Chapter 3
Vaughn rubbed a towel through his hair and stared at the parlor door, just as he had been every two minutes since he had returned Evelina Comerford to her home.
Well, it was her sister Arabella’s old home, as Evelina kept correcting him, even as she looked through him with that hollow, hurting stare.
The one he had caused because he needed her to know the truth, somehow. Why? Because he wanted a partner in his pain? Because he couldn’t stand to let her be happy with her misaligned memories? What a bastard he was.
The parlor door opened and she entered the room. She had changed from her earlier gown and her hair was down in damp curls around her shoulders. She had a little more color in her cheeks than she’d had on the ride back, and for that he was grateful.
She gave him a grim look and then crossed to the sideboard and poured them each a whisky in glasses far too tall for the drink. She handed one over and motioned to the chairs before the warm fire.
“Tell me everything,” she said after she’d taken a long sip.
He gripped his own glass in his hand without taking a drink. “Miss Comerford—”
“Please!” she interrupted, her voice sharp. “Please tell me.”
He nodded. “Very well. You deserve that after what I’ve just shown you. I suppose I must start with my marriage.”
He blinked after he said that last sentence. Talk about his marriage? He didn’t do that with anyone. And yet here they were.
“It was arranged, of course,” he said, practically forcing the words from his mouth because it was so difficult to make them fall naturally.
“I was twenty-five when I realized my father was dying and twenty-six when he brought me to his side and told me that he would see me married before his death. They had even chosen the lady for me, should I approve.”
“And you did,” Evelina said softly.
“I did. Florence was the eldest daughter of the Marquess of Estridge. It was a good political and social match. She was four years my junior, so not so young that we had nothing in common. And she was…is…lovely to look at.”
Evelina turned her head, but before she took another drink she conceded, “Yes. There is no denying that as much as I might like to do so in this moment. It seems you were drawn to her.”
He hesitated. “Nothing repelled me. And as it was the great wish of my family, I agreed to the match and we were married before that summer was out.”
He stopped talking then, trying not to let his mind spiral to what had come after those first heady months of marriage when he and Florence had tried to forge a bond beyond duty.
He thought they had sometimes when she slept in his arms or laughed at some silly quip, but now nothing in any happier day felt real.
Not when her smiles had so swiftly turned sour and her pleasure had gone in other directions.
“What changed?” Evelina pressed. “Divorce is almost unheard of in any set, but certainly not in the Upper Ten Thousand. How did you move from all the hopes of an arranged union to now?”
“Florence was…restless,” he said. “Even from the beginning. She wanted more, always more. When my father died and I became earl, I thought she would be sated, for we had access to all the funds and she had a great deal more to do as countess than she had as mere viscountess. She embraced it all. She redecorated every home I own, she bought gowns until the wardrobes burst with them, she hosted parties and more parties.”
“Did you like all that?” Evelina asked.
“I didn’t dislike it.” He said the words and felt how false they were even as he forged ahead in the explanation.
“I thought we had a reasonable marriage, truly. It was difficult not to like her, with all her spark and laughter and drive. Sometimes I thought I might even…” He drew off with a shake of his head.
“Well, she never returned any feelings toward me, but she wasn’t unkind.
And she never turned me away when I asked for her company. ”
He hesitated because this raw confession felt so odd.
He’d never said any of these things to any other person in his life, not a friend, not a family member.
And yet now that he’d begun to speak, the intimacies of five years of marriage came spilling out.
He hated himself for not being able to keep them in.
“There were no children,” he continued, now more slowly, for the pain was coming and he wanted to hold it off a little longer. “I wanted children, not just because it was my duty to provide them, but because I thought I might like being a father.”
She tilted her head, as if that sentiment surprised her. “Most men of the ton hardly notice their off spring.”
He shrugged. “And my father hardly noticed me unless it was to his purposes. But I wanted to be different. When it didn’t happen, I tried my best not to pressure her to try more often. After all, my cousins are the best of men. They would carry on the family name admirably.”
She wrinkled her brow. “Was it the children that broke it?”
“No.” He cleared his throat. “The first time I realized she was being unfaithful, I was shocked.”
She caught her breath and he felt her surprise. At least there was that. “When did it begin?”
“Two years into the marriage.” He shook his head.
“The man was her childhood friend. Someone I supposed she always cared for and had been separated from. I did confront her. She cried. Apologized. Told me that she had not intended for things to go so far. I forgave her and asked her to be more prudent. She said she wouldn’t do something like that again.
I believed her. Until I found out about another lover a few months later. And another. And another.”
Her eyes widened. “Gossip about such things usually reaches us first, but I admit the courtesan network never said a thing. Not until the divorce became public did anyone even suspect the marriage was troubled.”
“After she was caught the first time, I suppose she became more careful. But she never stopped. And there was no longer the excuse of an old love who she had been unable to resist. These were men she hadn’t known before, ones she didn’t even care about.”
“What did you do about it?” Evelina asked. “You must have been livid.”
“I was humiliated and yes, occasionally livid.” He clenched his hands against his thighs. “I confronted her, over and over. At first there were more apologies and tears, but as the number of lovers increased, she stopped pretending to be sorry. And what could I do?”
“There are ways some men handle a wife like that,” Evelina said.
“You mean a mad house?” Vaughn shuddered.
“I could never be so cruel. She wasn’t mad, she just wanted, like passion could fill some hole in her.
And she was cruel, because flaunting it to me, if no one else, became part of the game.
I chose to ignore it as much as I could.
Many lords and ladies live separate lives within the confines of their marriages.
Many more ignore the dalliances of their spouses in order to save face.
It was not what I’d hoped for, but I came to accept that it was part of life. ”
“Then what led to the divorce?”
“She did.” He sighed. “She began asking for it, demanding it, nine months ago. She would scream and weep and tell me she couldn’t go on like this. That the scandal couldn’t be more painful than the life she was leading. I didn’t understand why she wanted such a shocking thing, but now I do.”
“Because she was with Harry,” Evelina said softly. “Because he offered her the life of a duchess.”
Vaughn downed what was left of his drink and nodded. “Yes. For a woman who always wanted more, that was the ultimate carrot to dangle above her.”
“They cannot imagine they’ll be accepted by Society after all this is done.”
He snorted out a humorless laugh. “I’ve no idea what they imagine, but when it comes to the scandal you needn’t spell it out to me.
I’ve been colored with the same brush. And yes, I cannot I imagine how they will spin this tale to make it palatable.
Perhaps they’re truly in love. Perhaps none of this matters to them and all they need is each other. ”
Evelina pushed from her chair and crossed the room away from him to stare out onto the street below. When she didn’t move for a while, he cleared his throat. “I’m sorry.”
“No.” She didn’t face him but continued to look outside. “It’s good to know it.”
“What will you do about it?” he asked.
She did turn then and looked at him in confusion. “Do?”
“You’ve been betrayed.”
Her lips thinned. “A courtesan cannot be betrayed.”
He got up and took a few long steps toward her. “Whatever else happened in the end, Southwater and I were once friends. I know what promises he made to you. You were betrayed, Evelina. Don’t diminish it.”
For a long moment their gazes held there, locked together.
The soft brown of her eyes, sparkling lightly with unshed tears gave him a sensation he hadn’t had since the nightmare of this divorce had begun all those months ago.
He felt seen. Heard. Felt. And there was peace to that release of the loneliness of the separation and all the humiliation that had followed.
She broke the stare and the comfort went with it. The raw, dull ache of his anger and embarrassment and hurt returned.
“I will admit that when I looked into my window…my window…and saw them together, there was a moment I wanted to hurt him like he’d hurt me. To confront him and go to battle.” Her cheeks turned pink at the admission and her gaze returned to his. “I can see you understand that.”
He nodded. “When she demanded the divorce from me, when she begged me to set her free, I did everything she asked.”
“Why?”
He tilted his head in confusion over the question. “Why?”
“You could have simply pushed her from your home, made public your displeasure, cut her off even. She could have lived her affairs and you could have washed your hands of it rather than throw yourself into the fire even more.”