Chapter Twelve
“You’re packing,” Jasper said, standing in Nicholas’s doorway.
“I am.”
“Which fact should we address first, that you’re robbing poor Bertram of his livelihood, or that you said you’d be staying a few more days at least?”
Nicholas continued to stuff items haphazardly into a bag. “There’s nothing I need to do here that can’t be done from London.”
“Is Amelia going back?”
At the mention of her name, Nicholas gave up packing. Bertram could follow him later with his belongings. “Why don’t you go ask her?”
“I’m asking you.”
“Well, I wouldn’t know.” He picked up a book, only to slam it down on his dressing table. “Apparently, I don’t know a lot of things.”
“She refused you,” Jasper said gently.
“She didn’t just refuse me. She kissed me, like we were the only two people on earth and the world was unraveling around us, and then she refused me.”
“Well done, Amelia.”
“Well done?” Nicholas shouted. “Well done? This is the worst day of my life and you’re taking her side?”
“Lord Nicholas,” Smithson interrupted, frowning at his raised voice. “Your mother needs to speak with you at once.”
“Fine. I’m on my way.”
Anything to get away from Jasper or how miserable he felt. He’d finally declared himself and she turned him down. Not because she wasn’t attracted to him. Not because she didn’t care for him. Because she only saw him as being suitable for an affair, not for being her husband.
“I say ‘well done’ because it’s an excellent opening volley,” Jasper said, following him and speaking quietly over his shoulder.
“It’s not a volley. It was a finality. She doesn’t want to marry me.”
“She kissed you.”
“Yes.” She’d kissed Montrose, too. How foolish Nicholas had been.
“Did she enjoy it?”
“That is not the problem.” Nicholas didn’t want to think about it anymore.
“So she likes you and she likes your kisses. She just doesn’t want to marry you?”
Why did he have to keep repeating it? “Apparently.”
“Does she want to marry anyone?”
Nicholas stopped mid-step. “She says not, which is ludicrous. Which means that I have been under the tragic misapprehension—”
Jasper started laughing, loudly and with an extreme lack of consideration for anyone around him. At one point he bent over, holding himself up with a hand on his knee. When he was finished, his eyes were watering and he was fanning his face to help with the redness.
“What on earth is so amusing?”
“You don’t know a thing about women. Not your fault, really.” Jasper clapped him on the back. “You’ve dedicated your entire life to knowing this one woman and she’s gone and confounded you. This is where some diversity of experience would come in handy.”
“I know plenty about women. I do not need your help.”
“You do, desperately. Go and see your mother.” Jasper took a seat on a chair outside the study. “And when you’re done, we’ll go to London and I’ll take you to see the expert on women who do not wish to marry. She’ll know what to do to convince Amelia to change her mind.”
Nicholas wanted to ignore him. He wanted to stay angry, but if there was a chance, he had to take it. “Who’s this expert?”
Jasper’s grin was triumphant. “Lady Ruby De Vere.”
“Your sister?” It served him right for believing a single word that came out of Jasper’s mouth. Nicholas continued his path to the study.
“The legendary breaker of hearts who has turned down no less than three dukes and a crown prince. Who, yes, also happens to be my sister.”
He was an idiot. He was a fool. He turned around. “You think she can really help?”
“Obviously. She’s a De Vere.”
Nicholas wanted to marry her.
She hadn’t asked him for help with the next stage of her and Julia’s plan. How could she, with the way he’d stormed out? It was a good thing she didn’t want to marry, because her history with proposals was proving dismally unexceptional.
“Did you ask him? Will he do it?” Julia was waiting impatiently.
“No,” Amelia said, still in a haze. She sat down in the chair next to the bed, rubbing her fingers over the cover of the book of sonnets he’d left behind.
Julia followed her. “No, you didn’t ask him? Or no, he won’t do it?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“Why ever not?”
“Because he asked me to marry him.”
Julia was stricken silent for perhaps the first time in her life. Amelia stared at the wall, not actually seeing it.
“Nicholas asked you to marry him just now?”
Amelia shook herself, sighing. “Yes. I said no, and then he kissed me, and then I said no again. He stormed out.”
“Oh, Mia.” Julia climbed out of bed and wrapped her arms around Amelia’s shoulders. “Why did you refuse him?”
“I told you; I don’t want to marry. I want to stay here with you. I thought, of all people, Nick would understand but he thinks it’s because he doesn’t have a title. I’ve never seen him so hurt.”
Julia hummed her sympathy. “Men and their pride. Unfortunately, that puts a damper on our plans for your next big scandal.”
It put a damper on more than that. Nicholas was her best friend, next to Julia, and in some ways more than Julia. He was the person she turned to when she couldn’t see her way clear of something. She’d never seen him so upset.
Well, so be it. He’d misjudged her as badly as he thought she’d misjudged him. If he expected to hold the monopoly on hurt feelings, he was in for a surprise. “I think I know someone else I can ask. Lord Bellamy. I think he’ll help.”
“The man who punched Lord Montrose?”
“Yes.”
“You hardly know him.”
“We’ve become good friends. If there’s mischief involved, he’ll help if he can.” Unless he’d decided to take Nicholas’s side. But there would be no knowing until she spoke to him.
“He sounds intriguing.”
It was Amelia’s turn to wrap her sister in an exuberant hug. “I can’t wait for you to meet him. I’m certain you two will get on.”
Julia’s whole body stiffened. “Mia, no.”
“Julia, he’s not like that.”
“He’s the heir to a dukedom! I’m not meeting him.”
Amelia scowled at her sister. “Why am I the only one who has to take risks and expand my horizons?”
“Because you’re not a black mark on the family name, inveterately shunned by society.”
Amelia wasn’t done with that line of discussion, but she was prepared to leave it for now. “Well, give it a moment. If I do half the things we’ve planned, I’ll have earned my place right next to you.”
“Goodness. Poor Mother and Papa.”
“I know. They’ll start to wonder if our bloodline really is morally corrupt.”
“I think we can safely say it is,” Julia said with a grin.
Amelia jumped up, putting Nicholas out of her mind. “All right, then. We must make haste. I wish to be rid of Embry as soon as possible and get this whole mess behind us. How do we convince Papa to let you come to London?”
Based on the coldness of his mother’s greeting and the rigidness of her posture, Nicholas was about to be treated to an encounter with yet another woman who didn’t think he amounted to much.
“What did you need to speak with me about?” he asked, willing the encounter to end quickly.
“Smithson tells me you’ve called for the carriage. You’re leaving again?”
“Yes.”
Lady Wakefield’s eyes narrowed. “What happened at the Bishops’?”
“Nothing.”
“Do not lie to me, Nicholas. You were going to stay all week, and then you went over to that…that…” She was incapable of vulgarity even in her anger. “And now you’re leaving. Your father received a very distressing letter from Lord Montrose, so don’t pretend not to know what I mean.”
“It’s none of your business, Mother.”
“It is every bit of my business! Do you think it’s easy, being here alone with your father? Watching him fade? Watching him become violent?” Her hand flew up, hovering near her mouth. “You were supposed to be here with me, helping. Instead, nothing has changed. Wherever Amelia Bishop is, that’s where you can be found.”
It was the wrong day for her to challenge him on this. Any other day, he wouldn’t have argued with her. “Has it ever mattered to you in the slightest that I am in love with her?”
Her face shuttered into stubborn denial. “Don’t say that.”
“We both know it’s the truth. That’s why you sent me away. She’s the one person who makes me truly happy, but you care more about reputation than whether I’m happy.” He’d gone too far to stop now. He’d broached the unbroachable subject. And he should have done this a long time ago. “That’s why you’re alone. You could be surrounded by friends and family to help you through this, but you can’t dare to let anyone think the Wakefield bloodline might be as fallible as the Bishops’. Not after all the venom you’ve spewed.”
His mother went pale. She was shaking from the strain of not shouting at him. Nicholas wished she would. He wished she’d give up appearances once and for all and be his mother.
Instead she said, “You’re clearly overwrought. We’ll discuss this another time.”
“We won’t, actually. The issue of Amelia Bishop is closed.” God, it hurt to say it. “I offered her our name, but she didn’t want it.”
Lady Wakefield gasped. “You what?”
“I’m not good enough for her.” And honestly, could he blame her? Why on earth would she want to join a family that despised her when she could stay with her own? “So now you can rest easy. Amelia Bishop has refused the opportunity to become a Wakefield. Twice.”
“Thank God for that,” she breathed.
“No, Mother, not thank God. I shall spend the rest of my days miserable without her. I doubt God wants much to do with any of that.”
And if He did, Nicholas wanted nothing to do with Him. He left the room and headed for the train station with Jasper in tow. Hopefully Lady Ruby had some miraculous answer for them. Otherwise Nicholas would be spending the rest of his days alone.
With Julia’s help, Amelia convinced Lord Bishop that London was the best place for Julia, given the proximity of the world’s leading physicians. She had also convinced him that it would be best for them to return immediately, while Julia was relatively well, instead of waiting for a relapse to come along and ruin Julia’s chances for receiving the best medical care available.
It was a testament to Julia’s love for her. Agreeing to go along meant Julia would spend her time in London being tested and poked by every doctor Papa could get his hands on. Meanwhile, Amelia would be undergoing her own version of torture, attempting to brazen through the scandals Julia came up with. If only they could trade places. Amelia would much prefer private prodding to making herself a public spectacle.
They were barely settled at the new London house—Julia hated it, just like Amelia thought she would—when Lord Bellamy answered her summons. Amelia tried her best to convince Julia to meet him. “I swear to you, he might behave badly, but it won’t be because of your leg.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Julia!”
“Enough. Get out there. You’ve left a duke’s heir languishing in our parlor.”
Amelia sighed. She left the downstairs linen closet, the closest room available that Julia had ducked into when the butler asked if they were available to receive Viscount Bellamy, and made the short walk to the parlor. It served Julia right if she ended up trapped with the tablecloths for the duration of Jasper’s visit.
Lord Bellamy’s smile lit up the room when she entered. “Amelia, it is lovely to see you again.”
“I’m so glad you accepted my invitation. I wasn’t certain you would.” She left the parlor door open for propriety’s sake. Lord and Lady Bishop were out for the afternoon.
“Nicholas is being ridiculous. Don’t worry. He’ll come around.”
That wasn’t why she’d asked to see Jasper. “I need to ask a rather alarming favor of you.”
Jasper let the subject of Nick drop with a smirk, taking his ease in the wing-backed chair, looking as if he’d always belonged there. “Yes, your letter was intriguing, if a bit mysterious, but I like a good mystery.”
Amelia sighed in relief. “Well, in that case, I need your help creating my next scandal.”
Jasper’s smile was a slow spread across his face. “Finally off the reserve list, am I? Nicholas should abandon his senses more often.”
“I must up my game to be rid of Embry, and I think you are uniquely suited to what I have in mind.”
Jasper’s face lost its mirth. “So Montrose’s visit to your father didn’t cancel the engagement?”
Amelia scowled. “No. He is proving to be quite resilient. First, he claimed I was being hysterical. Then, that I was acting out from neglect. And now I’m to be married next month to save me from the altering strain of wedding jitters.”
Jasper frowned with her. “How many others can he blame before he must admit he’s engaged to a dragoness? So, what did you have in mind?”
Amelia couldn’t stop the blush that spread across her cheeks. “I wondered if you might take me to a gaming hell tonight.”
Lord Bellamy whistled. “Up your game indeed. Any one in particular?”
She straightened her shoulders. “I thought perhaps Crockford’s. Do you know it?”
Jasper laughed. “I do, though how you should, I’d like to know. Yes, my dear. I will take you to Crockford’s.”
They made plans to visit the hell the following evening when it was certain to be packed, and then it was time for Jasper to rush off to some other appointment.
“Thank you, Jasper.”
“On the contrary,” he responded. “I rarely have such a willing participant to my distractions.”
Amelia laughed as she walked him out.
“You didn’t tell me he was so handsome,” Julia accused as soon as the front door closed behind Jasper.
“You didn’t ask. Besides, what does it matter?” Amelia relished the opportunity to taunt her sister a little.
“It matters because what if I had agreed to meet him? Good God.”
“He would love you.” No one with any sense could meet Julia and fail to absolutely adore her. Someday she would see that. She just needed to meet more people who didn’t treat her like a pariah.
“You don’t know that. Anyhow, will he help?”
“He will.” Amelia burst into a huge grin.
Julia squealed with delight. “I can’t believe it. You’re going to a real live gaming hell! There will be rowdy men and loose women and foul language!”
Amelia’s stomach immediately dropped into her knees. “Oh God. I’m going to a real live gaming hell.”
“Don’t. Amelia Marie Bishop, do not do this to me.”
“I can’t do it. What was I thinking? The kinds of people that will be there—”
“Will still be well-bred, just badly behaved. Like us.”
Amelia rolled her eyes. “Like you, maybe. All I ever wanted was to be left alone in the country.”
“Well, that ship has sailed. We’re on a new ship bound for debauchery.” Julia flung herself against the wainscoting in a pose of extreme drama. “You must remember absolutely everything so you can tell me about it.”
“Why don’t you come?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“What’s ridiculous? I’m sure Jasper won’t mind, and it’s not like you’re worried about your reputation.”
Julia’s joviality disappeared. “No.”
“Julia.” Amelia wondered if her fearless older sister might not be quite so fearless after all.
“It’s all right. You’ll just have to tell me about it, that’s all.” Julia’s smile reappeared. “Goodness. We have to find you something suitably unsuitable to wear.”
“Why can’t I wear my normal clothes?”
Julia scoffed. “If you show up looking like yourself, they’ll never let you in.”
She had a point. This plan was getting worse by the second.
“You’re late,” Nicholas told Jasper when the carriage door opened. “You said we were going at four and it’s half past.”
“Heart-broken Nicholas is a bit of a killjoy.” Jasper moved over to make room. “She’s my sister. It doesn’t really matter when I show up.”
“It matters to me.”
“I had pressing business come up.”
“What sort?”
“The Amelia sort.”
Pain spiked through his chest. He stayed silent. Jasper was baiting him.
“She’s asked me to help her with the scandals,” Jasper offered, watching him closely.
It didn’t matter. It wasn’t his business anymore. Nick focused his attention on the passing buildings as the carriage turned off the mall, heading north toward Mayfair.
“I’m taking her to a gaming hell tonight.”
Nick spun around to face him. “Are you out of your bloody mind?” It was too much. It was beyond irresponsible. It was fine for Jasper, but to drag Amelia into a place like that was completely unthinkable. His objection wasn’t due to his feelings, it was common sense.
Jasper shrugged. “It wasn’t my idea. I merely agreed to accompany her.”
Affairs? Gaming hells? It was too far. She had lost her damned mind. “You can’t take her. Tell her you won’t go.”
Jasper raised his eyebrow. “No.”
“Yes!”
“She wants to go and I am inclined to be her escort.” Jasper studied Nick. “Of course, you are welcome to apologize to her and offer calm reasoning on why she should reconsider.”
Absolutely not. Not after she’d relegated him to the position of concubine. She’d even replaced him with Jasper as her ally in getting out of her engagement. No. She clearly didn’t value his opinion or listen to it.
“You could come with us. Make sure nothing untoward occurs.”
“No.”
“Suit yourself.”
The rest of the ride passed in silence as Nicholas made a list of all the reasons he should cease being friends with Jasper De Vere. He was only halfway finished when they pulled up in front of the early Georgian palace Jasper’s grandparents called home when they stayed in London.
His mouth dropped open. “You didn’t tell me we were going to the ducal residence.”
“My sister is unwed and my parents are dead. Where else would she live?”
Nicholas tried his best, but he couldn’t find a way to attribute the misunderstanding to Jasper. He must have been too distracted to have thought it out clearly. “Did you tell them you were bringing me?”
“Why would I? It’s my home, too.”
Nicholas should not have come. Imposing on a duke. His parents would have simultaneous heart attacks.
They ascended the wide front steps and entered a foyer done entirely in marble. Jasper didn’t wait to be announced. “Ruby, where are you?”
His voice echoed down the halls.
“Good God,” Nicholas muttered.
“Lady Ruby is in the flower garden,” the butler offered, unfazed. “Would you like me to tell her you are here?”
“That’s all right. We’ll surprise her.”
Tandem apoplexies due to shame—both his parents gone in one fell swoop. Could he be sent to the tower for a social affront?
In the garden, a woman who was Jasper-but-not sat painting in the dying light of the early winter evening. She shared Jasper’s dark hair and sharply aristocratic features, but her elegance was purely feminine. Seeing his friend in female form was an odd sensation that left Nicholas quite disconcerted.
“You’re lucky they’re at a musicale. Grandmother promised to skin you the next time you went bellowing down her hallway.”
“Our hallway.”
“Really? Is your name on the deed?”
“Lord Nicholas Wakefield, may I introduce you to the most irritating woman alive—my twin sister, Lady Ruby De Vere.”
She finished the flower she was painting and set down her brushes to stand and present Nicholas with her hand. “A pleasure.”
Nicholas bowed over it. “I’m delighted to make your acquaintance, Lady Ruby.”
“Manners, how novel. What foul elements conspired to see you mixed up with my brother?”
Nick almost smiled. “I ask myself that every day.”
“Enough of that,” Jasper said, sprawling in his sister’s chair. “Nicholas has a problem to which you are uniquely suited to give advice.”
“Not a social call then.” Lady Ruby shoved his boots off the opposite chair and reseated herself. “Well, I don’t have any plans this evening, so I suppose I’m game.”
Jasper raised his eyebrow. “Fresh out of admiring suitors?”
“I’m spending the week at home. Giving Duke Atherton time to cool off before we see each other again.”
“Atherton proposed?”
“Unfortunately. But you’re not here to talk about my romantic troubles.” She turned to Nicholas. “What can I help you with?”
Jasper gestured vaguely. “The woman Nicholas loves has refused his offer of marriage and made a counter-offer of an affair.”
Lady Ruby sighed. “Is the turning down of proposals all anyone imagines I’m an expert at? I’m quite accomplished, you know. Well-read, well-traveled, generally considered to excel in many areas that have nothing to do with failed attempts at matrimony.”
“We’re all famous for something, dear sister.”
She ignored him, turning back to Nicholas. “Did she say why she doesn’t want to marry you?”
“Does it matter?” Nicholas immediately regretted saying that. Lady Ruby was every inch the granddaughter of a duchess and knew exactly how to make a man feel utterly inconsequential with a look.
“It matters a great deal.”
Under the force of that unmanning stare, Nicholas had no choice but to tell her everything—twice. Once in his own way, and once again when she demanded to hear his and Amelia’s story from the beginning.
When he’d finished, Lady Ruby was nodding slowly. “So to make sure I have it right, this woman has been abruptly ripped from a lifetime of isolation, nearly lost her sister, and her sole experience with being betrothed thus far has been blackmail. Do I have all that correct?”
Nicholas didn’t trust himself not to say the wrong thing, so he nodded.
“And you think her objection is because she has been playing you false for over a decade, secretly despising your social status while pretending to be your closest friend and confidant?”
When it was put like that, he could see more than a gap in the logic. Oh God. He was an idiot. The things he’d said to Amelia—how could he have botched it so completely? She was terrified of everyone around her turning into strangers with secret motivations, and he’d shocked her with a sudden declaration of feelings and then had gone completely mad.
“How do I fix it?” Nick begged Ruby. “What can we do?”
“Well, for starters, Jasper can ring for tea.”