Chapter 27
Howard’s fingers clamped around Gwen’s wrist like an iron shackle. “Get up,” he ground out.
Victor’s hands fell away from her waist as Howard seized her. She stumbled to her feet, half dragged upright. The letter she had written crumpled further in Victor’s fist.
“Howard, please,” she heard her mother beg, but Howard paid her no attention.
Gwen could barely think. Her heart thundered. Her cheeks burned with shame. The room spun around her in a whirl of bookshelves, carpet, and horrified faces.
Howard yanked her toward the door. “You have disgraced us for the last time!” he snarled. “I will not stay another moment in this house!”
“Howard, she tripped!” Cordelia cried from the corridor, her voice quivering. “You cannot be certain of what you saw.”
“I saw enough,” Howard snapped.
He pulled Gwen into the corridor, and her shoulder collided painfully with the doorframe. She bit back a gasp and forced herself to keep her feet beneath her.
“Stop this instant,” Victor ordered behind them, his voice low and dangerous.
Gwen twisted around, catching a glimpse of him striding after them, his jaw set, his eyes blazing. He quickly tucked the letter into his coat as he approached.
The Dowager Duchess stepped into his path. “That is enough, Victor,” she said sharply.
He halted with visible effort. “Mother, move.”
Her eyes flashed. “I will not. You have humiliated this house enough for one evening.”
Howard dragged Gwen down the corridor, his grip bruising. She could still hear the Dowager Duchess and Victor’s voices growing sharper.
“You have behaved most inappropriately,” the Dowager Duchess hissed. “A gentleman does not compromise a lady in his own study, in his own house, in full view of half the ton!”
“I did not invite them to follow us,” Victor retorted. “And I did not compromise her. You saw what happened.”
“I saw you on the floor with that girl in your arms,” the Dowager Duchess snapped. “That is what everyone will remember. That is what they will speak about tomorrow. Not your careful negotiations, not your dutiful management of the estate. They will speak about your scandal.”
“Let them,” Victor said.
Gwen’s breath hitched.
The Dowager Duchess’s voice dropped, cold and cutting. “You are the Duke of Greystone. You have worked for years to keep your name above reproach. Now, you throw it away for a girl who has already ruined herself?”
Gwen flinched as if struck.
Howard did not slow down. “Do you hear that?” he muttered. “Even his mother thinks you are worthless.”
Gwen said nothing.
Victor’s answer came a moment later. “I do not care.”
“You do not care?” The Dowager Duchess’s voice sounded almost strangled.
“No,” Victor replied. “Not about the gossip. Not about their whispers. Not about the ton.”
“You are speaking nonsense,” the Dowager Duchess scoffed. “You cannot mean such a thing.”
“I only care about her,” Victor declared, his voice loud enough that it carried down the corridor.
Gwen’s feet faltered. Howard jerked her forward again with a curse.
Her thoughts spun. Victor had said it plainly. In front of his mother. In front of anyone within earshot.
“I only care about her.”
She did not know whether to feel elation or terror.
They reached the main hall. Conversation faltered as they passed. She felt the weight of a dozen eyes on her, caught movement at the edges of her vision as guests pretended not to stare.
Howard did not stop. He hauled her toward the front door, his grip punishing. A footman scrambled to open it before they collided with polished wood.
The cold night air hit her like a slap.
“My Lord, wait,” she tried, breathless. “Please. Let my mother—”
“Your mother will follow,” Howard said curtly. “After she apologizes to our hostess for raising such a harlot.”
The word sliced deep. She stumbled on the top step and nearly fell. He jerked her upright again without the slightest gentleness.
The carriage waited at the curb. The driver stared straight ahead, studiously pretending that he saw nothing.
Gwen’s heart raced. She could feel the ghost of the blow on her cheek while imagining the fresh one about to fall.
Howard dragged her toward the carriage. Behind them, footsteps pounded.
“Fenwick,” Victor boomed. “Release her at once!”
Howard did not turn around. “This is a family matter, Greystone. Stay out of it.”
The fury in Victor’s silence prickled over her skin even with her back turned.
She did not know what would happen next. She only knew that every step she took toward the carriage felt like a step toward an abyss.
Howard almost flung her at the carriage. “Inside,” he ordered. “At once.”
Gwen braced her hands on the doorframe. He raised his hand.
The simple, familiar motion turned her blood to ice.
He was going to do it again. Here, in the open, in front of the Greystone staff. They would pretend not to see. The night would swallow the sound.
His arm tensed… right as a shadow moved between them.
Victor.
He came from the side, fast like a storm hitting shore. His hand closed around Howard’s wrist before it could descend.
“I told you to release her,” he growled.
Howard wrenched his arm back, furious. “Unhand me. She is my responsibility, not yours.”
Gwen could feel Victor’s proximity like heat at her back. He did not touch her, but he stood close enough that she could sense the space he occupied, solid and unyielding.
“Your responsibility is not a license to strike her in my drive,” he retorted. His voice carried, level and clear, in the cold air.
“And what would you know of responsibility toward a woman?” Howard sneered. “You compromise her in your own study and now pretend outrage when I discipline her?”
A murmur rose from the servants clustered near the entrance. One of the grooms failed to mask his disgust.
Victor’s jaw tightened. “You will not lay a hand on her again tonight.”
“Or what?” Howard challenged.
Victor’s fist connected with Howard’s jaw in a clean, brutal arc. The heavy crack was sickening and deeply satisfying all at once, hanging in the winter air.
Howard staggered backward, his eyes wild, his hand flying to his face as if it were the very first time he had ever been hit, let alone in the face. He nearly slipped on the edge of the cobblestone and righted himself only by clutching the carriage lantern.
Gwen stared, stunned. She had never seen Victor lose control in such a manner. His violence had always been rumor, not reality.
He stood very still now, his breathing even, his eyes narrowed, every muscle and sinew coiled.
“If I see even one hair missing from her head when I call on your house tomorrow,” he warned, his voice low and dangerous, “you will regret it.”
Howard’s face mottled with rage. “You strike me outside my carriage, in front of my servants, and threaten me in my position as her guardian?”
“Yes,” Victor snarled. “And I will do it again if you do not heed me.”
“Do you think I will not answer you?” Howard snarled, clenching his fists. For a moment, Gwen thought he would launch himself at Victor.
Victor did not back away. In fact, he took a menacing step forward.
Their gazes locked. Pride and fury and rank battled silently.
Then Howard exhaled through his teeth, slow and venomous. “Very well, Your Grace. If you wish to involve yourself in my family, you shall have your opportunity. You had better be at Fenwick House tomorrow.”
“I shall,” Victor said.
“That way, when I tell you exactly what I think of you and your treatment of my stepdaughter, it will be within the privacy of my own walls.”
Victor inclined his head a fraction. “I look forward to it.”
The carriage lantern flickered between them.
Howard turned away, seething. “Get inside, Gwendoline,” he snapped. “We have caused quite enough spectacle for one evening.”
Gwen climbed into the carriage on trembling legs. Her heart beat wildly. She pressed her back to the seat as Howard hauled himself up opposite her, his jaw already darkening where Victor’s fist had landed.
The door closed with a heavy thud. Outside, Victor stood in the drive, a lone, rigid figure against the glow of Greystone House.
Then the carriage lurched forward, and he vanished from view.
The road home stretched dark and uneven beneath the wheels. Inside the carriage, the air was thick, full of anger and the faint tang of spirits on Howard’s breath.
Gwen stared out the window, watching the lanterns recede, trying not to tremble.
For several minutes, Howard said nothing. He breathed heavily as his hand pressed against his jaw. The mark would bruise. It pleased her far more than it should have.
At last, he spoke.
“I never imagined you had it in you,” he said, a smirk playing at the corners of his mouth.
His tone had changed. Less raw fury. More something that might have been admiration if it did not sound so venomous.
Gwen did not look at him. “Had what in me?”
“Cunning,” he replied. “Apparently, my little stepdaughter is capable of far more than I gave her credit for.”
Her stomach tightened. “I do not know what you mean.”
He laughed, the sound scraping along her nerves. “Of course you do. Getting a duke to risk his reputation for you. To punch a viscount in the face for you. That is not a small thing.”
She flinched. “I did not ask him to.”
“Perhaps not with words,” Howard relented. “But something about you has him thoroughly entangled. It is the first useful thing you have ever done.”
Her hands curled in her lap. “I am not trying to entangle anyone. I never wanted this.”
“You ruined yourself to avoid marriage,” Howard went on, ignoring her.
“Then you sneaked around town with the Duke of Greystone. Now you were found in his study, sprawled over him in a position no man in his right mind can ignore. You have forced his hand most effectively, whether you meant to or not.”
Gwen’s heart thudded. “I did not do it on purpose.”
He waved a dismissive hand. “Intention is irrelevant. Outcome is what matters. And this has provided us with a far better outcome than I expected.”
Silence stretched. The carriage hit a rut.
“What do you mean?” she asked cautiously.
Howard leaned back, a smug smile curving his lips. “You will marry a duke, Gwendoline. That is what I mean.”
Her breath left her in a rush. “No.”
“Yes,” he barked. “I have been negotiating with a baron. A dull, plodding man, but suitable enough. Now that I see how Greystone looks at you, I would be a fool not to aim higher. A duke brings far more advantageous connections. And money. A lot of money.”
“I will not marry him because you wish to profit,” she said sharply. “Victor is not… He does not…”
“He defended you in front of half the servants,” Howard cut in. “He assaulted me in his own drive for your sake. He has invited you to his house, singled you out by name, and compromised you in his own study. Trust me, child, this is precisely how such things begin.”
“He did not compromise me,” Gwen protested.
Howard snorted. “No one will believe that, least of all Greystone. He knows his duty. He will call tomorrow. When he does, I will make certain he leaves with a clear understanding of what is expected. You will be a duchess before the Season is out.”
Gwen’s head spun. She stared out the window. The night blurred into streaks of black and grey.
This was not how she had wanted the night to unfold. Not like this. Not by being dragged yet again into a bargain between men. Not by being used as a token to be exchanged for prestige and money.
She had dreamed, in foolish moments, of Victor wanting her for who she was. Wanting her because he could not bear not to.
Now, Howard wanted to twist whatever feelings Victor had into something ugly. Something transactional. A victory scored at a table Gwen had never asked to sit at.
“I wish I had never come tonight,” she whispered.
Howard chuckled. “You say that now, but you will change your mind when you see your new house. Rosewood is quite fine, I hear. Far finer than anything a little governess’s wage would have purchased you.”
She closed her eyes.
Governess. Freedom. Her aunt’s house. A modest life of work and peace. It had seemed possible in the darkness of the inn. But now, it seemed very far away.
Regret clawed at her. Regret for the letter in Victor’s pocket. Regret for every kiss, every confession, every soft word that had tied her heart to his.
She had dragged him into this mess. She knew it. If she had left him alone after the first night, if she had never gone to his house, if she had not fallen in love with him, he would not now be staring down the barrel of Howard’s greed.
She would not let him pay for her choices. Not if she could help it.
Howard stared at her with self-satisfied indulgence. “You will be charming tomorrow, do you understand? You will curtsy prettily. You will keep your eyes lowered. You will let me speak for you. You will do precisely as I say.”
Gwen did not answer. Her mind had already drifted ahead, past the shouting, past the threats, past the sickening notion of being sold.
Victor would come tomorrow. She would find a way to free him from this snare. Even if it meant binding herself more tightly in his place.
She pressed her fingers to the cold glass and watched her reflection blur.
I am sorry, Victor, she thought fiercely, as if he might somehow hear her. I will make this right.