Chapter Seven
“I could ask you the same question.”
Georgie silently congratulated herself for keeping most of the wavering out of her voice. Years of keeping her emotions locked away had paid her dividends in an unthinkable moment such as this.
Tom sat opposite her, their knees nearly touching, the heat of his body and the scent of his cologne filling the space between them.
“I asked first,” he said, the subtle flick of his brows suggesting a dare.
He teased her so effortlessly. It had been some kind of easy magic he’d been gifted. When they were younger, he’d used it to coax her to the banks of streams where they’d sit and talk about their youthful hopes and fears when she should have returned to her pianoforte lessons.
But those days, and the power of that magic, were gone. She’d extinguished it, and he’d never forgiven her for it.
“I am waiting to return home,” she said, running her hands over the smooth silk of her skirts, keeping her voice as steady and nonchalant as if he’d asked her the time of day.
He let go a low chuckle laced with a bitterness that only added to the tension. “Don’t play games with me, my lady.”
Georgie almost wanted to laugh at the hypocrisy. “Indeed, I believe that is what we are both here to do.”
She felt him shift in his seat, the subtle motion causing the hem of her skirts to brush his legs. He must have felt it too, because he stopped. Even that touch—the barest graze of silk on his leather boots—had been too much for him.
“I thought you were supposed to be married,” he said after a pause.
“We can both see I am not,” she said, congratulating herself on her efforts to remain calm. “Now go, before Miss Duigood returns.”
“Concerned for your reputation?” he asked. “Or concerned that we may be discovered and forced to wed. I know how laughable an offer that once was. Though given the standards for the high-and-mighty Georgiana Hawthorne, even an heir to a viscountcy may still not be good enough for you.”
The accusation landed, aided by the coolness of his delivery. Georgie was thankful for the shadows to that concealed the sting of his words as heat rushed to her cheeks and pricked at the back of her neck.
I am to marry someone befitting my station, Tom. Surely you know my father intends me only for someone worthy.
How she’d hated those words. Marcus had helped her write them, after he’d somehow discovered one of Tom’s love notes to her.
But she’d delivered them. And she’d broken his heart.
She’d been so young, so desperate not to have her father learn the truth.
It might have cost Tom, and his entire family, their livelihood.
It had cost her everything.
She swallowed that bitter memory and fixed her gaze on him.
“I think we both know that while we are in the shadow of this establishment neither of us are in danger of being forced to marry,” she said. “I will not spoil your suit of Miss Fairfax.”
“It is not Miss Fairfax I am trying to win.”
“You spent half the night listening to her with rapt attention,” she said.
“So you noticed me,” he said.
She sat back and crossed her arms. “Of course I noticed. The whole table noticed you laughing at every joke.”
“Miss Fairfax likes to talk,” he replied. “I was being an engaged listener, like any gentleman would do. Indeed, if anyone was giving her attention, it was Mr. Crowley, not me.”
“Do not try and change the subject,” she said. “If not Miss Fairfax, Miss Morehouse then.”
“Yes,” he said. “Miss Morehouse.”
“She seems like a sensible woman,” Georgie said, considering the two women as objectively as possible under the circumstances. “She has a respectable fortune, but I believe Miss Fairfax would be the greater prize on sheer wealth alone.”
Silence stretched as Tom’s bluster seemed to retreat.
Georgie knew nothing of the Worthington situation, but on the strength of fortune alone—which had clearly attracted Mr. Crowley, the fourth son of a viscount—Miss Fairfax wasn’t the clear preference.
Miss Morehouse, on the other hand, was like Georgie, the daughter of a peer.
Realization dawned.
She cocked her head to one side, unable to keep the smile from her lips.
“But it’s not money you need, is it?” she said. “The lost heir of an old family, but not quite old enough, needs legitimacy.”
The way he stilled told Georgie she was right.
“There is a stipulation in my grandfather’s will that I must marry a lady of appropriate social standing before my twenty-sixth birthday if I am to inherit all the lands and fortune not entailed.
” The words came out rushed, like a confession.
It reminded her of the time he and Gabe had been caught sword fighting with some of the old weapons from the family armory.
Georgie couldn’t help herself. She threw back her head and laughed.
“I’m glad you are finding delight in my misery,” he grimaced.
“Not at all,” she said, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. “But I understand. You need a match, and you need it quickly.” His birthday was only a few weeks away, she remembered.
“So now my little secret is out,” he said. “I am here to make a very deliberate and efficient match. But why are you here, Georgie?”
The question sobered her instantly. Whether it was the earnestness in his question, or the brief but urgent need to tell someone who knew her, who once upon a time seemed to understand her, the words rushed out of her mouth.
“To escape one.”
The directness of her answer, and its implication, landed like a lead ball in Tom’s gut, stunning him into silence.
“Now,” she continued, smoothing her skirts as if she hadn’t just confessed she was breaking every rule she’d spent her youth upholding, “if you don’t mind, my companion will be back any moment and I am quite ready to quit this place for the evening.”
“What do you mean, escape?” Why on earth Georgie’s marital prospects would rouse his curiosity, Tom could not—or perhaps would not—say. “I thought you were to be married years ago, unless that was a lie to escape the horror of being wed to someone so beneath you.”
Even in the dim light, he could see her throat working, as if she were swallowing back tears. Christ, he could be an arse.
“Apparently you’re not the only person I can disappoint,” she snapped, her voice growing thick with emotion.
She sat motionless, her hands clasped in her lap, even as she turned her face toward the window. She seemed so bloody alone, somehow, and he found that he hated it.
A wave of remorse rushed over him, and he fought every instinct he had to reach out and take her hand.
“Georgie—”
Before he could say another word, the carriage door swung open, and another young woman was about to climb in.
“Oh!” she said, stepping away, clearly embarrassed. “Excuse me.”
“There is no need, Miss Duigood,” Georgie said with an easy politeness that betrayed no hint of vulnerability she’d let slip seconds ago. “Mr. Worthington and I were merely taking a moment to become reacquainted.”
Reacquainted? Tom suddenly felt as though he didn’t know Georgie at all.
But it was his time to leave.
“Indeed,” he said, turning to the woman standing on the curb, “please excuse me.”
Without looking back, he exited the carriage, taking a moment to assist Miss Duigood.
“My apologies for intruding on your evening,” he said to the ladies. “I wish you a good evening.”
He shut the door, then, instead of turning on his heel and returning to the Lyon’s Den to loosen this unwelcome knot that formed in his chest with a good bottle of brandy, he remained on the curb, unable to take his eyes off the carriage until it had turned off Cleveland Row.
If Tom had entertained the fiction that his heart had dried to dust when Georgie had first refused him, her presence here sliced through that belief with the precision of a stiletto.
He hadn’t even felt the wound at first. But there was this odd ache in his chest that hadn’t been there even a moment ago.
He should have known that ridiculous story Georgie had given him earlier was absolute rubbish.
Georgie didn’t dare do anything—she didn’t climb trees, be late for dinner, and most especially attend notorious gaming halls.
But, somehow, she was here, in this room, right now, to find a husband of all things.
No. That wasn’t exactly it, was it? She was here to escape a match. And the only way for a woman to do that—even one with a powerful family like the Hawthornes—was to marry someone else.
He spun on his heel and strode back to the gaming hell, his boots clicking on the cobblestone, eager to put Georgie out of his mind.
He headed straight for the study, settled himself in a perfectly worn-in leather chair near the fire, and signaled for a servant to fetch him something strong enough to dull the sharp edges of his current mood.
He’d briefly considered going to the gaming floor and trying his hand at cards, but at the moment it held no appeal.
Besides, he’d had his fill of games tonight.
He downed the first glass of brandy in a single swallow, savoring the heat of the liquor on his throat, then poured himself another.
This week was supposed to be simple. He was here to find a wife.
He’d already been given a new name, a new place in society, and once the wedding was complete, the old Tom Blakey and those old wounds would be gone forever.
Until he’d walked into that dining room this evening and saw Georgiana Hawthorne, it had been.
But when he saw her, they opened right back up again.
She was even more beautiful than he remembered, and even though he’d tried to forget her, he’d failed miserably.
So many of her features had been indelible in his mind, as if written in ink: the way her flaxen hair curled at the back of her neck, the shape of her plump lips, the creaminess of her skin.
She’d grown into herself, her feminine curves fuller than he’d recalled, and the very thought of her now made his body come alive.