “Forgive me, Georgiana, but I must leave at once.”
“Go, do what you must,” her friend urged, hugging her briefly.
Daphne hurried away and mounted her mare with the assistance of her groom and then rode away. Several minutes after, she alighted at their townhouse in Grosvenor Square and quickly ascended the stairs. The door opened as she reached the top steps, and she sailed inside the elegant and exquisitely appointed house. “Is his lordship home?”
“Yes, my lady. He is presently in the library,” Knobbs replied.
She made her way to the library and dawdled for a few minutes before she knocked once, opened the door, and entered. The room was empty. Daphne wasted no time checking the drawing room and music room before she mounted the stairs to her room. He must have left the townhouse and the staff was unaware.
She opened the door to her chamber and faltered. Her husband was staring at the packet of letters she had found. Daphne swallowed. A few had dropped out of the pockets of her discarded gown onto the carpeted floor. With a hand that trembled, she closed the door and leaned against it. Sylvester’s head snapped up.
His jaw tightened imperceptibly, and she tried to swallow against the sudden tightness in her throat.
“Strange, I do not see an envelope with my sister’s name,” he said, glancing up from the letters. He stared at her with a guarded watchfulness and chilling civility.
She hardly knew where to start. Best to get on with it. “There are more in the pocket of my gown.”
He picked up the gown from the chaise lounge and went into the pockets. Sylvester withdrew the letters, and he shuffled through them. Her husband turned to marble before her eyes. Evidently, he found the one with his sister’s name.
“So, you had them all along. And to think I believed you were so different from your family.”
The breath left her lungs, while a sudden ache burned her throat. “I swear on my honor I found those letters a couple hours ago in my mother’s escritoire. I only thought to search for them because of how certain my brother and Redgrave had been that I must be in possession of these letters. I had doubted their very existence until this afternoon,” she said, clasping her hands before her.
“How convenient,” he drawled with an icy bite.
Stung, she jerked back from him. “You believe me capable of such dishonesty?”
A fraught silence lingered, but his eyes spoke the truth. They gleamed with a contempt she had never espied before.
“Have you read these letters?”
“I have not,” she said softly. “I…I never knew about Lady Henrietta…Hartington. I am so deeply sorry my father’s despicable actions hurt your family, Sylvester.”
The fury that leaped into his gaze had her flinching. “What do you think you know of my sister?”
“I—”
“Answer me,” he said in a dangerously soft tone.
The fierce intensity that burned in his eyes had her heart jerking. “I know that my father believed he knew some scandal about your family that had a dreadful impact on her…so much so…that…” Daphne could not repeat the damning truth.
Sylvester prowled closer, and she retreated until her back was pressed against the closed door.
“Until she despaired enough to take her life,” he finished.
“Yes. Oh, Sylvester, I cannot express my sorrow.”
“Can you imagine the torment my sister must have endured to drive her to such actions? The pain and the shame, all because your father wanted my title for you. Do you know the horror I felt to find her bleeding on the floor from the wounds she made to her wrists and the letter your father sent her, threatening to expose all if I did not declare my intentions immediately?”
The icy disdain and the agony in his tone made her want to weep. A harsh sob tore from Daphne’s throat and tears streamed down her cheeks. “I did not know,” she whispered, feeling battered, all the love and belief she’d had in her father’s honor shattered. “I was silly enough to hope you had fallen in love with me that day at Kellits Hall and the few outings we had leading up to our marriage.”
Derision gleamed in his green eyes. “Silly, indeed. I am quite unaware of what love has to do with marriage.”
That clearly told her even if their marriage had started in a different vein, love and tender sentiments would never have been a factor.
“I ask you again, what do you know of my sister’s scandal?”
“Nothing,” she said firmly. “I only know of the consequences, my father’s shame, and my deep regrets.”
Sylvester touched her cheek, his fingertip ghosting over her tears, his eyes so indifferent it chilled her soul. Awareness of her vulnerability to this man seeped into every crevice of her being. Would there ever be a time his indifference and lack of trust did not pierce deep into her heart?
“I would never ask you to forgive my father, but I ask, my lord, that you do not hold me accountable for his terrible actions. I never wanted a title—that was his misguided ambitions for his only daughter. I…I…only wanted you and made the error of making my desire known to a flawed father.”
A fingertip stroked her lower lip, and she swallowed past the tight lump in her throat.
“Ah, my sister’s pain reduced to a meager explanation of a flawed father.”
Profoundly disturbed by Sylvester’s intense stare, she glanced away.
“My question to you, Countess, is how did you know my sister attempted to take her life? You so defiantly claim you had no knowledge of these letters or the information they hold, but you are aware of how they impacted my sister. How?”
She stiffened. “Sylvester, I—”
“How?”
There was such chilling mistrust in the eyes that stared at her, she felt a harsh burn of pain that she had so callously demanded his secrets from Georgiana. A denial trembled in her heart, but she could not bear to speak it. “Before I understood your heart and honor and saw the possibility of what our marriage could be like, I asked the broker for your secrets, so I could have more bargaining power.”
He recoiled, a slash of pain bracketing his mouth before his expression shuttered. “Just like your father and your brother,” he murmured caustically.
Daphne flinched, the shame and guilt raking her like talons. She forcibly swallowed the ache in her throat. “You did get a letter from Henry, why did you not inform me of his dastardly actions?”
His jaw was set in rigid lines. “It did not signify.”
“My brother acted with such gross indignity and it did not signify?”
The contempt that flared in her husband’s gaze felt like a whip across her flesh, stinging and searing. “I am no longer the vulnerable boy I was when I bent to your father’s will. I am at a loss how you do not perceive you acted with a similar indignity in demanding the very secrets you knew your father blackmailed me with.”
The rumble of shame and rage in his voice had her pressing a hand to her mouth. She had never truly considered how impotent and powerless he must have felt. Oh God, how could she have been so blinded. “Sylvester, I—”
“I had no great expectations of honor from your brother, so his attempts were quite underwhelming. I simply burned the letter I received a few days ago. But you, my countess, I had truly come to believe in the sweetness, the kindness you presented, but your heart is just as black, it seems.”
She stared at him, unable to sort the jumble of emotions twisting though her so fiercely. “I was desperate, so very desperate when I asked Georgiana for your secrets, Sylvester. We were married for six years and the only thing I knew about your heart was that it was cold and empty, with no regards for me. I hungered for freedom from such an unagreeable marriage, but you were determined to make our marriage into something I could not envision, or have much hope in.”
“And your desperation would justify uncovering the very secrets which your father had used to blackmail me?” He snarled. “The very ones your brother also claimed he had?”
A most horrifying realization splintered through her. “Do you believe I am a party to my brother’s blackmail attempts?”
The last few days, Sylvester had seemed more reserved and watchful and had made no attempt to drive her mindless with his seductive touches and want. She had foolishly thought it was because their bargain was ending.
Sylvester’s mien shuttered, and she waited for a reply in vain. She would have better luck asking a stone to display emotion, her earl was so frightfully blank. She tried to swallow past the searing pain. “You do believe it,” she whispered. “All these weeks, and you’ve still no notion of my character.”
Wretchedness enveloped her in its cruel arms. Why did she hurt so much? She hadn’t truly possessed any great expectations of him and their marriage. Except, with all honesty and foolish hopes, she had. God, she was not going to cry over this. He’d already gotten six years’ worth. No more.
“I could have lied just now, but I cannot, for I only want honesty between us. I could have read the letters and learned your sister’s secrets, but I could not, because I wanted you to tell me when you were ready. In truth, I do not need to know her secrets, for they have already defined too much of our marriage. When Georgiana gave me another letter just now, I tore it to pieces because I know I am falling in love you, and I could not hurt you. If you cannot trust me to behave with integrity and honor…that is not an agreeable marriage, my lord,” she said hoarsely.
She moved close enough that the hem of her riding habit brushed against his shoes. This close, Daphne realized he was not at all indifferent. His eyes bespoke anger and betrayal. She raised her face to his and held his eyes fiercely with her own. “Do you believe me, Sylvester, that I had nothing to do with my brother’s demands?”
Please say yes…
His face was without expression, without sentiment. And then she knew. Before her stood a man incapable of trusting her. If he could not trust her, he would never lead his heart to loving her. “I do not find the lack of trust and love in our union palatable,” she whispered. Not when I love you so desperately. She could not stay in this marriage and hunger after a man who would never return her sentiments.
“Nevertheless, we are married, aren’t we, and there will be no divorce.”
Her breath trembled on her lips. “I beg your pardon?”
“You heard me, Countess. There will be no separation or divorce.”
Daphne bit back the cry of hurt that almost broke from her throat. She had suffered years of his indifference and the very notion of even enduring another day, another hour was intolerable, let alone to envision a lifetime. Her heart cracked into two and nothing could ever put it back. It wasn’t a quarrel, infidelity, or some scandal that created a distance between Daphne and her earl. Sylvester had once again retreated to chilling incivility. “You lied to me. This arrangement was only ever in your favor. You would never have granted me a separation after our bargain. Where is your honor?”
“It is because of my honor that I have not had my way with you, wife. It is because of my honor that I would not grant a divorce that would see both our families ruined. I cannot fall back on my honor or pride when it comes to you. You asked if I love and trust you… I do not understand how to explain what I feel for you, but I know enough to say I’ll not easily walk away from this marriage, as you are wont to do.”
“I’ll not stay!” she said fiercely, battling the fears tearing though her heart. He had so much power, he could do anything with her if he wished.
“Then go,” he bit out coldly. “Travel, run, move your belongings to another estate, but there will be no divorce, and you will do your duty to the title, Countess, and I will have my heir.”
She stared at him in mute shock. “That is not a marriage, and I will not continue to endure this life another moment. If you will not grant me my freedom, then I will secure it myself.” Her voice came out in a raw whisper, tears blurring her vision. She did not want a response, not that he seemed inclined to offer one. Daphne opened the door and hurried away, tears blurring her view. Their past of pain and blackmail would always be between them, and would forever render their marriage into the cold, displeasing union it had always been. This encounter only proved she had to press on with her plan to act with disreputable indecency and be free.
If only the very idea didn’t make her ache with a pain she hadn’t felt before. If only the sense of loss that tore through her didn’t make her stumble and struggle to breathe. Why had she agreed to the foolish bargain? She’d only led herself to more heartache than she could ever possibly bear.
And his vow now to never let her go? Well, then…he would simply have to.