Chapter 8 #2
Miss Trent, in short, was not only going to make Lord Dain crawl, but she would have Herriard do the dirty work for her, and have it all done legally, with not a loophole for Dain to wriggle out of.
“There is no animal more invincible than a woman,” Aristophanes had said, “nor fire either, nor any wildcat so ruthless.”
Ruthless. Vicious. Fiendish.
“Oh, no, you don’t,” Dain muttered. “Not via go-betweens, you demon spawn.” He wadded the note into a tight ball and hurled it at the grate. Then he stomped to his writing desk, grabbed a sheet of notepaper, scrawled an answer, and shouted for his valet.
In his note to Mr. Herriard, Dain had declared that he would meet with Miss Trent at seven o’clock that evening at her brother’s house.
He would not, as Herriard had requested, send his solicitor to meet with hers, because the Marquess of Dain had no intention, he wrote, “of being sworn, signed, and bled dry by proxy.” If Miss Trent had terms to dictate, she could bloody well do it in person.
If that didn’t suit, she was welcome to send her brother to Dain, who would be happy to settle the matter at twenty paces—with both combatants armed this time.
Given the last suggestion, Jessica decided it would be best if Bertie spent the evening else-where. He still had no idea what had happened.
She had returned from the police station to find her brother suffering painful consequences of his alcohol consumption during Lady Wallingdon’s ball. His constitution weakened by months of dissipation, he had succumbed to a violent dyspepsia, and had not left his bed until teatime yesterday.
Even in the best of circumstances, his brain functions were unreliable. At present, the effort to comprehend Dain’s anomalous behavior might trigger a relapse, if not apoplexy. Equally important, Jessica dared not risk Bertie’s bumbling after Dain with the misguided idea of avenging her honor.
Genevieve had agreed. She had, accordingly, taken Bertie to dine with her at the Duc d’Abonville’s. The duc could be relied upon to hold his tongue. It was he, after all, who’d advised Jessica to hold hers until she spoke with a lawyer.
It was also the duc who was paying Mr. Herriard’s fee. If Jessica had not agreed to let him do so, Abonville would have called Dain out himself. That offer had told Jessica all she needed to know about the French nobleman’s feelings about Genevieve.
At seven o’clock, therefore, Bertie was safely out of the way. Only Mr. Herriard was with Jessica in the drawing room. They were standing before a table upon which a neat pile of documents lay when Dain stalked in.
He swept Herriard one contemptuous glance, then bent his sardonic obsidian gaze upon Jessica. “Madam,” he said, with a short nod.
“My lord,” she said, with a shorter one.
“That takes care of the social niceties,” he said. “You may proceed to the extortion.”
Mr. Herriard’s lips set in a thin line, but he said nothing.
He took up the papers from the table and gave them to Dain, who moved across the room to a window. He set the papers upon the wide sill, took up the topmost one, and leisurely read it. When he was done, he put it down and took up the next.
Minutes ticked by. Jessica waited, growing edgier with each passing moment.
Finally, nearly a half hour later, Dain looked up from the documents it should have taken him a fraction of that time to comprehend.
“I wondered how you meant to play it,” he told Herriard. “If we spare ourselves the legalisms and Latinisms, what it boils down to is a defamation suit—if I don’t agree to settle the matter privately, according to your exorbitant terms.”
“The words you uttered in the hearing of six other parties could be construed in only one way, my lord,” said Herriard.
“With those words, you destroyed my client’s social and financial credit.
You have made it impossible for her to wed or earn a respectable independent livelihood.
You have made her an outcast from the society to which she was bred and properly belongs.
She will be obliged, therefore, to live in exile from her friends and loved ones. She must build a new life.”
“And I’m to pay for it, I see,” said Dain. “Settle all of her brother’s debts, amounting to six thousand pounds.” He glanced over the pages. “I am to support her to the tune of two thousand per annum and…ah, yes. There was something about securing and maintaining a place of residence.”
He leafed through the pages, dropping several on the floor in the process.
It was then Jessica realized he wasn’t using his left hand at all, and that he held the arm oddly, as though something were wrong with it. There shouldn’t be, except for a minor bullet wound. She’d aimed carefully, and she was an excellent markswoman. Not to mention he was a very large target.
He looked her way then, and caught her staring.
“Admiring your handiwork, are you? I daresay you’d like a better look.
Regrettably, there’s nothing to see. There’s nothing wrong with it, according to the quacks.
Except that it doesn’t work. Still, I count myself fortunate, Miss Trent, that you didn’t aim a ways lower.
I’m merely disarmed, not unmanned. But I have no doubt Herriard here will see to the emasculation. ”
Her conscience pricked. She ignored it. “You got—and will get exactly as you deserve, you deceitful, spiteful brute.”
“Miss Trent,” Herriard said gently.
“No, I will not guard my tongue,” she said. “His Lordship wanted me present because he wanted a row. He knows very well he’s in the wrong, but he’s too curst stubborn to admit it. He wants to make me out to be a scheming, greedy—”
“Vindictive,” said Dain. “Don’t leave out vindictive.”
“I, vindictive?” she exclaimed. “I was not the one who arranged to have the biggest gossips in Paris ‘happen along’ while I was half-undressed and being led—fool that I was—straight to ruination.”
His black brows rose a fraction. “You’re not implying, Miss Trent, that I arranged that farce.”
“I don’t have to imply anything! It was obvious.
Vawtry was there. Your friend. And the others—those snide Parisian sophisticates.
I know who arranged for them to watch me be disgraced.
And I know why. You did it for spite. As though everything that’s happened—all the gossip, every dent in your precious reputation—were my fault! ”
There was a short, taut silence. Then Dain threw the rest of the papers to the carpet, stalked to the decanter tray, and helped himself to a glass of sherry. He needed only one hand to do that, and only one swallow to empty it.
When he turned back to her, the irritating mockery of a smile was in place. “It would appear that we’ve been laboring under the same misapprehension,” he said. “I thought you had arranged for the—er—interruption.”
“I’m not surprised,” she said. “You also seem to labor under the misapprehension that you are a splendid catch—in addition to mistaking me for a lunatic. If I were desperate for a husband—which I have not been and never will be—I should not have to resort to such ancient, pathetic tricks.”
She drew herself up. “I may appear a negligible, dried-up spinster to you, my lord, but yours, I assure you, is the minority view. I am unwed by choice, not for lack of offers.”
“But now you won’t get any,” he said. His sardonic gaze drifted lazily over her, making her skin prickle. “Thanks to me. And that’s what all this is about.”
He set down the empty glass and turned to Herriard. “I’ve damaged the goods, and now I must pay what you deem the value of the merchandise, or else you will heap me with documents, plague me with barristers and clerks, and drag me through endless months of litigation.”
“If the law regarded women in a proper light, the process would not be endless,” said Mr. Herriard, unruffled. “The punishment would be severe and swift.”
“But we live in benighted times,” said Dain. “And I am, as Miss Trent will assure you, the most benighted of men. I have, among other quaint beliefs, the antiquated notion that if I pay for something, it ought to belong to me. Since I seem to have no choice but to pay for Miss Trent—”
“I am not a pocket watch,” she said tightly.
She told herself she ought not feel in the least surprised that the cocksure clodpole proposed to settle matters by making her his mistress.
“I am a human being, and you will never own me, no matter what you pay. You may have destroyed my honor in the eyes of the world, but you will not destroy it in fact.”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Destroy your honor? My dear Miss Trent, I am proposing to redeem it. We shall be wed. Now, why don’t you sit down and be quiet like a good girl and let the men sort out the details.”
Jessica experienced a moment of numb incomprehension before the words struck, sharp and stunning as a blow to the head. The room darkened and everything within it wobbled drunkenly. She had to struggle to focus. “Wed?” Her voice sounded very far away, weak, plaintive.
“Herriard demands that I bail out your brother, and house and support you for the rest of your life,” he said. “Very well. I agree—but on the same terms any other man would insist upon: exclusive ownership and breeding rights.”
His hooded gaze dropped to her bodice, and heat simmered there and spread, just as though it had been his hands, not his eyes, upon her.
She summoned her composure. “I see what you are about,” she said. “It’s not a genuine offer at all, but a strategy to tie our hands. You know we can’t sue you if you offer to do the allegedly honorable thing. You also know I won’t marry you. And so you think you have us at point non plus.”
“I do,” he said, smiling. “If you refuse me and attempt litigation, you’ll only humiliate yourself. Everyone will believe you’re a money-hungry slut.”