Читать книгу The Determined Lord Hadleigh - Virginia Heath - Страница 13

‘Try not to be nervous. Now that we know who the culprit is and that it was meant well, there really is nothing to worry about.’ Clarissa offered another one of her reassuring smiles of encouragement which Penny returned half-heartedly when the truth was she was still reeling from the revelation hours later.

While it was a relief to know that she wasn’t in any immediate danger, to learn that the man responsible for paying all her debts was the same man who had doggedly pursued her husband through the courts was bizarre. Why would he do that? It made absolutely no sense.

She was nothing to him. Just another face in an ever-changing sea of faces on the busy witness stand of the Old Bailey. Their interactions had been brief and impersonal. Or at least his interactions with her had been impersonal. He never once showed an ounce of human emotion in all the many long hours of the trial. For her, those hours had been deeply personal and life-changing. One minute she had been unhappily married to a brute and the next unwittingly married to a traitor who had been sentenced to death. Now, suddenly, out of the blue, the prosecution lawyer decided he needed to pay all her rent... Why? And more importantly, what the blazes was she supposed to say to him on the subject when he imminently arrived at her small apartment.

‘It is peculiar though...isn’t it? Why would he do it?’ Penny asked. Clarissa had asked the same question at least sixty times since Seb had told her the news just after dawn. What exactly had motivated him to be so unwelcomely generous? Guilt? Penny sincerely hoped not. ‘And what possessed him to set a Bow Street Runner on me to watch my every move?’ Knowing she had been under surveillance when she had assumed she was safe—completely incognito—really bothered her. Aside from the unpalatable fact that it was reminiscent of her years under watch during her awful marriage, if the Runner had easily found her, would the press? Or her horrid husband’s criminal friends? That was the trouble with London. In a vastly overcrowded capital, it was too easy to hide in plain sight. She had become complacent and, in so doing, had stayed far longer than she had originally intended. A situation she needed to quickly remedy for Freddie’s sake.

‘I don’t think he did that for anything other than noble reasons. In many ways, I would actually find it a comfort that somebody cared enough to want to ensure my safety and...’ Clarissa’s voice petered off as Penny glared and the fraught silence settled between them once again.

They had spoken about this most of the morning. While Clarissa seemed of the opinion it was perfectly acceptable to take the man’s money now that they knew who it came from, because it made her life considerably easier, Penny found the idea of his or anyone’s charity abhorrent. Again, it felt uncomfortably familiar. Penhurst had made her jump through hoops for every farthing she dared ask for and then used it to his advantage afterwards. You need a new dress? Wear this one... Freddie needs toys? He can have them if you stop bothering Nanny Francis... Your mother is dying and you need to take the post to visit her? If you do as you are told for the next week, and beg convincingly, I might give you the fare...

Such experiences scarred a person.

Besides, never a lender or a borrower be. Her father’s old motto rung in her ears and was too ingrained to shift. She had marched blindly into a marriage with a shameless borrower and her life had been both miserable and embarrassing as a result. Before he began his career as a criminal, it had been Penny who had had to deal with the debt collectors and the awkward conversations with friends who had lent him money in good faith when Penhurst knew full well he was in no position to pay it back.

Just thinking about how her life had been made her muscles tense and her toes curl inside her shoes. She would not start her new life beholden to anyone.

How did one explain all that to Clarissa?

Nor could Clarissa possibly empathise, particularly as their perspectives were so at odds. But then Clarissa had not had every aspect of her life controlled and Penny had. What she had initially assumed was her besotted groom’s eagerness to have her in his life had quickly turned into a rigid and oppressive life which his penchant for ruthless violence ensured she adhered to. Simple, everyday activities like walking to the village to buy ribbons were restricted unless expressly sanctioned by him. Not that she ever did buy ribbons. To buy ribbons, one needed pin money and despite bringing a significant dowry to the marriage, Penhurst never gave her a farthing unless it had many strings attached.

Control like that made you crave the opposite. Freedom and independence like she used to have. Which was why Penny was eager to start afresh. A new life. A new place. A new, improved and better her, shaped by her past certainly, but not tied to it. Rightly or wrongly, she saw her current situation as a second chance and one she refused to squander. Well before his arrest, her life shackled to Penhurst had become a wretched existence. That that had ended, regardless of the circumstances, had to be viewed as a blessing and she was not inclined to mourn its loss.

Her friend wanted to anchor her here where the past hovered ominously to haunt her for her own well-meant but ultimately insulting reasons. Poor, mistreated, misguided and fragile Penny. A label which was probably well deserved, but now galled, because it reminded her too much of the woman she had temporarily been, but now loathed. Much as she loved Clarissa and would be forever grateful to her, her overprotectiveness now was stifling and, when they clashed on any topics involving Penny’s future, felt alarmingly like control once again and instinctively that made her chafe against it. Like her awful husband and her oppressive sham of a marriage, the green, anxiously compliant and tragic Lady Penelope Penhurst was dead and good riddance to her. Long live Penny Henley! Whoever Penny Henley was.

They had both lapsed back into their own quiet thoughts, the brittle peace broken only by the ominous ticking of the second-hand clock on the tiny mantel, until the polite tap on the door had her practically jumping out of her seat.

‘Finally!’ Clarissa stood with the innate grace her plainer friend had always envied and smoothed down her dress, the action highlighting the first beginnings of the tiny baby bump forming in her normally perfectly flat tummy. The bump which she had yet to formally appraise Penny of, no doubt not to give her another excuse to want to stop being a needy burden on her generous friend’s time. ‘Sit straighter. Pull your shoulders back. Don’t smile. Remember, you want to keep the upper hand.’

Clarissa had staged the room to put the lawyer at a distinct disadvantage. Penny sat in the tallest and most regal chair, one which her friend had had delivered from her own house less than an hour ago to give the illusion of a gravitas she did not feel. Both Clarissa and Seb were to sit on the small sofa near the room’s only window, there for moral support and to ensure Penny did not allow herself to be walked over. This was well meant, but it galled. As if she would continue being a doormat after all the times Penhurst had metaphorically wiped his muddy feet on her back!

Lord Hadleigh got to sit in the short, hard chair next to the roaring fireplace. Being mild by October standards, the unnecessary fire would also serve to make the interfering lawyer feel uncomfortable. Clarissa intended the man to bake like a crusty loaf while he sweated out his apology. While Penny thought all her friend’s staging was taking things a bit too far, she did hope the searing heat would encourage him to leave swiftly. Hopefully with a polite flea in his ear, put there by the new, assertive, improved version of herself and after promising to acquire a refund from Mr Cohen for the rent. Because Lord only knew Penny stood no chance of scrabbling together a year’s worth of rent any time soon to repay him.

Clarissa opened the door and the lawyer positively filled the frame. An unpleasant surprise, when she had worked hard to convince herself he had only seemed imposing in the courtroom because of his austere barrister’s attire, and she had been entirely intimidated by the proceedings and the intentional, dramatic theatre of the Old Bailey.

He stepped in, his sharp eyes taking in the whole room, and only then did she notice Clarissa’s enormous husband behind him. Heavens, the barrister really was tall! And handsome, in an aristocratic and detached sort of way. She hadn’t noticed that before—probably because of the wig and gown. The intimidating staging of the legal system.

‘We shan’t beat around the bush...’ Clarissa gestured specifically to the tiny chair ‘...seeing that you clearly have some explaining to do and we are keen to hear it.’

He walked straight past the chair and stopped in front of Penny, inclining his golden head politely and taking her hand. ‘Lady Penhurst—my humblest of apologies. Leatham here tells me my clumsy gesture caused you angst and for that I shall never forgive myself.’

For some reason, she had not expected an outright apology straight away. Nor such a pretty one. Nor had she expected his gloveless hand to be so warm or his touch so reassuring. As if he had read her mind, his other hand came to rest on top of hers in what she assumed was meant as a friendly gesture, but in actuality made her feel a little odd. Not in an unpleasant way, but those large, gentle hands, combined with the way his unusual burnt-amber eyes locked and held with hers, set her pulse jumping.

She recognised the sensation from long ago. That frisson of awareness and excitement she remembered only too well from those initial heady days of her first and only Season, when a dashing new suitor showed an interest and flirted. Her former hopelessly romantic heart would begin to race as her vivid, naive imagination began to conjure up scenarios of a future with him. Because then, despite all the teachings of her sensible and hard-working parents, she had abandoned good sense for unrealistic dreams of romance and love. What a foolish girl she had been then!

Instinctively, she disentangled her hand and buried it with the other safely within the folds of her skirt. She watched his eyes dip to them before he smiled and her stupid pulse quickened further. She had never seen him smile. It suited him. ‘It was not my intention to cause you concern.’

‘What exactly was your intention?’ Annoyance at her own body’s reaction made her tone irritated and for that, at least, she was glad. She had fallen for pretty words once before and look where that had got her. Annoyed was decisive. Penny Henley was decisive.

He took a step back, but appeared perfectly content to stand. Uncharitably, Penny decided he was avoiding the chair on purpose to deny her the chance to take control and she instantly bristled. ‘I imagine, given our limited and professional acquaintance, my actions do seem a trifle odd, but believe me, they truly were well meant. After the Crown saw fit to render you homeless, I could not in all good conscience allow you and your innocent son to struggle.’

He considered Freddie? That was nice... Good grief, girl, grow a backbone! You used to have such a fine one. He took it upon himself to make a decision for you when he had no right. None whatsoever. She wasn’t a wife any longer. Not a chattel nor a charity case.

‘Do prosecution barristers regularly pay the household bills of defence witnesses?’ He blinked, the only sign her forthright words had been unexpected.

‘Under normal circumstances, the Crown would not take the archaic decision to strip a family of their title and assets.’ They agreed on that at least. Losing her home had ripped the floor from under her feet, hurting far more than losing her distasteful husband. ‘I was merely attempting to make some small amends for that travesty in my own ham-fisted and clumsy way.’

A plausible answer. A charming and disarming one. But not to her direct question and Penny felt her hackles rise further. He was being the unfazed and convincing lawyer she had seen every day at the Old Bailey, attempting to play her like a violin. She had seen him in action. He was charming and decisive. Used to commanding the ears and then the thoughts of those who found themselves listening to his clever arguments and well-chosen words. A man who had reluctantly come here today with one purpose. To justify having her put under surveillance for months and then anonymously settling her debts—apparently for her own good.

Despite all of Clarissa’s careful staging, he now thoroughly commanded the room. He had ignored the tiny chair. Avoided the sweltering fire. And instead of regally looking down her nose at him, Penny was forced to look up. A long way up. Another professional trick he had clearly done on purpose. She stood, hoping she appeared partially regal despite the vast difference in their heights, and allowed her irritation to show plainly on her face. Money aside, no matter which way one looked at it, having her followed was a gross invasion of her privacy, one she had every right to feel angry about.

‘Did the Crown also sanction the Runner you had spy on me?’

He blinked again, frowning slightly. ‘No. Of course they didn’t. My actions have nothing to do with the government or the Crown in any way.’

‘But you are such a noble man, such a seeker of justice, that you simply decided to right a wrong regardless? Or do you merely have a guilty conscience about what transpired?’

‘Not at all.’ He took another step back and his normally inscrutable expression dissolved briefly into one of outrage. ‘I had no part in their decision.’ The bland barrister’s mask slipped back in place. ‘If you must know, I petitioned the Attorney General on your behalf.’

That she knew. Clarissa and Seb had told her as much that dreadful night in their house in Grosvenor Square once she realised she no longer had a home to go back to. Those had been the darkest and most hopeless days of her life. The press had huddled outside the house like vultures, doing whatever they could to catch a glimpse of the traitor’s wife—soon to be traitor’s widow. No peer of the realm had been stripped of his title and his estates in decades. Neither had any peer been sentenced to death for any crime—let alone treason—since Lord Lovat after the Battle of Culloden two generations previously. Meanwhile, inside her friend’s house Penny had been too stunned, too broken down after years of her oppressive marriage, to do anything other than weep or stare, catatonic.

What was she going to do? What was to become of her son? Oh, woe is me!

When news came days later that her husband had escaped the hangman’s noose only because his criminal associates had decided it was safer to have him murdered in Newgate than risk having him make any deathbed confessions which might implicate them, an intrepid reporter had broken into Seb’s house. The intruder had successfully climbed three stairs before he was tackled and removed by the guards. Those had been three stairs too many for Penny and strangely galvanised her into action, awaking a part of her which had lain dormant for too many years. She was so tired of being the helpless victim.

Weeping and lamenting Oh, woe is me was not going to change a single thing and it certainly wasn’t going to protect her son. Only she could do both—yet could do neither while feeling pathetically sorry for herself when she only had herself to blame. The signs had been there from the outset. Clarissa had warned her. Even her father had offered to help her flee the church on the morning of her marriage despite spending a king’s ransom on the gown, the elaborate wedding breakfast and the marriage settlements, and despite knowing her mother would also be devastated to have encouraged the match. But blinded by the belief she was madly in love and madly loved in return by her handsome, titled, ardent suitor, she had positively floated down the aisle towards her groom, regardless of the niggling voice in her head which cautioned she was making a huge mistake.

It had been a revelation to finally accept the fact she had made her own bed, through her own foolish weaknesses, and now had to lie in it—and just because her new bed was hard and uncomfortable, it didn’t make it a bad bed. If anything, it was a significantly superior bed to the one she had been lying in. Only this time, she could make it exactly as she wanted.

The next day she had gone into hiding, in plain sight at Seb’s suggestion, to live independently for the first time in her twenty-four years and she had not looked back or wallowed in one drop of pointless self-pity since. Her new life had started and she found she rather enjoyed it. The past was the past. Done. Dead. She had come to terms with it all and was well shot of it. Didn’t allow herself to think upon it any more.

Yet now the past was back in the most unexpected and unforeseen way. Not from the press. Not from being recognised. But from the man still stood proudly in front of her. Too proudly when he was the one clearly in the wrong here. What gave him the right to assert change on her life when he’d had a professional hand in creating her current situation? Did he feel guilt at proving her husband guilty?

Perhaps that was the problem? That awful possibility had been niggling since she had learned the truth this morning. What if his guilt about the trial ran deeper than he was letting on? If so, then it kicked a veritable hornets’ nest she was only too content to leave well alone.

For five months, there had been no doubt in her mind that Penhurst had been guilty of all the charges levelled against him and probably more. Penny had realised as much the moment the King’s Men had stormed into her house and arrested him. Later, the lawyer’s case had been convincing and thorough, and while she felt stupid at her own ignorance and ashamed of her own cowardice to question that ignorance, so many things she had seen or heard during the final year of her marriage suddenly made perfect sense once all the pieces of the puzzle were finally slotted together.

Lord Hadleigh had done that. So much so, it had given her the confidence to stand up to her husband by telling the truth and she had resigned herself to hearing a guilty verdict.

Resigned was the wrong word.

It suggested she was dreading the verdict, when the opposite was true. While she had not expected a peer of the realm to receive the death penalty, she had anticipated a guilty verdict and a life blessedly free from Penhurst afterwards. Looked forward to it eagerly—something which caused her guilt late at night when sleep eluded her. Whatever Penhurst had done, he was still the father of her son. Something she knew she would one day have to explain to her little boy.

Was it wrong to be completely relieved to be free of him? Or to have helped him on his way by testifying against him the moment fate had given her the chance? For five months, she had consoled herself that she had done the right thing for Freddie’s sake so that he could grow into the man he was meant to be rather than one tainted and poisoned by his sire’s warped morals.

The lawyer’s guilty conscience suddenly made her question the validity of the trial. Had Lord Hadleigh embellished the truth or lied? Covered important and pertinent details up? Fabricated evidence? She sincerely hoped not. Penny did not want to have any of her relief at the tumultuous end of her marriage dampened. She had hated Penhurst and was glad he was dead. Felt no guilt at his violent passing whatsoever. But guilt might well explain why the lawyer had paid her rent for an entire year.

* * *

‘I don’t want your blood money!’

‘Blood money?’ Her harsh words took him aback. ‘I can assure you, madam, my gift was nothing of the sort.’ Hadleigh raked an agitated hand through his hair and began to pace. The very idea was as preposterous as it was insulting and he wanted to loudly proclaim his utter disgust at the suggestion. He was a principled man who believed in right and wrong. Good and evil. Justice and truth. A man who righted wrongs, not caused them. How dare she even suggest his motives were fuelled by...what? Malpractice? Deceit? Wrongdoing? And on what evidence was his good reputation so unfairly besmirched?

But as he paced the worn old rug on the hard, scuffed wooden floor, took in the mismatched furniture, the cramped and basic surroundings alongside the proud and clearly frightened woman stood before him, he couldn’t help but remember a similar scene years ago. And another time when he had attempted to rescue a woman who flatly refused to be rescued because there was nothing she needed to be rescued from.

Absolutely nothing.

Hadleigh realised that losing his temper now, just as it had done then, would not help her at all. Better to stick to reason, logic and the truth and keep emotion well out of it.

‘I can see why you would jump to that conclusion, so please allow me to reassure you. My actions had nothing to do with guilt regarding your husband or the way his trial was carried out. I am sorry if you find that difficult to hear, but on that score I am remorseless...’ Good grief! Hardly the best way to win her over and accept his benevolence in the spirit it was intended. ‘I acted as I did more out of a sense of regret that you had to suffer more than was necessary and completely unjustly. If the Crown refused to see you right, then someone needed to. I am a wealthy man, so it was no hardship for me to help. Consider it my penance for failing to get the Crown to see sense.’ He was righting a wrong. It was that simple.

‘That does not explain why you saw fit to have me spied upon these past months.’

‘I didn’t have you spied upon.’ So much for sticking to reason, logic and the truth. Hadleigh found himself wincing. She had a perfectly valid reason to be angry with him and now that he was seeing it all through her eyes, he had made a royal hash of it. ‘All right... I suppose in a manner of speaking I did, but again it was not done with any malice. After you had been left with nothing—through no fault of your own, I might add—I needed to reassure myself you and your child were coping all alone. When the Runner informed me you were selling your jewellery...’

‘Insignificant pieces to which I had no attachment.’ Her pretty face flushed as she resolutely avoided her friends’ sympathetic eyes and he realised he had inadvertently put his big, fat foot in it again. Like his mother, she was too ashamed of her situation to accept help despite none of it being her fault. ‘Things given to me by a husband which I would prefer to forget and mine to dispose of as I see fit.’ Despite the fact that both her friends, and he, knew she was pawning her mother’s jewellery to pay her monthly bills, she was still labouring under the misapprehension that her friends, at least, didn’t. ‘I no longer wanted any reminders of him in my house.’

She was proud in the face of defeat and his heart wept for her. His hands wanted to touch her, tug her into his arms and hold her close. What was that about, aside from the bone-deep exhaustion which came from weeks of sleeplessness? No wonder his emotions were a tad frayed and close to the surface. ‘A perfectly understandable reason to sell them and one which makes me sorrier my heavy-handed and unnecessary response has caused you both worry and embarrassment.’

‘I am not in need of charity, Lord Hadleigh.’

‘That I can plainly see, my lady.’ Blast it all to hell, he had gone about this all wrong. Pride always came before a fall and, like his mother, this one would rather suffer in silence than allow the world to see her pain. He, of all people, should have pre-empted such a reaction. ‘And once again, I humbly apologise for insulting you. It was well intentioned, although, I concede, highly inappropriate and misguided.’

It was time to make a hasty retreat before he was backed into a corner of his own making and forced into rescinding his gift before she had had time to mull over the many benefits of it. Given a little time, and the obvious easing of her financial burdens, she might be convinced to keep it.

‘I really meant no offence, or to cause you worry of any kind. Although I can see that my ham-fisted, overbearing and overzealous attempt at helping you has done exactly that, and for that I am sorry. This has most definitely not been my finest hour. But know that I am on your side whether you want me to be or not.’ From his pocket he produced a calling card which he gently pressed into her hand, making it impossible for her to refuse it. For some reason, his fingers longed to linger so he quickly snatched them away.

‘What I should have done all those months ago, rather than put a watch on you, was simply this. Should you need anything...anything at all...money, help...a ham-fisted but well-meaning friend...all you need do is ask. Whatever it is, whenever it is, send word to this address and I will move heaven and earth to see it done.’ Before she could respond he bowed. ‘Good day to you, Lady Penhurst. Thank you for allowing me the chance to explain and to see for myself the error of my ways. You have been most gracious.’ Then, with the swiftest and politest of nods to the room in general, he promptly turned and marched swiftly out the door.