Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
“We must talk about what happens next.”
“Yes, we must,” agreed Louisa, unable to restrain her deep sigh or summon anything close to a smile.
This peculiar walk under so many eyes in Rosemere’s gardens was so far from every dream she’d ever had around a marriage proposal. Was it even a proposal when it seemed to already be agreed on all fronts?
Still, Louisa could feel the warmth of Benedict’s body through the light summer fabric of his jacket and drew some strange comfort from that despite herself. This was not what she had wanted, but he had not wanted it either, and she was not alone in her predicament.
Was the Duke of Northwick a rake or not? Her thoughts on this question now were ever more confused. The actions of his hands and lips in the drawing room last night ought to be damning evidence of immorality and yet Louisa could not bring herself to condemn him.
While puzzled by her own desire, she had wanted their kisses and caresses just as much as her partner in crime.
Nor had Benedict abandoned Louisa to her fate after their discovery, as a rake would surely have done.
On the contrary, he had shielded and defended her at every turn. None of it made sense.
A day earlier, Louisa had been a carefree, entirely unattached and unmarried young lady. Now, she was betrothed to a duke, and had apparently virtually jilted a second gentleman of whose existence she was only minimally aware. Was this really her life or some awful dream..?
“It appears that we are betrothed, Benedict,” Louisa said, the word sounding so very strange in her own ear.
The man beside her gave a short laugh.
“It does, doesn’t it? I apologize for any inconvenience it causes you, but there is no other way. I am glad that you see that.”
While not the path he would have chosen, their shared fate did not seem to trouble him as deeply as it troubled Louisa. How could it? This was a man who did not believe in true love. He was marrying her only out of duty and obligation. What happiness could either of them hope for from that?
“Yes, there is no other way,” Louisa agreed dully.
“We ought to look on the bright side, I suppose,” he mused and Louisa frowned, uncomprehending.
“When I am a respectable married gentleman, the ton must stop chasing me with nonsense scandals, mothers must stop throwing their eligible daughters in my path in the hope of marriage, and I need not worry about hiding the carriages of late-night visitors…”
“Do you have many late-night visitors?” inquired Louisa with unintentional sharpness, her mind again recalling that awful imagined parade of ladies in Benedict’s strong arms, their lips raised for his kisses.
“Sometimes, yes,” he answered shortly, looking back at her with appraising eyes. “That need not concern you, Louisa. I am sure we can respect one another’s privacy and independence.”
She stared at him, speechless. Louisa had known that the duke did not believe in love as she did, but what did he even understand by marriage? Was he actually expecting her to play hostess to his lovers?!
“I have already considered the practicalities,” Benedict continued, apparently unaware of her consternation.
“We shall draw up a legal agreement that suits us both. If you wish, you may remain at Rosemere with your aunt, and I shall visit often enough to keep the gossips at bay. If you would like to be mistress of Northwick Park, that role is also open to you.”
“What will you do?” Louisa asked.
“I shall return to London,” Benedict answered immediately, as though this was obvious, and perhaps, to him, it was. “That is where my life has always been.”
This complete vision of a marriage of separate lives was too much for Louisa. Sinking down on a stone bench, she buried her face in her hands, not wanting Benedict to see her pain when he could talk of the future with such insouciance.
“Louisa?” he crouched down beside her.
“My life and my dreams will be wiped out at a stroke, wherever I choose to live,” she told him through her fingers, not expecting him to understand. “You will continue to live as you always have.”
The duke gave a long exhalation and then sat down beside her on the bench.
“I know exactly what I have done, Louisa. If there had been any other way, I would have taken it. You must marry, and there is only me…unless, you would rather your aunt negotiated for an engagement to this Lord Ashbourne…”
“No!” exclaimed Louisa, raising her head immediately from her hands and regarding her companion fiercely. “I would never marry him! I don’t love him…”
Unable to hold back anything now, she burst into tears. She would not marry Lord Ashbourne because she didn’t love him, but she would still have to marry the Duke of Northwick regardless of the fact that she didn’t love him. One was preferable to the other but Louisa didn’t know why.
She suspected that if Lord Ashbourne had put his arm around her shoulders as Benedict did at that moment, it would not have felt half so comforting.
For a moment Louisa warily considered the eyes likely still watching this display but then reminded herself that she was now publicly known to be betrothed to the man beside her, and such minor liberties forgivable.
“You must think me a very foolish young woman,” Louisa said as she took the handkerchief Benedict offered and wiped her eyes. “I am sincerely grateful for what you have done, truly.”
“I ought not to have laid a finger on you last night,” he sighed. “You should blame me for that.”
“I cannot,” murmured Louisa in response. “I don’t know what came over me but we were both to blame…”
Their eyes met for a moment and something blazed brightly in his blue-green gaze, an echo of the intimacy they had shared so briefly in the drawing room.
Slowly and deliberately, Benedict removed his arm and shifted a little away from her, taking a deep breath.
Louisa hoped he did not think her offended when she knew he was only trying to comfort her.
“I am older, Louisa, and I have lived a fuller life,” Benedict told her soberly.
“I am more to blame because I do know what came over both of us. For your sake, I wish I could undo it, but I cannot. I must do the next best thing and offer you the protection of my hand and my name, as soon as the wedding can be arranged.”
“I’ve dreamed of marriage all my life,” reflected Louisa, the idea now a melancholy one rather than the joy it had once been. “Never of fortunes or titles, but only of a husband who loved me, as I loved him, and a house full of happy children loved by both of us…”
“I’m sorry I cannot give you all of that,” Benedict replied frankly.
“I have only title and fortune to offer, and must hope they are some small recompense. Love has always seemed a fairy story to me, but people can have good marriages without love, where there is understanding and respect on both sides. After all, feelings may come and go, but duty is always there.”
It was a virtuous view in its own way but distinctly pragmatic and Louisa’s heart sank to hear it stated so bluntly.
“You sound more like a solicitor negotiating a complex contract than a husband-to-be planning a marriage,” Louisa observed with a sad smile. “I suppose it cannot be otherwise, can it?”
“No, it cannot,” he agreed. “Now, if you have preferences for the wedding itself, tell me soon. I shall arrange everything with your aunt.”
Louisa nodded her agreement. A quick wedding, and then separate lives. How very cold her future looked from this vantage point…
“You mentioned children,” Benedict now picked up again, his tone very matter-of-fact.
“I had not considered that in my own planning yet, but I will fulfill my duties, as frequently as you wish it. If you are at Rosemere and I am in London, we will have to schedule matters carefully, but it can be done…”
“What?!” Louisa exclaimed, her heart lurching in her chest as she stood and regarded him with hands on her hips.
“Well, a woman can only conceive a child at certain times of the month, so we would have to…” Benedict began to explain himself and then paused. “Ah, I should have spoken more carefully of this matter. How much do you know of the getting of children, Louisa?”
The last of Louisa’s romantic dreams crumbled away.
There would be no love letters, shared laughter, and stolen kisses beneath moonlit skies for her.
Instead, she would have a husband who calmly scheduled the conception of their future children as though he were discussing planting seeds in the garden, or mating horses in the stables.
“I know how horses are covered …and I am not a horse!” Louisa declared crossly, before realizing how absurd her statement sounded and breaking out into helpless laughter.
It was all so ridiculous, what else could she do but laugh?
After a second of surprise, Benedict laughed too and then rose before her, tall, handsome and broad-shouldered.
His hands found hers and raised them as his impossible eyes, one blue and one green, found hers.
Warmth and trust seemed to flow between them, regardless of everything.
“I know you are not a horse,” he told her, smiling. “I promise that when the time comes that you want children, I shall be very careful and very gentle in showing you how how such things are done between a man and a woman. It will be my privilege and my pleasure as well as my duty…”
That strange ache began again with Benedict’s words, his closeness and the touch of his hands, strange longings fluttering in Louisa’s stomach and throbbing between her thighs.
“Benedict,” she sighed, gazing up into his eyes and feeling her cares begin to slide away into the background.
“Louisa,” he breathed, pulling away one of his hands to stroke her face.
Just as Louisa became sure that he was about to kiss her again, a voice broke in upon her consciousness.
“There you are,” called out Aunt Beatrice from the end of the rose garden’s paths.
“I dare say you lost track of time out here. The children have had their breakfast and I cannot keep them indoors any longer. You had best come and say good morning. After all, you will have the rest of your lives to stroll together in rose gardens.”
The silver-haired dowager’s eyes were far too knowing and Louisa blushed a little to think what her aunt might have witnessed if she had arrived a few minutes later.
“I suppose we will,” Benedict agreed, letting out his breath slowly and lowering but not releasing Louisa’s hand from his. “Are you ready, Louisa?”
Louisa nodded. It was time to put aside all dreams of knights on white horses, proposals by moonlight and true love. She had chosen a loveless marriage over ruin and now there was a wedding to be arranged…