The Duke’s Perfect Wife

Chapter 16

Hart looked at Darragh, who was listening, openmouthed. “Remind me, Darragh, not to go up onto the roof with my wife.”

“Best not,” Eleanor agreed. “You can be rather aggravating.” She turned her smile on Darragh. “So you see, lad, I have no more love for the English than you do. That colonel muscled his way into Great-Great-Grandmother Finella’s home and had his way with her, which is why I do not blame her one whit for the roof. I myself would love to see England become detached from Scotland and drift off into the sea—except that two of my sisters-in-law are Sassenachs, and I’d want them safely here first. Along Lord Cameron’s Romany friends. And Mrs. Mayhew and Franklin and all the servants from Hart’s London house. Not to mention my English friends, and my father’s cronies at all those universities and the British Museum.” She made a helpless gesture with her good hand. “So, you see, it is not such a simple thing, is it? To say all people labeled this should live, and all labeled that should die? Neat and tidy, you don’t have to think about it. But alas, the world is much more complicated than that.”

Darragh was clearly out of his depth. He looked to Hart for support.

“She’s asking you to think about what you’re doing, lad,” Hart said. “To use your intellect, not your emotion.”

“I suppose he’s not been told he has an intellect,” Eleanor said sadly. “My father says that is the trouble with so many. They’re told they’ll never amount to much, and so they believe it, and so it becomes true. But the human mind is quite intricate, no matter what body it is born into.” Eleanor gently tapped Darragh above his left ear. “So many thoughts in there, all of them with great potential. They simply need to be pursued.”

There it was—Eleanor smiling at the lad, her fingertips soft on his hair. Darragh looked into her blue, blue eyes, and was smitten.

Eleanor smoothed Darragh’s hair, a motherly gesture. “What do you intend to do with him, Hart?”

“Send him to America to his sister,” Hart said.

Fellows came alert on the other end of the room. “No, you don’t. He shot at you and hit your wife. He needs to be arrested and stand trial for that.”

“His colleagues will never let him live that long,” Hart said. “He stays with me, I protect him, and he tells me every last detail about his friends and where I can find them.”

“I’ll not betray them,” Darragh said quickly.

Hart bent him a severe look. “You will. In exchange, you go to America and forget about secret organizations. Get an honest job and live a long and healthy life.”

Fellows strode to them. “Mackenzie, the law isn’t for you to take into your hands. I need to know these contacts. I can’t go back to my chief inspector and tell him that I let you send a violent criminal off to America with a slap on the hand.”

“You know that once he tells us what we need to know, his life won’t be worth anything,” Hart said. “If his colleagues don’t come for him, he’ll go to Newgate and be hung or shot for treason.”

“Rewarding him by sending him to America to live with his sister won’t exactly reform him, will it?”

Eleanor broke in before Hart could answer. “Neither will hanging him, Mr. Fellows. He’s only a boy. He’s nothing more than a trigger, like an extension of the pistol. I’m willing to give him a chance, if he helps you find those who want Hart dead.”

Darragh sat silently through the exchange, fear large in his eyes. It was beginning to dawn on him, Hart saw, how he’d been used. “I’m not a trigger,” he said in a small voice.

Eleanor smoothed his hair again. “Best you keep your head down and mouth shut, lad. Or Inspector Fellows will be driving you away in a cart with bars on it. Your only chance is to do what His Grace tells you.”

Darragh blinked back tears. “But I can’t… tell.”

“Mackenzie,” Fellows said, voice strained, “I understand your tactics. I even admire you for them, but you’ll cost me my job.”

“Hart will never let it come to that.” Eleanor smiled sweetly at Fellows, then Hart. “Will he?”

“No,” Hart said. “The Home Office will answer to me soon enough, Fellows. You’ll keep your job. Especially if you are instrumental in rooting out a cache of Fenians.”

“Then that’s settled,” Eleanor said. “Perhaps you should give Darragh some tea before you start with the questions. He looks all in.”

Hart put his hand under Eleanor’s arm and lifted her from the chair. “You are the one who is all in. The boy will be fine. You are going back to bed.”

“I am rather tired.” She sagged, and Hart slid his arm around her waist. “You must give me your word you won’t hurt him,” she said.

“He’ll stay intact. Fellows, keep the boy here while I take Eleanor upstairs.”

Fellows glared at him. He looked so much like their father when he did that.

Eleanor’s legs buckled, and Hart swept her into his arms and carried her out. The anteroom and halls beyond were empty, Isabella having the sense to herd the remaining guests into the garden for an alfresco dinner.

Hart carried Eleanor through the enormous front hall, still decorated with swags for the wedding, and up the stairs. The giant vase that always stood on the hall table today was filled with pink roses and lily of the valley.

Eleanor smiled at Hart as he carried her upward, her eyes sleepy blue slits. She touched his chest, the diamond and sapphire engagement ring glittering next to the plain gold of the wedding band. Eleanor Ramsay. His wife.

“Don’t be too long,” she murmured. “It’s our wedding night, remember.”

Eleanor rested her head on Hart’s shoulder and went sweetly to sleep.

Hart Mackenzie was an arrogant son of a bitch who would never change.

Lloyd Fellows stormed away from Hart’s study several hours later. Hart had carried his wife to her bedchamber—what a tender husband—and then returned to put Darragh through it. Hart was expert at twisting information out of anyone, and he’d twisted it out of Darragh. He’d never even touched the lad. Darragh had given up the names of the leaders and where they met in London and in Liverpool.

Fellows doubted they’d still be there. They’d have heard from one of their own that the assassination attempt was a failure and that Darragh had been taken. They’d still be in the area, though, and now Fellows knew their names. It would not be long before he found them.

He admired Hart and at the same time wanted to strangle him. Hart Mackenzie had grown up with every privilege, while Lloyd Fellows had grubbed for himself. Fellows had worked hard all his life to take care of his mother in the back streets of London while Hart had slept between soft linen sheets and eaten food prepared by celebrated chefs.

Now Mackenzie, instead of staying at his injured wife’s bedside, had sat in his opulent study and done Fellows’s job. Better, probably, than Fellows could have.

It rankled. Never mind that Hart had given Fellows enough information with which to return to London and start rooting out the madmen who thought nothing of shooting into crowds and blowing up railway lines. Fellows would nab them and get all the glory. Hart would let him. That rankled too.

To relieve his feelings, Fellows stormed into a room at the end of the hall, unaware even of where he was going in this colossal house.

“Oh,” said a female voice.

Fellows stopped, his hand on the door handle, and saw a young lady standing unsteadily on a ladder, her hands full of garlands. She was definitely teetering, the garlands rendering her unable to steady herself. Fellows hurried to her and kept her from falling by putting strong hands on her hips.

“Thank you,” she said. “You did make me jump.”

She was Lady Louisa Scranton, Isabella Mackenzie’s younger sister. The dress beneath Fellows’s hands was a dark blue silk, the hips beneath that supple.

Fellows had met Lady Louisa on several occasions at Mackenzie gatherings but had done no more than exchange polite pleasantries with her. Louisa much resembled her sister, Isabella, with brilliant red hair, green eyes, a curving figure, and a red-lipped smile.

Fellows wanted to let his hands linger. She smelled of roses, and her flesh beneath the fabric was warm.

He made himself ease his hands away. “Are you all right?”

She blushed. “Yes, yes. I was taking down these garlands and became careless. I thought they should come down, under the circumstances. The guests won’t be using this room.”

It was a drawing room, one whose ceilings were a mere fifteen feet high rather than the twenty to thirty usual in this house.

“They have servants to do this.”

Her skirts made an enticing rustle as she reached for more garlands, rising on tiptoe in slender ankle boots.

“Yes, but truth to tell, I felt rather underfoot and wanted to be useful. Isabella can grow quite agitated when she’s upset, and rather bossy, poor lamb.”

Fellows couldn’t think of a thing to say. He was a policeman. Polished manners were beyond him.

“Lady Eleanor will recover, I think,” he said stiffly.

“I know. I looked in on her not long ago. She’s sleeping like a baby.” Louisa’s green eyes scrutinized him, and Fellows suddenly felt hot. “You are very tall. Would you help me reach that?” Louisa pointed to a garland fastened to a sculpted frieze out of her reach.

“Of course.”

Fellows thought she’d descend, and he held out his hand to help her, but she shook her head. “You need to come up here, silly. We both must grab it or the whole thing will be ruined.”

Silly. No woman in Lloyd Fellows’s life had dared to tell him he was silly.

He put his foot on the bottom rung of the stepladder. Another two steps, and he was level with her.

He found it difficult to breathe. This close to her, he was sharply aware of her scent, the curve of her cheek, how her red hair darkened at the temples.

“There we are,” Louisa said softly, and she kissed him.

A light touch, a virgin’s kiss, but the cushion of her red lips ignited fires throughout his body. Fellows slid his hand to the nape of her neck and scooped her up to him. He did not open her lips, but brushed them again and again, taking in the warm softness of her. He ended with a kiss to the corner of her mouth, which he savored for a time.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” she whispered, breath gentle on his skin. “But I’ve been wanting to kiss you.”

“Why?” His throat was dry.

Her lips curved into a smile. “Because you’re a handsome gentleman, and I like you. Besides, you once saved Mac’s life.”

“And this is gratitude?”

Her smile widened. “No, this is me being dreadfully forward. I would not blame you one whit for being disgusted.”

Disgusted? Was she mad?

“You should have told me.” His voice still wasn’t working.

“It is not something easily worked into conversation.” Louisa reached for the garland. “Anyway, now I have told you. And I truly need help with this garland.”

Fellows put a firm arm around her and reached up beside her. He was not quite sure what had just changed in his life, but the world felt different, and he would make certain that he and Louisa continued to explore what had begun in this room.

Eleanor slept. She dreamed dark dreams that slipped away when she swam to wakefulness and pain. Then she was restless, the injury keeping her from slumbering again. When Beth offered her more laudanum in water, Eleanor was hurting enough to readily drink it.

She slept through her wedding night, all the next day, and well into the next night. She awoke, hungry, able to eat the bread and butter Maigdlin brought her. Eleanor felt well after that, and decided to get up, only to find herself on the floor, her friends lifting her back into bed.

Fever came, and she saw the faces of Beth, Ainsley, and Isabella come and go. And Hart’s. She wanted to cling to him and ask him a thousand questions—what had happened to Darragh? Were there any other assassins lurking? Had Inspector Fellows arrested Darragh’s friends? But she had no strength to speak.

After what seemed a long time, Eleanor woke again, in quiet darkness. Her arm was sore, but the worst of the pain had receded, thank heavens. Eleanor stretched and yawned. Her body was damp with sweat, but she felt rested, relieved.

She was not alone, she discovered—Maigdlin lay back in a chair, snoring, an oil lamp glowing next to her. Feeling fusty, she woke Maigdlin and asked the startled maid to run a bath. Maigdlin protested, fearing Eleanor’s fever would return, but Eleanor wanted to find Hart, and she did not want to go to her husband after sweating in bed for… who knew how long.

Maigdlin helped her bathe, being careful of her bandages. Three days she’d been asleep, Maigdlin told her, and so sick they feared they’d lose her.

Nonsense. Eleanor always threw off her fevers. She was strong as an ox.

Feeling much better after the bath, Eleanor wrapped herself in a thick dressing gown, put on warm slippers, and headed for Hart’s bedchamber, three doors down from hers.

The hall was silent, the rest of the house asleep. The doors in between her chamber and his led to Hart’s private library and study. Eleanor supposed she should be grateful that she had to walk only twenty feet to reach his bedroom. When she’d stayed at Kilmorgan as his fiancée, long ago, she’d been put in the guest wing, which was on the other side of the house.

Eleanor did not bother to knock on the immense double doors. She’d come prepared with a key, which she’d procured the day she’d arrived at Kilmorgan. But there was no need for it, because the door was unlocked. She saw why when she entered the enormous chamber. Hart wasn’t in it.

Hart’s bed, empty and neatly made, was colossal, with brocade hangings flowing to it from an oval canopy ten feet above it. The rest of the room was taken up with formal tables and chairs, a bookcase, a padded bench, and a console table holding brandy and a humidor.

In spite of the elegant furnishings, this was a cold room, even with the coal fire burning brightly on the hearth. Eleanor shivered.

Hart’s windows faced the front of the house and the east side of the grounds. The curtains had not been drawn, and Eleanor walked to the east window and peered out.

“He’s gone out to the mausoleum, Your Grace.”

Eleanor stifled a shriek and turned to find Hart’s French valet in the doorway. Marcel stood ramrod straight, looking not at all tired. The perfect servant, awake and alert to serve his master, even at three o’clock in the morning. Poor Maigdlin had succumbed to slumber.

“The mausoleum?” Eleanor asked when her breath returned. “In the middle of the night?”

“His Grace will go there sometimes when he can’t sleep,” Marcel said. “Is there anything I can fetch for you, Your Grace?”

“No, no. That’s fine, Marcel. Thank you.”

Marcel stood aside to let Eleanor leave the room, then he hastened down the hall ahead of her to open her bedchamber door. Eleanor thanked him politely and bade him go to bed. Hart would be fine without him, she said, and Marcel needed sleep. Marcel looked puzzled, but he went.

Eleanor bade Maigdlin, who was changing her bedsheets, to help her dress and to fix her arm in the sling. Maigdlin didn’t want to, of course, but Eleanor was firm. She then sent Maigdlin up to her bed, hurried downstairs, and let herself out of the house through a back door.

She sped across the damp grass toward the squat, dark building on the edge of the grounds, her breath catching when she saw the wink of a lantern inside.

The Mackenzie family mausoleum was always cold. Hart’s breath fogged inside it, even though the April night was almost balmy.

His grandfather had built this place in the 1840s, a Greek-looking mock temple with plenty of marble and granite. Hart’s grandfather and grandmother reposed here, as did Hart’s father and mother. Cameron’s first wife did not, because Hart’s father wouldn’t hear of it. She was a bitch, a whore, and Cameron’s disgrace, the duke had said. She can make do with the churchyard, though I’ll be surprised if the vicar lets her in.

Hart’s wife Sarah did have a tomb here, as did his son, Graham.

The marble of Sarah’s tomb was black and gray, cold to the touch. The plaque on the front of the tomb was filled with flowery phrases that Hart never remembered asking for.

The smaller plaque next to Sarah’s said, Lord Hart Graham Mackenzie, Beloved Son, June 7, 1876.

Hart traced the lettering of his son’s name with gloved fingertips. Graham would have turned eight this year.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I am so sorry.”

Silence and darkness filled the space. But Hart felt comfort from the cool marble, from the presence of the boy he’d held—only once.

If Hart had done everything right in his life, he and Eleanor would have been married long ago, and Kilmorgan would be overrun with children by now. The bodies of Sarah and Graham would not be in this cold place, with nothing but chisel marks on marble left to honor them.

But Hart had done everything wrong. This time, at least, this time, he’d gotten Eleanor to the altar. And then she’d pushed him out of the way of the pistol, trying to save him.

These last three days, while Eleanor lay in a fevered stupor, had been absolute hell. Tonight, the doctor had announced that the fever had turned, that Eleanor was resting. Hart in his relief hadn’t known what to do. He’d shaken off his brothers’ well-meaning offers of all the whiskey he could down and retreated here.

To assure himself that Eleanor wasn’t out here, cold and alone? He didn’t know.

All he knew was that he’d made a mess of his life, and he was still doing it. Hart, the arrogant, self-assured Mackenzie, could get nothing right, and these tombs were tangible evidence.

He’d always thought of his courtship and engagement with Eleanor as a farce in three acts.

Act I, Scenes: Their first dance together, followed by a kiss in the garden had awakened every need in his body. Next, the boathouse down by the river at Kilmorgan, where he’d unbuttoned Eleanor’s modest dress and kissed her skin, discovering that she had a passion in her that she didn’t hide, at least not from him.

Act II, Scene: The summerhouse. Hart remembered Eleanor riding beside him in her prim habit and riding hat, smiling and chattering as usual. The summerhouse, the old duke’s folly, perched on a promontory, a gorge dropping away from it to a river below. From there, one could see across a vast stretch of Mackenzie lands all the way to the sea.

When Hart had led Eleanor inside, her reaction had been pure Eleanor.

“Hart, it’s beautiful.” The summerhouse folly had been fashioned like an ancient Greek temple, complete with overgrown ruined stone, a very un-Scottish structure. But the view was magnificent, and the summerhouse very private.

Eleanor turned in a circle, arms open. “My father would love this. So false and yet so true at the same time.”

Hart had stepped to the stone balustrade and looked out over the vistas that never failed to stir his heart. The Mackenzies had come back from poverty and powerlessness after Culloden to become the wealthiest family in Scotland, and this panorama of their lands rammed it down the throats of every Englishman who came up here.

“You’re proud of it, aren’t you?” Eleanor said, coming to rest next to him. “In spite of you sneering that it’s a ridiculous English affectation your father built, you like it. You would not have brought me here otherwise.”

“I brought you for the view.” Hart lifted Eleanor’s riding hat from her head and set it out of the wind. “And for this.”

He slid his arms around her waist from behind. Eleanor closed her eyes as he kissed her neck, wisps of red curls silken under his lips. Hart let his fingers drift to the buttons that closed her habit in front.

Eleanor only sighed as he unbuttoned her, her head resting against his cheek. Hart parted her placket and nibbled her bared neck.

“What are you doing to me, El?” he whispered into her ear. “I think you’re breaking me.”

“Hardly,” she murmured. “Hart Mackenzie is far too wicked for the likes of me to tame.”

“But I’d like to let you try.”

He turned her around. His gaze roved her mussed hair, her parted red lips, the bodice gaping to show her damp throat. She was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

He was not supposed to do this now. He’d planned to take her to London, to the elegant house in Grosvenor Square, to bring out the old and valuable Mackenzie jewels, and promise them to her if she’d agree to become his wife. Formally done, in the drawing room, his hand on his heart, dazzling her with diamonds so that she would not say no. Women would do anything for diamonds.

Up here in the summerhouse, with the jewels locked far away in the vault in Edinburgh, Hart had nothing to offer. Only the view—how bloody romantic and stupid.

But he had the feeling that if he didn’t speak now, secure her now, his chance would slip away. Eleanor was twenty, an earl’s daughter, and lovely. If he didn’t lock her into an agreement, she would be fair game for every other lovelorn gentleman out there. Her poverty wouldn’t matter to a nabob wanting to better his connections through her family. She had charm and grace to go with her lineage, the perfect wife for Hart Mackenzie. Hart Mackenzie would have her.

It was too soon. He should use the beautiful view from the folly as one more enticement in a string of enticements in this courtship, so that when he finally asked for her hand, Eleanor would have no reason to say no. Hart would have woven his web so tightly she’d not want to break free. If he asked her here, now, Eleanor could turn him down, and he’d have no more chance to convince her.

But Hart felt his mouth open, heard the words come out in a rush. “Marry me, Eleanor.”

Eleanor’s eyes widened, and she took a step back. “What?Why?”

The question stirred his anger. Hart seized her hands and forced a smile. “Why does a man wish to marry a woman? Does there have to be a logical reason?”

Eleanor blinked those big blue eyes at him. “I’m not much bothered about why any man wishes to marry any woman, in general. I’m sure there are dozens of theories, if one wanted to debate. What I would like to know is why you wish to marry me.”

Hart clamped down on his impatience. “So that I may kiss you,” he said, voice light. “I plan to kiss every inch of you, Eleanor, and if I do that, we’d better marry.”

He saw a flicker of delight in her eyes, but Eleanor didn’t melt. Dear God, she was stubborn.

“But I mean, why me? I’m not vain enough to believe that no other young lady in Scotland is good enough for the attentions of Hart Mackenzie, for kissing or otherwise. I have a pedigree, but so do others, and my family is a bit down at the heel. You could have any lady you wanted with the snap of your fingers.” Eleanor snapped in demonstration, even though Hart still had hold of her wrist.

“I do not want any other lady in Scotland. I want you.”

“You flatter me.”

“God’s balls, woman,” he shouted. “I’m not asking you to marry me out of flattery.” Hart’s words echoed from the hills around them. “I’m asking you because I can’t do this without you. I can’t face my father, or the world. When I’m with you, all that doesn’t matter. I need you, El. How the devil can I make you understand that?”

Eleanor stared up at him, lips parted. Any moment she’d laugh at him, sneer at him for being so sentimental. He sounded like a lovesick fool, God help him.

“That is all I wanted to know,” she said softly.

“If you marry me, Eleanor Ramsay, I promise to give you everything you ever wanted.”

Eleanor smiled suddenly, looked into his eyes, and said, “Yes.”

Hart’s heart pounded so hard it hurt. He gathered her into his arms, trying to remember how to breathe. She was like a rock in a raging river, and he clung to her as though she was the only thing between him and drowning.

His first kiss opened her lips, Hart tasting the woman he’d conquered. It was heady, joyous.

He’d had his valet pack a blanket for their picnic. Hart now spread the blanket on the summer-warm stones and began to undress her.

Eleanor said not a word, offered no protest. She smiled as her habit came open, shivered as Hart spread the laces of her corset. Her eyes went soft when he parted and removed the camisole beneath, helped her out of her skirts, and laid her on the blanket in the sunshine.

Hart gazed down at her, bare but for her stockings and prim riding boots, a beautiful woman he’d a moment ago made his. Triumph beat through him.

Hart stripped off his coat and waistcoat, shirt and boots, then underbreeches, saving the kilt for last. He liked how Eleanor watched him, not shy, wanting to look at him as much as he wanted to look at her.

Hart undid the kilt and let it fall, showing her how hard he was for her.

She was a virgin, Hart reminded himself. She’d never known the touch of a man—not until mine—and he knew he’d have to be patient with her. He was prepared to be, looked forward to it.

Eleanor blushed as Hart lay down with her. The feel of her body beneath his sent his heart racing. He could take her now, swiftly, make her understand who she belonged to. This could be quick, satisfying.

But Hart had learned how to give a woman, any woman, perfect pleasure. He did not need exotic techniques and devices—the key was the pleasure.

“I won’t hurt you,” he said.

Eleanor shook her head, smiling a little smile. “I know.”

The trust in her eyes stung his heart. Hart kissed her, and gently, gently touched her, opening her to him very slowly. He went carefully, teaching her about arousal, making her damp enough to take him without hurt. His body shook with the effort of holding himself back, but it was very important that he didn’t rush her.

Her body closed around his with heat that threatened to break his control. He wanted to thrust and thrust into her, to satisfy himself and forget about not rushing.

No. Take the time. Teach her. Later, when Eleanor was used to him, he could show her more interesting things, but today, this was about Eleanor’s first pleasure.

Eleanor was so warm and ready that he slid in the first inch without impediment. Hart stayed there a time, kissing her, coaxing her, letting her get used to him.

Another inch, and again, stopping, teasing, nipping, teaching her what it felt like to have a man inside her. Then came the barrier, which he knew would hurt. Hart took it slowly, a fraction of an inch at a time.

This was a first for him too—he’d never been with a virgin. He feared to break her, to mar her in some unrecoverable way. Then again, Eleanor was resilient. She lifted her body to his, touched his face, nodded when she was ready.

And then Hart was inside her, she squeezing him, a feeling of glory and hot, hot joy.

“El,” he said. “You are so tight. You feel beautiful.”

Eleanor’s body rocked against his, her arms coming around him, her mouth finding his. Wanting, accepting, loving.

The astonishing feeling of her around him made him drop his seed before he was ready. Hart groaned with it, amazed at himself, then he laughed. Hart’s women usually tried every trick they could to make him do their bidding, to lose control to them, and they never succeeded. Eleanor had conquered him by lying there being warm and beautiful.

Hart kissed her, knowing that something exquisite had just happened and not knowing quite what to do about it.

The rest of Act II had been heady. News of the betrothal of Lord Hart Mackenzie and Lady Eleanor Ramsay spread to every corner of the country, filling every newspaper and magazine.

Glorious days. The happiest days of his life, Hart realized now. At the time, the stupid, selfish young man he’d been had only tasted triumph of landing the woman he’d wanted. Eleanor would bring the notorious Mackenzie family a measure of respect, which they badly needed. Hart’s horror of a father had eroded the Mackenzie reputation, as had Ian’s supposed madness, Mac’s running away to live among depraved artists in Paris, and Cameron’s very bad marriage.

But no one could say a wrong word about Eleanor. She sailed above all scandal, her talkative charm melting one and all. Eleanor was kind, generous, strong, and well liked. She’d lead Hart to glory.

Hart told her he loved her, and it was not a lie. But he never gave the whole of himself to her, never believed he needed to. Looking back, Hart realized that he’d kept himself from her out of fear.

And that had been his great mistake.

So stupid was Hart that he didn’t understand what he had to lose, until Act III.

Scene: Eleanor Ramsay’s ramshackle home in autumn, the trees surrounding it having turned brilliant red and gold. Their radiant glory splashed against the dark evergreens that marched across the mountains, silent reminders that the coming winter would be brutal and cold.

Hart had been as buoyant as the cool weather, looking forward to visiting his lady with hair the color of autumn leaves. Earl Ramsay received Hart in the house and told him, in a strangely quiet tone, that Eleanor was walking in the gardens and would see him there.

Hart had thanked the earl, unsuspecting, and had gone to find Eleanor.

The Ramsay gardens had long become overgrown and wild, despite the valiant efforts of their one gardener and his pruning shears. Eleanor always laughed at their unruly patch of land, but Hart liked it—a garden that blended into the Scottish countryside instead of being structured, overly clean, and shutting out true nature.

Eleanor paced the walks in a dress too light for the weather, the shawl too small to keep out the cold. Her hair had come down, the wind tearing at it. When Eleanor saw Hart walking toward her, she turned her back and strode away.

Hart caught up to her, seized her arm, and turned her to face him.

Her stare had made him drop his hold. Eleanor’s eyes were red-rimmed in a face too white, but her glare was angry, an intense rage he’d never seen in her.

“El?” he asked in alarm. “What is it?”

Eleanor said nothing. When Hart reached for her again, she tore herself from his grip. Clenching her teeth, Eleanor yanked off the engagement ring and threw it at him.

The circlet thunked against Hart’s frock-coated chest and fell with a tink to the paving stones.

Hart didn’t bend down for the ring. This was something more than Eleanor’s rare flashes of temper, her frequent exasperation at him, or their teasing arguments about ridiculous things.

“What is it?” he repeated, his voice quiet.

“Mrs. Palmer came to call on me today,” Eleanor said.

Cold fingers snaked through his body. Those words should not come out of Eleanor’s lips. Not Mrs. Palmer. Not with Eleanor. They were two separate beings, from separate worlds, separate parts of Hart. Never to meet.

“I know you know who I mean,” Eleanor said.

“Yes, I bloody well know who you mean,” Hart snapped. “She should not have come here.”

Eleanor waited a beat, as though expecting Hart to say something like My love, I can explain.

Hart could explain, if he chose. Angelina Palmer had been his mistress for seven years. He had ceased to go to her once he’d started courting Eleanor. That had been Hart’s decision, and so be it. But Angelina, it appeared, in her jealousy, had scuttled here to tell Eleanor Hart’s dirty little secrets.

“She felt sorry for me,” Eleanor said, answering Hart’s silence. “She told me she’d followed me about when I was down in London last, and watched me. She learned all about me—remarkable, since I knew nothing at all about her. She saw me be kind to a wretched old lady in the park, she said. I remember I’d given a poor thing a coin and helped her to shelter. Mrs. Palmer decided that this made me a kind young woman, one who should be spared a life with you.” Eleanor’s eyes were full of anger, but not with anger at Angelina Palmer. At him.

“I admit that Mrs. Palmer was once my mistress,” Hart said stiffly. “You deserve to know. She ceased to be my mistress the day I met you.”

Eleanor’s look turned deprecating. “A pleasing half-truth, the kind at which Hart Mackenzie excels. I’ve seen you say such things to others; I never dreamed you would to me.” Her color rose. “Mrs. Palmer told me about your women, about your house, and hinted at the sorts of things you do there.”

Oh, God, oh, damn, damn, damn, damn, damn. Hart saw his world falling away, the fiction that he could be anything other than a blackguard bastard crumbling to dust.

“All in the past,” Hart said in a hard voice. “I have not touched another woman since I met you. I’m not that much of a monster. I gave it all up, Eleanor. For you. Angelina is a jealous and coldhearted woman. She’d say anything to keep me from marrying you.”

If Hart had thought the speech would have Eleanor smiling and forgiving, he was wrong, oh, so wrong.

“For heaven’s sake, spare me,” she said. “You believe that hiding the truth is not the same as a lie, but it is. You have lied and lied, and you are still lying. You planned my seduction so carefully—Mrs. Palmer told me how you decided on me, how you finagled invitations to every gathering I went to, sometimes with her help. That you hunted me as a man tracks a fox, that you played upon my vanity and made me think I’d caught your eye. And I was stupid enough to let you.”

“Does that matter?” Hart cut in. “Does it matter how I wanted you, or how we met? Nothing after that was a lie. I need you, El. I told you that in the summerhouse. I didn’t lie about that. My dealings with Mrs. Palmer are over. You never need worry about her again.”

Eleanor looked at him in cold fury. “If you believe jealousy has made me angry, you are very wrong. I was not shocked to find you’d had a mistress—many gentlemen have them, and you are so passionate, Hart. I can forgive a past mistress you have not visited since you started courting me, or even some of the risqué games you played, which she decided she should not describe in detail to a lady.”

“It’s bloody evident you can’t forgive me, since you threw the blasted ring at me.”

“That is the crux of the matter, isn’t it? Everything is about you. The entire world revolves around Lord Hart Mackenzie. I should do as you wish, because I fit into a certain place in your schemes, and so does Mrs. Palmer. You treat us equally, each of us occupying certain niches in your cupboard of life.”

“Eleanor…”

Eleanor held up her hand, her voluble nature taking over. “What’s infuriated me is the other things she told me of. About your tempers and your rages. How you cycle between hot and cold, how Mrs. Palmer is never certain what you’ll want from her from day to day, or what your mood will be. She told me she started bringing other ladies into the house, because his lordship was growing bored. She knew that she had to assuage your ennui by any means she could so you wouldn’t leave her. You made use of her, and she scrambled to please you. And in the end, you threw her over because you no longer needed her.” Eleanor stopped, her face red, her breath coming fast. “How could you be so cruel to another human being?”

Hart stepped back. “Have I got this right? You want to break our engagement because I’ve been rude to a courtesan?”

The pinched look around her mouth told Hart that this was the wrong thing to say. “More than rude. You played upon her, as you play upon everyone—as you played upon me. It should make no difference whether a person is a courtesan or a street girl or an earl or an earl’s daughter.”

Every word was a blow, because every word was true. They cut him, and Hart struck back. “Perhaps I am not as egalitarian as you.”

Eleanor flinched, and Hart knew he was losing her. “Cruelty is cruelty, Hart,” she said.

“And when have I had a chance not to be cruel?” Hart shouted. “If I am, it is because that’s all I ever learned how to be. It is how I survived. You’ve met my father; you know what I grew up with. You know what he did to my brothers and me, what he made us into.”

“Certainly, blame your father all you like—and I know how awful he is. I have experienced it firsthand. And I’m very sorry for you, believe me. But you have choices. The choices you make are your own, not your father’s.” Her eyes narrowed. “And don’t you dare punish Mrs. Palmer for what she’s told me. She is terrified of you—do you know that? She knows you’ll never forgive her over this, that she’s lost you forever. Yet, she found the courage to come and speak to me.”

Even then, though, in his amazing foolishness, Hart convinced himself that he could still win.

“Yes, to turn you away from me,” he said swiftly. “Obviously, she is succeeding. She might have come to you as a poor soul, but I assure you that Angelina Palmer is a manipulative bitch who will do anything to get what she wants.”

Eleanor’s eyes widened. “I’ll thank you to believe I know my own mind. Of course Mrs. Palmer is cool and manipulative—she has had to be, a woman in such a position, alone in the world, with you as her only support. But you did not see her. She knew that by telling me, everything she had with you would be at an end. She was resigned to it. Resigned. You think me an unworldly young woman, brought up by a naive gentleman, but I know much about people. Enough to see that you broke her. She devoted herself to you—she would do anything in the world for you—and you broke her. Why should I not think that you will do the same to me?”

Hart could not breathe. Eleanor stood there like some avenging angel, making Hart face everything he was, everything he’d become. By his own choice.

He ran a shaking hand over his face, finding it wet with sweat. You broke her. Maybe he had. Angelina had soaked up his needs, his terrors, his tempers, and his frustrations like a sponge. She’d taken everything he’d thrown at her. This did not make her a saint—she’d been far from that—but she’d put up with Hart and his life.

But Hart Mackenzie could never bow, apologize, or back away for the sake of another. He’d never learned how to control his anger or his selfish desires—to have any idea that he ought to control them. His father had vented anger by terrorizing, and Hart had never learned there could be any other way.

Whatever Hart wanted, he took. Those who got in his way paid the price.

He looked at Eleanor with her quiet strength. No matter what he’d done or how hard he’d tried, he’d never truly won Eleanor. And that made him so angry.

“I can ruin your father,” he said. “Don’t think I can’t. Ruin him, ruin you… easily.”

Eleanor gave him a grim nod. “I am certain you could. You are wealthy and powerful, and everyone will say what a fool I am for turning you down.”

“I’m not jesting, El. I can destroy him. Is that what you want?”

Hart waited for Eleanor’s fear, for her need to say anything, do anything, to make him withdraw the threat. He waited for her desperation to put Hart back to his laughter and wicked jokes, to smooth him over, to do what he wanted. Everything Angelina had done.

Eleanor looked at him for the longest time, shadows from the overgrown garden playing across her face. She never registered fear. Only sadness.

“Please go, Hart.”

Hart growled. “You agreed to marry me. We have a contract. It’s too late.”

Eleanor shook her head. “No. Please go.”

Hart caught her arm in a hard grip. She stared at him in amazement, and he softened his hold but didn’t let go.

“What will you do without me, Eleanor? You have no one to go to, and you have nothing. I can give you everything in the world. I told you that, remember?”

“Yes, but what price will I pay for it?”

Hart lost his temper. He knew, even then and all through the long years, that it was that temper that had lost him everything. He’d been too young and too sure of himself to understand that not everyone in the world could be bullied, especially not Eleanor Ramsay.

“You are nothing.” The words came out a snarl. “You are the daughter of an impoverished earl who is too feckless to understand where his own dinner comes from. Is that what you want for the rest of your life? Poverty and idiocy? If I walk away from you, you are finished. Ruined. No one will want Hart Mackenzie’s leavings.”

Eleanor slapped him. He barely felt the sting, but he grabbed Eleanor’s wrist again, and she glared at him, eyes blazing.

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to. She wrenched herself from his grasp, glared at him another moment, then turned and walked away. Head high, her shawl and light gown billowing in the wind, Eleanor Ramsay walked out of Hart’s life.

Hart felt himself falling down, down, down, into an abyss of his own making. “El!” he’d called, his voice cracking, pathetic.

Eleanor did not stop and did not turn back. She walked on, never looking at him, until she was lost in the shadows of the overgrown garden. Hart had put his hands on top of his head and watched her go, his heart aching until he thought it would burst.

He hadn’t let it go at that, of course. Hart tried over the next weeks to make Eleanor change her mind. He’d attempted to recruit Lord Ramsay, only to find that Eleanor had told him everything… every embarrassing detail.

“I’m sorry, Mackenzie,” Lord Ramsay had said sorrowfully when Hart approached him. “I’m afraid I must stand behind my daughter. You did play a rather bad game.”

Even Hart’s argument that he’d taken Eleanor’s virginity brought him nothing.

“I’ve not started a child,” Eleanor had said when he’d argued this. She’d not even blushed when Hart had laid out the fact that he’d ruined her to her father. “I know the signs. I’ll likely not marry anyone else anyway, so it does not matter, does it?”

Eleanor and her father, the pair of them with their stubborn, steadfast, unyielding Scots stolidity, had defeated him.

End of Act III, Hart, the villain, exits. Never to return.

Act IV had to be Hart’s life since Eleanor—his father’s death, marrying Sarah, losing her on one day and his son the next. Hart, who never cried, had stretched across the floor of his bedroom and wept brokenly after he’d laid Sarah and Hart Graham Mackenzie to rest in the overdone Mackenzie mausoleum.

This then, was Act V. The heroine returns to drive the villain insane.

“Hart?”

Eleanor saw Hart blinking at the light as he jerked around to face her and the lantern she carried. His hand was on the chiseled letters of his son’s name, and he was holding on to them for dear life.