Page 73 of The Art of Sinning
After that sent him into a long silence, she prompted him to go on. “So you became her pupil.”
He roused, as if from a dream. “I paid for the tutoring myself out of my generous monthly allowance. While my parents assumed I was drinking in taverns like most men my age, I was actually having secret lessons with Mrs. Miller.”
“My, my, you certainly are good at secret meetings with ladies.”
“I am that,” he drawled. “Though it probably didn’t hurt that she had her own cottage. It made it easy to spend enough time with her to really learn something.”
A lump stuck in her throat. “And for you to fall in love with her.”
He shot her a sharp look. “More like lust. It’s not the same. Or so I’m told, although romantic love isn’t a feeling I’ve ever experienced myself.”
Well. Nothing like being blatantly warned that he didn’t love her. That perhaps hecouldn’tlove her.
Not that it mattered. She didn’t love him, either.
Or rather, shehopedshe didn’t. The last time she’d fancied herself in love with a man who kept secrets, it had ended so awfully that she no longer trusted herself when it came to men.
Still, she hadn’t given up hope that one day a gentleman would sweep away all her fears and she would know he was the one she could marry. Recently she’d even begun to hope it might be Jeremy. But he seemed bent on dashing that hope.
Fighting to hide her tumultuous emotions, she asked, “What about the Widow Miller? Was she in love with you?”
He shook his head. “She was still mourning her late husband. But we shared common interests and were both young and lonely and randy as hell. So it was probably inevitable that we ended up in bed together.”
Inevitable? Yvette snorted. If the woman had possessed a pair of eyes and Jeremy had been even a tenth as handsome as he was now, it had definitely been inevitable. Especially for a widow, who needn’t worry about losing her innocence. Widows were notoriously wanton, she’d heard.
And having spent time in Jeremy’s arms, Yvette began to understand why.
He stared down at his hands. “When I learned Hannah was bearing my child, I wasn’t exactly overjoyed. I had big plans—to go away to Philadelphia, about three hours from Montague, and study painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Then I’d planned to travel and view the world’s masterpieces.”
A sad smile twisted his lips. “Hannah knew of my dreams and didn’t want me to give them up for her. When I proposed marriage, as I knew I must, she said she would only marry me if I continued with my plans. She suggested that we go to Philadelphia together as husband and wife.”
His voice hardened. “We were so naïve. We thought we would merely march into my father’s study, announce we were getting married, and he would happily send us off to Philadelphia with his blessing. And my usual allowance.”
The bleak look in his eyes made her want to cry. “It didn’t happen that way.”
“Hardly.” He straightened on the stool. “My father wasn’t about to permit his only son to run off and become an artist. He’d always meant for me to manage the family mills, as he’d done from the day he’d married my mother.”
Jeremy clenched his hands into fists on his knees. “The branch of the Keanes that moved to America hadn’t been wealthy. He’d always craved what his rich relations had, so he was eager to marry Mother and get his hands on her mills, since she was her father’s only child and heir. After Father and Mother inherited the company, he was determined I would be his successor.”
“But you didn’t want that.”
“Ineverwanted that. I respected the work it took for him to keep them running, but I didn’t see why I had to do it, too. By the time I’d turned eighteen, he already had competent managers. He didn’t need me. Or so I thought.”
A muscle worked in his jaw. “But when I told him I wanted to marry Hannah and go study painting in Philadelphia, he made it quite clear that he wouldn’t countenance that. He said he’d cut me off if I pursued art as a profession; everything would go to Amanda.”
“That’s awful!” She was irate on his behalf. “In England a father can’t cut off his son like that, you know. Or not easily, anyway.”
“Well, then, I suppose there are some advantages to the English system of inheritance.” Anger flared in his eyes. “I wanted to tell him to give my inheritance to someone who gave a damn, but I couldn’t. I’d soon have a wife and baby to support. So Father had me where he wanted. He said he’d give his blessing to the match if I agreed to stay at Montague and learn how to run the mills.”
His voice grew choked. “Hannah told me I should refuse his conditions. We would go to Philadelphia without his money. She would give lessons and I’d find a position somewhere until we could save enough for me to attend the academy.”
He paused, as if fighting for composure, and Yvette choked down tears of sympathy. She could see how much it cost him to tell her this. Should she even have asked him to speak of it?
Yes, she’d been right in that. Any man who kept such torment bottled up inevitably found himself dragged down by it. She’d seen it happen to both Edwin and Samuel after Mama’s death. Neither of her brothers had ever fully faced their grief, as she had. They’d simply twisted it into something else. For Edwin, it had been cynicism and melancholy. For Samuel, it had been recklessness.
But Jeremy’s tragedy had run far deeper than theirs. To lose a wife and child in one fell swoop! How had he borne it?
He drew in a long breath as if to steady himself. “But I feared that Hannah and I striking off together on our own was beyond my abilities. I had no experience at anything but being a rich man’s son. How was I to find a position that paid well enough to take care of a family?”
