Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Benedict breathed as steadily as he could, counting the beats of his own thumping heart as he tried to think straight.
“You wish me to marry your niece, Lady Esher,” he stated slowly, conscious of the sob Lady Louisa had emitted in response to her aunt’s previous statement. “But does Lady Louisa wish to marry me?”
The scene felt almost unreal. Benedict had been caught in supposed scandals before, but they had all been storms in a teacup and easily weathered.
His past partners in passion had generally been widows rich and clever enough to shield their reputations with their money, or devious and dissatisfied wives able to connive their way out of their husband and society’s disapproval.
No real harm had been done to anyone or anything beyond society’s hypocritical expectations, and Benedict had always been ready to defy all challengers, ignore all gossip and then carry on with his life as before.
Lady Louisa Ascot, however, was neither rich, nor experienced nor conniving.
She was certainly clever, but not in a way that could help her now.
It was only Benedict’s selfish succumbing to his own desire that had put her in this intolerable situation tonight.
Why could he not have simply admired her beauty and sweetness from afar, as he had previously determined to do?
Right now, Lady Louisa was terrified and trembling, only making Benedict wish he could take her into his arms all over again, this time to comfort and defend her rather than purely from physical desire.
He could not remember ever feeling such a strong urge to protect a woman – not since his mother, and he had failed there in the end…
“Aunt Beatrice, please,” put in Lady Louisa, her voice breaking with tears. “I cannot…”
“Louisa has no choice,” the dowager replied, sad but firm. “One kiss, or a hundred, by impulse or by design – you were seen together by our servants and this matter cannot be hidden. Louisa must marry or be ruined.”
The sound of the young woman weeping beside him was heartbreaking to Benedict.
Lady Esher was entirely correct in her diagnosis of this crisis.
Benedict had brought it about, and now he could only remedy it by doing Lady Louisa another injury.
She had wanted to someday marry a virtuous knight errant for love, and now she would be forced to marry him instead, only to save her reputation.
How ironic that Benedict’s ire had once been roused by the very thought of a man breaking her heart, and now that man was him.
“Lady Esher, it is almost the middle of the night and Lady Louisa needs time to think,” he said, again resisting the urge to reach out and put an arm around his companion’s shoulders. “We cannot make this decision now.”
“Very well,” she agreed reluctantly, perceiving her niece’s distress. “Still, it must be made by breakfast. We will speak again on this in the morning.”
The formidable dowager fixed him with steely blue-grey eyes as she spoke, as if to somehow force him to her will. It irked Benedict, even though he was disputing nothing that his hostess had said.
“I am not some callow youth to run from my responsibilities, Lady Esher,” Benedict told her. “You need not worry on that score.”
“I know what you are, Benedict Hale,” she countered crisply, “or at least, I thought I did. After tonight, I believe I must have overestimated either your integrity or your self-control. Come, Louisa.”
There was no answer to be made to the very same recriminations Benedict was laying against himself. Silently, he watched as Lady Esher put an arm around her weeping niece and guided her out of the drawing room.
Louisa felt she must have lain awake for the rest of the night.
There could be no easy escape into sleep from what had happened with the Duke of Northwick that evening.
If she had slept at all she did not remember it, only the hours of tossing and turning on her pillow, her heart aching and body restless.
All her life she had dreamed that she would one day meet the man of her dreams, fall in love and marry.
They would live happily in a house just like Rosemere, and not too far away from Aunt Beatrice.
Louisa and her dream-husband would would have a family of happy children, not too few, and not too many – perhaps three, or five.
This fantasy man would ride a white horse, like Sir Benedict in the favorite book of her youth, and he would fence and shoot as well as any soldier.
In some of her dreams, he also wrote poetry, composed music or painted beautiful works of art to delight his wife.
Now, Louisa would never meet him, never fall in love and her dreams were shattered.
Her life was to be permanently blighted by those few brief and illicit kisses.
Louisa ought to have broken away from the Duke of Northwick and run back upstairs at the first opportunity, instead of returning his embraces.
She had known something of his character and her aunt had tried to warn her away from him several times.
What have I done?!
Burying her sobs in her pillow to avoid waking the children in the next room, Louisa turned over again and curled into a ball. Whichever way she turned, misery faced her.
Aunt Beatrice had been kind last night when they were alone upstairs in her aunt’s bedroom, but still she had offered Louisa no hope of escaping her unwanted fate. Louisa had tried to explain what had happened as best she could but found everything swept aside as irrelevant.
“The duke ought not to have been alone with you, Louisa, never mind at such a late hour. This could never have happened if he had observed the most basic rules of propriety. What possessed him to do such a thing?”
“I must confess that I kissed Benedict too, Aunt Beatrice,” Louisa had admitted, her innate fairness not allowing the blame to be laid solely at his door. “I do not know why, but I did. I never had any intention to do such a thing, but then it…just happened.”
Lady Esher’s face grew sorrowful but no more yielding on hearing this. She did not miss Louisa’s use of the duke’s christian name.
“Benedict indeed!? It seems some of the fault is mine, Louisa. Your person and your nature are both attractive, and it was obvious to me that the duke noticed you. I tried to warn you both away from any intimacy but perhaps I did not try hard enough. You are not…his type. I believed he would keep any interest in check.”
“But why did I kiss him?” wondered Louisa aloud, as distressed by this fact as by any other. “Why did I not run away when he first kissed me? I know I should have done.”
The memory of the duke’s arm around her waist and his lips upon hers thrilled Louisa still, in spite of everything. The sensations he provoked in her body simply through his proximity were powerful enough to sweep all good sense and normal behavior aside. It was alarming to be rendered so helpless.
On this one score, Lady Esher tried to offer some solace, although her attempt only created fresh anxieties for her niece.
“The Duke of Northwick is a handsome man, is he not? He has many virtues too, regardless of his…flaws. I doubt there are many women who would not return his kisses, Louisa. In fact, I know it.”
“What do you know, Aunt Beatrice? Are you telling me that Bene..the duke, I mean, has compromised other young ladies?”
Lady Esher’s expression grew conflicted as she considered this question, Louisa’s mind filling with images of the duke embracing a succession of other women, and her eyes filling with tears in tandem.
“Yes…no…It is complicated, Louisa. As I said, you are not his usual type and I thought you safe. I cannot believe him so ill-intended as to have planned this, but some temptations are too great for any man. Oh, I should have seen the danger more clearly and kept you by me, but it is all too late now!”
All too late… These words echoed in Louisa’s head through the long hours of darkness. Too late to return to her old life, too late for all her dreams, and too late for love itself…