Chapter 3
“You foolish child! What have you done? What have you done?”
Aunt Lilly stepped forward and slapped at her.
When Veronica wasn’t quick enough to dodge, one of the blows struck her on the cheek.
She pulled back, both of them momentarily horrified.
As angry as Aunt Lilly had been with her in the past, she’d never before struck her.
Especially in public. Outside. In front of an audience.
Aunt Lilly shook her head, as if to negate both the action and the rage that fueled it. “See what you’ve made me do, child? I’ve never been so humiliated in my entire life.”
She glanced behind her, the look one of summons. None of her cousins mistook it and trailed behind their mother like ducklings heading for a pond.
At the top of the steps, Aunt Lilly turned and looked down at her, decorum evidently pushed aside for her anger.
“I took you in because you were family,” she said.
“And because your uncle is a kind and generous man. You are his only sister’s only child.
But if I had known, on that day, that you would shame us to such a degree, I would have let you starve in Scotland. ”
“Lilly,” Uncle Bertrand said, silencing her with one word.
It was evident, from the look on her aunt’s face, that she waged an internal war between anger and obedience. In this rare instance, however, Uncle Bertrand did not win.
“I refuse to have that harlot in my home,” Aunt Lilly said, extending one imperious finger toward her.
Aunt Lilly leveled a look of such fulminating hatred on her that Veronica took a step back.
She’d always known that family was intensely important to her aunt.
She’d forgive her children anything, any slight, any imperfection, any failing.
Evidently, her attitude of tolerance did not extend to a niece by marriage.
“You have offended us in the most grievous way possible,” she said, her voice lowering in pitch as if conscious that the neighbors might be listening.
“Not only have you sneaked out of our house in the middle of the night, but you return naked. Naked!” Evidently, decorum was being mightily trounced by anger.
“You have jeopardized the futures of your cousins. If you cannot think of your own lamentable life, have you no Christian charity to spare for those who’ve done you no wrong?
Indeed, everyone in this house has done nothing but welcome you to their bosoms from the moment you became an orphan.
You were never alone. Never left to grieve or mourn.
You were surrounded by love from the moment you came to this house, Veronica MacLeod.
And what do you do to return that great love? ”
Aunt Lilly stood upright, her chest heaving, her florid face trembling with emotion. “You have brought shame to us.”
They disappeared into the house, leaving the three of them standing outside in the fog-laden air.
“You’re not a servant,” the stranger at her side said.
“I never said I was. That was your assumption.”
“Of course,” he said dryly. “One can naturally assume a lady to be at a Society of the Mercaii meeting.”
“What sort of meeting?” Uncle Bertrand asked.
The man at her side furnished the details. “They’re given to studying oddities of nature, the supernatural. No doubt ghosts and goblins and the like.”
Her uncle turned and looked at her in contempt.
“Your Gift again, Veronica?”
She clasped her hands together, feeling the cold seep from her bare feet all the way up through her body. Or maybe her soul had simply turned to ice.
“I merely wanted an answer, Uncle.”
“And did giving you an answer require that you remove your clothing?”
She’d never heard her uncle’s voice quite that loud. The neighbors were probably enjoying the spectacle.
She’d never thought to be reprimanded on the front steps of her uncle’s townhouse. For that matter, she hadn’t thought to return home naked, or nearly so.
Dear God, what had she done? Any criticism leveled at her was rightfully earned. She’d been worse than an idiot—she’d been a gullible, na?ve idiot.
Her uncle mounted the steps in front of her; but when she would have followed him, he held up his hand.
“Do you think to enter this house with no further ramifications for your actions, Veronica? You are not welcome here.”
“While I agree that your niece’s actions were reprehensible,” the stranger said, “surely banishment is a bit much?”
Uncle Bertrand ignored him, addressing his comment to her.
“You have set upon your own course, Veronica. Continue on with it.” He glanced at the man at her side. “At least you found yourself a titled protector.”
“You know who I am?”
“Montgomery Fairfax,” Uncle Bertrand said. “An American, recently come to England to prove your right to the title of 11th Lord Fairfax of Doncaster. I’m the Earl of Conley, a member of the Committee for Privileges of the House of Lords, sir. I oversaw your application.”
“Should I thank you for your decision, sir?”
“It was a fair one. It’s an old title and the line of succession was proven successfully, for all that you’re an American.”
Uncle Bertrand’s glance swept up and down Montgomery in a gesture no doubt meant to be insulting.
The man at her side stiffened.
“A fact that might adequately explain your part in tonight’s disaster. However, my niece is not exempted by ignorance. She knows what constitutes proper behavior.”
She took a step forward, wondering what she could say to soften her uncle’s anger.
She hadn’t undressed herself. The fact that she couldn’t remember exactly what had happened was a worry, but was gullibility punishable to such a degree?
Surely, he couldn’t mean what he said? Did he intend to cast her out, naked, onto the street?
“Please, Uncle. I never intended to harm you or Aunt Lilly, or any of my cousins. I only wanted to know what they thought.”
He disregarded her words, turned, and pulled the door open.
She began to shake. She clasped her arms in front of her chest and willed herself not to fall. She would not faint or beg.
But what was left her?
She mounted two steps. “I wanted to know if my Gift was real,” she said. “My parents always said it was, but ever since coming to England, I’ve wondered.”
Her uncle halted in the doorway.
“You’ve always said I was foolish to believe them, to believe in it. I just wanted to know the truth.”
“That explanation is supposed to excuse your behavior? I’m supposed to be reassured that society will call you daft as well as wanton?”
She wasn’t going to tell him the other reason she’d attended the meeting. Doing so would probably garner her even more punishment. But what could be worse than being sent to live on the streets?
Her uncle gave her a look no doubt meant to chastise her—and succeeded admirably—before closing the door in her face.
Montgomery had seen men paralyzed by fear on the battlefield. They couldn’t seem to grasp the fact that war was real, that death was truly imminent. So they stood there and waited to be shot or blown to bits by cannon.
Right at that moment, he knew exactly how they felt.
This couldn’t be happening.
“Damn it,” he said, striding toward the door.
He glanced at the woman on the steps. “Don’t make this situation worse by crying,” he said. “I’ll not tolerate it.” A moment later, he looked back over at her. “I mean it,” he added, before turning and pounding on the door.
When no one answered the knock, he turned, frowning down at her.
Now what did he do?
“Will you take me in?” she asked.
When he didn’t—couldn’t—respond, she smiled tremulously. “My reputation is evidently destroyed. Does it matter if I stay with you?”
“It matters to me. I’ve no intention of caring for a woman. A silly woman. A woman without an ounce of sense.”
“Why are you so angry? I’m the one who’s just been tossed out of her home. Not you.”
He glanced down at her.
“I felt, for some reason, compelled to rescue you from the events of tonight. I didn’t realize that would require finding you a place to live, too.”
At that, her spirit seemed to rise in some contradictory fashion. She tilted her chin up and glared at him.
“I did not ask you to rescue me.”
“No,” he said, biting off the words. “You’d have preferred being raped in full view of dozens of men.”
That shut her up.
What the hell did he do with her?
He didn’t underestimate the Earl of Conley’s stubbornness, especially since the man had admitted to being part of that insufferable body of aristocrats before whom he’d had to appear last week. They’d been supremely aware of their position in life as well as their exceptionality.
The Earl of Conley might well leave his niece to starve.
Nor would remaining huddled on the front door of her uncle’s home do anything to repair Veronica’s reputation.
“You needn’t frown at me,” she said, her voice sounding as if she were trying not to cry.
“I can’t say that I’d do any different if you were my niece,” he said, barely restraining his anger. “You’ve been an absolute idiot.”
She turned and, without another word, marched down the stairs, down the path, and to the street. He thought she was going to the carriage, but she disregarded it and kept walking.
She was an idiot.
He caught up with her finally, grabbed her arm, and twirled her around to face him. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Leaving.”
“Do you have a friend to stay with? Or another relative?”
“I don’t know anyone else in London,” she said, her curious accent making the words sound almost lyrical.
“Then where did you think you were going?”
“Away,” she said, looking up at him. “Anywhere. It’s quite evident that neither you nor my uncle wants me around.”
The fog was lifting, the lamplight glowing like a yellow moon.
He speared his hand through his hair, offered her the unadorned truth. “I haven’t the slightest idea what I’m going to do.”
“Neither do I,” she said primly.
“Get in the carriage,” he said.
She shook her head.
“Why not?”
“Because it wouldn’t be proper.”