Page 8 of The Inconvenient Compromise
* * *
Happiness wassomething she could not afford to hope for. She had long since accepted that it was not meant for her. Her goal had been to marry well enough to help her sister establish herself in society. After all, they were teetering on the edge of financial ruin, and Francesca had no idea. She’d wanted to protect her sister from that, just as she’d spent her life protecting her from all the unpleasantness of their parents’ marriage. In so doing, she’d perhaps done her a disservice. Francesca’s innocence, hopefulness, and belief in love had left her vulnerable to a man who had only intended to use and discard her.
“I will not hope for happiness,” she said. “I will hope that we can be, at best, allies.” If she dared hope for more, she would only be disappointed. Lucian Maxwell was a rake. A ne’er-do-well. A man who coasted through life on his handsome face and his charm. How could she ever put her faith in such a man? Perhaps the real reason she’d been so willing to set her cap for Kenworth was that he was so very staid, so very dull, and so very bound by his honor. He would have, at the very least, been a predictable sort. Now, she had no notion what the future might hold.
“No, Fiona. We will be much more than that.” His eyes glittered with something she did not understand—something she could not name. But it both frightened and excited her. “We shall be lovers… and very shortly. Your reprieve is at an end.”
SIX
Sunday—Evening…
They were staying at Mivart’s. After disembarking from the hack they’d taken from the posting inn to the fashionable hotel, they were greeted by a bevy of servants who rushed to make them welcome.
Lucian spared a glance at her as they were being shown to their room. She had been quiet in the carriage after he’d made his pronouncement that he would not be extending the reprieve he’d granted. But he’d kept his word to the priest and allowed her a good night’s sleep; she had been well-fed, and was now a respectably married woman. And there was a great deal riding on the fact that he should produce an heir expeditiously. Not to mention that the longer they avoided it, the more resistant she would become. Because Fiona, while quite ready to get married, was not at all prepared to be a wife. Not yet, at any rate. Her lack of trust in the world, and in men specifically, could make things very rocky for them. Establishing a more intimate connection between them would hopefully inspire some semblance of affection to combat her cynicism.
“We will have a light meal prepared and sent to our chamber. And have hot baths prepared for the both of us,” Lucian instructed the servant who showed them to their rooms.
He heard her squeak of alarm but ignored it.
A short time later, the servants poured bucket after bucket of steaming water into two large tubs, each tucked behind a screen for warmth and modesty. He bathed quickly, eager to move on to the other pressing matters of the night. But he didn’t rush her. Instead, he settled himself at the small table where their repast had been laid and listened to the sounds of the water splashing. He could just imagine what was taking place on the other side of that screen, and he was enjoying the pretty pictures it painted in his mind.
* * *
Fiona was lingeringin her bath, the water growing cooler to the point she was actively shivering. It was a blatant attempt to postpone the inevitable. While she was not afraid of him or the marital act, she was still terrified. Panicked even—but her fears were more that it would change her somehow, that it would soften her heart and make her vulnerable to him in ways that she was not quite prepared to deal with. Being vulnerable to anyone terrified her. After months of tolerating the backhanded insults thinly camouflaged as either concern or teasing, of walking on eggshells for fear of incurring Charlotte’s wrath, all Fiona wanted was a bit of peace.
One of the things she’d hoped for in marrying the Earl of Kenworth was simply an escape. She wanted to leave London andthe Tonfar behind and settle in the country to raise babies and tend a little rose garden with a mostly absent husband. She very much doubted that Lucian Maxwell would ever be content with such a bucolic existence, and he would likely never permit her to do so without him. He seemed to be the sort who would demand from her the things she did not want to give just to be a contrarian and to irritate her beyond measure.
“You cannot hide behind that screen forever, Fiona.”
Think of the devil, and he will speak.
He continued, “The water has grown cold, I know, and soon our dinner will be just as chilled.”
Reluctantly, Fiona rose from the tub. There was only the screen separating them, and as she stood naked behind it, drying herself with the towel the maid had left, she was acutely aware of that fact. Rushing through the process, she donned the nightrail provided for her along with the wrapper. Where they had come from, she was afraid to ask.
She took a deep fortifying breath before moving from behind the screen to the dressing table. There she began the long and arduous process of combing the snarls from her hair. She could feel his gaze upon her.
“Your hair truly is magnificent,” he remarked, rising from the small sitting area where he waited for her. “I do not think I have ever seen such hair on anyone in my life. Like an ancient warrior princess. I can quite easily picture you in braids, with your face painted and a sword brandished before you.”
“You are clearly given to flights of fancy,” she retorted. “I am not especially brave or fierce. I certainly have no notion how one should use a sword.”
“Unless it is to benefit your younger sister… then you are like a lioness,” he observed.
Fiona placed the comb back on the dressing table and began twisting her still-damp hair into a thick braid. It would take forever to dry, but she hadn’t the patience to do anything else with it at that point. “My mother and father have always been consumed with their own interests and their aversion to one another. Francesca and I have largely been left to ourselves. I have always taken care of her. And I always will.”
“Even if that means leaving her alone and marrying a man you do not love—a man you barely know—in order to help secure her future,” he surmised.
“Yes,” she said firmly. “I have endured Lady Bruxton’s abuse for months. I doubt you will dish anything out that is worse.”
He laughed. “Whatever conceit I possess, Fiona, I think you will manage to quash it. Effortlessly, it would seem.”
“I do not mean to be difficult,” Fiona said. “But I cannot fathom how we will be anything but miserable in this match.”
“And did you expect to be happy with Kenworth?”
“No. I expected not to care enough for him that it would matter one way or another… and I suspected he would care just as little for me. I thought, in truth, that we would live very separate lives once our duties had been fulfilled.”
“And heir and a spare?”
