Chapter Thirteen
The carriage Jonathan had ordered pulled away from the front of the house in Cavendish Square and rumbled across the paved roadway.
From his position at the window of his study, on the first floor, he watched it until it turned out of the square, heading westwards, before turning back into the room with a grimace of disgust.
Good bloody riddance.
It was the day after the wedding, and his mood could not have been worse.
Why on earth he’d allowed himself to be coerced into a marriage he didn’t want, he had no idea.
He could only put it down to having been much in excess of three sheets to the wind almost continuously for the last week and taken in by the astonishing good looks of his bride.
He’d been more than looking forward to consummating that marriage, and not just because she was so pretty.
No. Also due to her feistiness. The pleasure of the chase and the winning over of a reluctant bride with his charms had enticed him, as it always did. And he’d thought they’d worked.
Until bedtime last night.
His ruminating was interrupted by the study door bursting open and Walter precipitating himself into the room, cheeks flushed and hair awry.
Not quite the immaculate Walter he was more used to seeing.
In fact, since his friend had virtually forced him into marriage, Walter had been looking decidedly flustered.
Obviously organizing a wedding, even with the assistance of one’s mother, was a flustering experience.
“Did I just see your carriage heading off piled with luggage and with Cousin Verity aboard?” he spluttered. “Stap me, Jonnie, but where’s she off to? You can’t be fed up with her already, can you? Not even you could have such a short attention span.”
Jonathan glowered at his friend, thoughts of how much easier it would have been to have refused to marry Verity and to have bloody well killed Walter in the ensuing duel tumbling through his head.
Easier than this, for certain. “On the contrary,” he said, keeping his voice as measured and calm as possible. “It is she who is fed up with me.”
Walter froze. “Fed up with you?” At least he sounded amazed, as though wondering how any woman could be fed up with his friend. A sop to Jonathan’s dented pride.
Jonathan nodded. “Yes. Fed up with me. Need I speak more clearly?”
Walter’s brows shot up. “What on earth did you do to her last night?” A glint of salacious curiosity shone in his eyes. He was clearly flipping through his list of heinous crimes that could be undertaken on a wedding night with a blushing bride.
“Nothing,” Jonathan said. “Nothing at all.”
Walter, after a moment’s pause while he no doubt digested this, gave him a sly grin. “Come now. It can’t be true that she don’t like you. All women like you. Did you shock her with the size of your splendid manhood? Frighten the girl? You must have done something.” He was almost wheedling.
Jonathan ignored the flattering reference to his manhood and shook his head again.
“I mean nothing when I say nothing. My bride took herself off to her bedroom shortly after we dined together and refused to come out. She barred the door against me, if you must know.” He paused, hesitating to reveal the extent to which he’d been shown up.
“There has been no…consummation. I can assure you she departs virgo intacta, or so she would like me to believe.” He gave an angry shake of his head.
“I’ve decided to apply for an annulment. Immediately.”
“I say,” Walter said, taken aback. “That’s a bit stiff.
You have to give the girl a chance. She’s my cousin, don’t forget, and she’s not like one of your light o’ loves, you know.
And not like the girls we meet at balls and such like.
Been brought up different. And besides which, annulments aren’t exactly ten a penny.
Damned hard to get one. Look at old Carstairs.
Stuck forever with that horse-faced wife his parents promised him to as a child and he don’t like. ”
Jonathan sighed, mainly because he knew Walter to be correct. An annulment between two healthy people would not be an easy thing to arrange. And if she wasn’t virgo intacta and was examined by a doctor, it would look as though he was responsible for her state. Nonconsummation could be a nonstarter.
He shook his head in frustration. “She might be your cousin, Walter, but she’s proved herself a vile temptress.
A hussy. Please don’t be offended, but I fear she and her pestilential papa dishonor your family name.
I’m sorry to have to say so.” He refrained from stamping his foot, as he had been wont to do as a child and which had mostly worked as everyone had been obliged to pander to his temper tantrums. “The blame must lie with her renegade father. He’s caused her to lead some kind of itinerant lifestyle and now she does not possess the same morals as we do. ”
Walter bristled at this mention of morals.
“I say, Jonnie, no need to insult my family. She is my family, you know, even though no one’s laid eyes on her for years.
So I can’t have you saying things like that about her.
” But he didn’t sound as though this was anything more than a lip service objection.
He shook his head as though to clear it.
“So where has she gone off to in your carriage?”
“Luxborough.”
“Whatever for?”
Jonathan shrugged. “Because I decided she shouldn’t remain under the same roof as me…
” His voice trailed off. Had he sent her away because he was just angry with her?
Or had it been to get her out of his sight, and therefore rid himself of the temptation of her presence, which had grown ten-fold since her rebuttal of him.
He had no desire to repeat what they’d said to one another.
Mainly because if he did repeat it to Walter, he might get that duel after all.
Walter had no need to know he’d actually implied to Verity that she wasn’t the virgin she claimed to be.
Although, from her reaction, he might have been wrong in his initial assumption.
A little voice at the back of his mind kept saying that she’d deny his accusation even if he’d been right, though.
Why was life so damned hard where women were concerned?
Far better to have a mistress than a wife.
One could just cast a difficult mistress adrift on a whim, but not a wife.
He was stuck with her now for the rest of his life.
Or hers. Although, as he almost never went to Luxborough, he’d as good as cast Verity adrift this morning.
“And?” Walter’s tone was insistent.
“And?”
“You still haven’t given me a good reason for sending her off on her own.
Why didn’t you go with her and…do a bit of that wooing everyone says you’re so good at.
Live up to your reputation. Surely you can get her to like you?
Every other woman you smile at does. Can’t understand it myself.
A smile from you and their tongues are hanging out and they’re ready to jump into bed with you.
” He paused. “Did you try smiling at her?”
Jonathan grit his teeth for a moment, then gave a dismissive shrug.
“Of course I did. Do you think me an idiot?” He gave an angry shake of his head.
“No wife of mine is going to show me up. She can kick her heels at Luxborough for a while until she gets lonely and bored and comes to realize being married to me isn’t such a bad thing.
And I’m going to continue with my life here in London without a thought for her.
Mark my words. Being married is not going to be a barrier to resuming my old ways. ”
But did he really want to do all of that? Frustration rising to the fore, he kicked one of the legs of his desk and then regretted it.
Walter frowned. “Not sure you’d ever given them up.
I don’t think I ought to be condoning all this, you know.
She is my cousin, after all. Not some gal I don’t even know.
What would the mater say if she found out?
You don’t want to go putting her back up, Jonnie.
She’s taken young Verity under her wing and loves her like a second daughter, even though she’s only known her a little over a week. ”
Jonathan shrugged. “Quite frankly, I don’t care. She’s made a fool out of me and as far as I’m concerned, she can rot down there in Oxfordshire. I rarely go there, so I’ll have little need to see her.”
Walter pulled a disbelieving face. “You’re sure that was a wise move?
What with your sainted grandmother being down there, and your sister?
What d’you think they’ll say when she turns up there?
Have you even told them you’re married? I really think you should go down there post haste and attempt to win your wife over. Yes. Much the best idea.”
Jonathan scowled. “I have no intention of crawling to her like a beggar after the crumbs from her table. And as for letting them know, you’ll be happy to hear I sent a note down a few days ago informing them of my decision to marry and telling them they had no need to bestir themselves and attend.
None of them would have, anyway. My grandmother is half the time out of her wits, my mother wouldn’t have cared and is housebound nowadays, as you know, and as for Kitty…
well, I couldn’t have her coming up here, now could I?
Too many questions would have arisen.” He paused.
“And, before you bestow more of your wisdom on me, I have no idea if it’s a wise move and nor do I care.
All that bothers me is getting my wife out of my hair.
So let us repair to White’s, shall we? I have need of an exclusively male retreat.
I’ve had my fill of women for now. Wives especially. Let’s go.”
And with that, he swept past Walter and out into the hallway.