Chapter Thirty-Three #2
“Good God, Katie! You behave as if you did not know that I was as poor as a church mouse,” he snapped, finally showing his ire.
“How the devil did you think we could marry? I had nothing but my meager allowance and you had nothing at all—or so I believed at the time. Surely you must have known that I was just voicing my dreams rather than promising you anything.”
“I was six-and-ten—a child—how was I to know that when a gentleman tumbled a woman and then gave his word of honor, it meant nothing? Less than nothing as you could not even tell me face-to-face that you had married. Do you know how I felt at that ball your father gave to celebrate your wedding to another woman? Can you imagine how devastating it was to see you—a man who’d pledged himself to me—dancing and laughing and smiling with your new wife? ”
He flinched at the heat in her words, but his expression was petulant. “I have repeatedly apologized for that. What else do you want?”
“If you think your empty apologies mean anything to me, then you cannot be nearly as smart as you think you are. I have told you repeatedly that I do not want to be seen with you, not to mention indulge in—in, well, whatever you seem to be suggesting. You must have a maggot in your head if you think—”
“Enough.” A dull red flush slashed his cheeks and his stunned expression turned unpleasant.
He leaned forward so suddenly she recoiled, hitting her head against the worn bolster.
“So high and mighty you’ve become.” His handsome face turned even uglier.
“As you’ve been such a little bitch to me, I have changed my mind about offering you a bit of fun. ”
“Let me guess,” she retorted. “We are back to extortion, now. Well, you can go to the devil because I will not give you a penny!”
“That is what you say now. But what will happen when your husband receives a letter that tells him—in graphic detail—about your deflowering.”
“Dulverton already knows I did not come to his bed a virgin, you odious fool.”
“But does he know all the lurid details such as how often, what positions?”
Katie was momentarily rendered speechless. “You really are a disgusting worm, aren’t you?”
“Please, keep talking, darling. Every vicious word out of your shrewish mouth only sends the figure I will demand higher.”
“Why are you so desperate for money? I thought you were headed off to Naples again with your grandmother’s money bulging in your pockets. Lady Grimsby also mentioned—in excruciating detail—how Judith’s grandmother left all her wealth to you.”
“The amount she is giving me is insulting. I’m only taking it to get away from her incessant hectoring.
As for the money Judith’s grandmother—that mad old cunt—left for my poor dead wife?
” He smirked when Katie gasped at his vulgar language.
“The old crone didn’t even leave enough for poor darling Judith’s laudanum overdose.
” His smile turned sour. “So, yes: I need money.”
“Laudanum? Lady Grimsby said your wife died from some fever.”
He laughed bitterly. “Not hardly. I might like a flutter at the gaming tables, but Jude had a taste for laudanum that had been years in the making—so do not think that I drove her to it.”
“I doubt you helped matters.”
His eyes narrowed. “I believe three thousand pounds is what I will require to forget what a bitch you are.”
“I repeat—since you didn’t appear to hear me the last time—you will not get a penny from me.”
“Then I shall commence scribbling my epic.”
“Do your worst.”
He eyed her thoughtfully, and Katie did not like the malicious gleam that entered his gaze.
“I cannot tell whether you are bluffing or not. You are much more interesting now than you were five years ago.” His expression softened so suddenly that the shift left her dizzy.
“Come, Katie, let us not argue and fight. Put aside your hurt feelings. We were so good together. You would love it on the Continent. It is the perfect place for free spirits. Don’t you recall how we used to talk about the journeys we would take together?
You cannot really wish to remain here and scrabble in the dirt with Dulverton.
Run away with me and we can live without any of the tiresome constraints that society imposes. Come with me, my love.”
Katie could only stare in horrified disbelief. “You expect me to believe you care about me after you’ve been threatening me with extortion?”
He gave a dismissive wave of his hand. “You and I are passionate people, darling. We say things in anger without thinking. Come now, you know that I didn’t really mean any of that nastiness.
I am positively wild about you, and it eats me up thinking about you wasted on old Dullness.
You fill my thoughts all day and my dreams at night.
Just think how happy we would be together! ”
Katie could not imagine a worse future. “How happy we would be,” she repeated, dazed.
Hope lit his eyes. “Yes! Now you are—”
“—just you, me, and my money.”
The dreamy, cozening smile on his plush lips fled in an instant. “Now, that wasn’t a very nice thing to say, was it?”
“It doesn’t make it any less true.”
“Fine. Have it your way,” he snarled, his eyes glittering with malice.
“Three thousand pounds by Friday or I will deliver an epic to Dulverton the likes of which has never been seen. And if he is too dull to find it stimulating reading, I’m sure I can find a few newspapermen in London who will.
I’ll wager I could sell our juicy story for a handsome price. ”
Katie felt a stab of real fear. “You would be muddying your own name in the process, Jasper. Lady Grimsby would cut you out of—”
“No. She would not cut me out of her will. Not if she wishes to keep my daughter. As to shaming my name?” He laughed. “Rakes never take any harm from raking, do they? In fact, it would just enhance my reputation.”
The worst part about his words was that there was more than a grain of truth in them. “You are revolting.”
He grinned nastily. “I will send word to you about when to bring the money—but we both know the place, don’t we, darling?”
“Just where do you think I will get so much money?”
“Where there is a will, there is a way. Or so I’ve heard.”
The carriage jolted to a stop and Jasper leaned toward the door. “Ah, here we are. Allow me—”
“Don’t bother,” she snapped, yanking on the door latch, and tumbling out of the carriage without either steps or assistance. She left the door hanging open and strode toward the house without a backward glance.
Cranston opened the door before she even reached it. “Ah, Your Grace—”
“Not now,” she barked, knowing even as she spoke that she would have to apologize to the ancient butler later for her abruptness. But not now. Not when she barely made it up the stairs before the tears began to flow.
Katie prayed her chambers would be empty. Of course, that was too much to ask, and when she flung open the door, she almost ran poor Becky down.
“What is it?” Becky demanded, grabbing Katie’s arms, her small hands surprisingly strong.
“I—I just shut my foot in the door and it hurts.”
Becky scowled. “I saw Lord Jasper in the carriage with you.” She led Katie to the settee in front of the dormant fireplace. “Sit here a moment and I will ring for a tray.”
“If I eat or drink anything I will just cast it all up.”
Becky dropped down beside her. “I was downstairs in the kitchen when your carriage returned without you. John Coachman said Lord Jasper sent it back. What happened?”
“If you can believe it, he once again tried to rekindle what we had.”
“He must be mad.”
“No, just desperate for money.” Katie yanked off one glove and then the other and flung them onto a nearby table where they landed with a very unsatisfying floof. “That isn’t the worst of it. When he realized I was not afraid of him telling Dulverton—”
“What? How can you not be afr—”
“Because I am going to tell him everything, that is how.”
Becky gave Katie an annoyingly self-righteous look. “That is what I have said all along. If that is the case, then you need not fear Lord Jasper at all.”
“Unfortunately, he had another, more awful threat in reserve.”
“What could be more awful than telling tales to His Grace?”
“Telling them to a newspaperman.”
Becky’s jaw dropped. “Oh, Lord. What—what are you going to do?”
“He wants three thousand pounds.”
“Are you—do you have such a sum?” Becky sputtered, her eyes round.
“Of course I don’t.” She did not tell her friend that she had at least that much in jewels.
Nor did she admit she was considering giving some of them to Jasper in lieu of money.
The pearls from Selina and Gaius were worth a fortune alone.
It would be agonizing to use her sister and brother-in-law’s generous gift to bribe a man, but getting Jasper away from Gerrit, and out of her life, was worth even more.
“Perhaps His Grace can talk sense to—”
“Do you honestly believe Dulverton would talk to a man trying to blackmail me?” Katie snapped. “This is my problem; I will deal with it.”
“But I thought you said you would tell His Grace everything?”
“After that cad is gone.”
Becky covered her face with her hands. “Why must you be so willful?” Her words were muffled, but Katie still heard the frustration and fear in them.
She patted her friend’s back. “I do not know why,” she answered honestly. “But it is too late for me to change now, even if I could. I made this mess, and I will clean it up.”
“How?” Becky wailed.
“I don’t know,” Katie admitted, rubbing soothing circles on her agitated friend’s back as she thought about giving Jasper what he wanted. “But I will think of something.”
And she would have to think of it in a hurry because he was leaving in a mere five days.