Page 100 of To Pleasure a Prince
“But if she had not succeeded, Louisa might have ended up—”
“I know, I know.” She sighed heavily. “I shall never forgive myself for that. Still, since it sounds as if he made sure she was not seen, I don’t think he meant to ruin her. All he wants is to take her to the prince for one meeting.”
He glowered at her. “I suppose you approve of that.”
“I don’t approve of his underhanded tactics, no. But if you weren’t being so stubborn, he would not have resorted to such ridiculous maneuverings. You could have taken Louisa to meet His Highness yourself, you know. Then after he stated his piece, she could have made her own decision.”
“The chit is risking ruin for your idiot brother, and you think she can be trusted to make her own decisions when confronted by our manipulative regent?”
“His Highness isn’t the monster you seem to think he is,” she said stoutly.
“You don’t know anything about him, damn it. You see the charming smile he bestows on the ladies, the seemingly amiable wit and the excellent taste in art and music. You don’t see the sideIhave seen.”
She sensed that she was on the brink of discovering something very important about her husband. “What side is that?”
“The one so bloated with his own importance that he thinks nothing of seducing married women like my mother and Iversley’s mother—”
“Iversley’s?” she interrupted. “Lord Iversley is Prinny’s son?”
He blinked, then scowled. “Damn. I had no right to reveal that.”
She stared at him, her mind racing. That was why he and the earl were such good friends. And why the man’s wife was sponsoring Louisa in society. Sweet heaven. “Are you sure that Lord Iversley is Prinny’s son?
“Iversley’s father was impotent, and his mother had one liaison. With the prince. Iversley is sure, so yes, I’m sure.”
“But she could have had other lovers—”
“Not from what Iversley says. She was apparently nothing like my own mother.” His voice hardened. “Although that hardly mattered to Prinny—he’d bed anything in skirts.”
“True, and I can understand why that would make you resent him.” She chose her words carefully. “But many men in society are like that—Mr. Byrne, for example. You lethimaround Louisa. So why refuse to let His Highness near her?”
“Because once the prince has her under his control, he will do anything to get what he wants, damn it!” he spat out. “Even if he has to browbeat her or order her locked away in a dungeon—”
“Locked away in a dungeon! Don’t be absurd. He would never—” Marcus’s fierce expression made her blood run cold. “You didn’t…oh, please tell me you were never locked in the dungeon at Castlemaine.”
For a long moment, the only sound was the beat of the horse’s hooves on the road. He glanced out the window, his jaw tight. “I was. Once.”
She gaped at him in horror. “Because of Prinny?”
His gaze swung back to her, hot, angry. “Because he ordered it. His Confounded Highness did not take well to hearing what his insolent thirteen-year-old son thought of his character.”
“You lectured the Prince of Wales?” she said, incredulous.
“I told him he was a vile whoreson who didn’t deserve ever to be king.”
“Sweet heaven,” she murmured, marveling at the foolhardy bravery of Marcus at thirteen.
“I was angry, all right? What do you expect of a boy who’d heard his mother called the ‘Whore of Wales’ and other filthy names at school? Bad enough that I had to learn from schoolboys that I was considered a bastard, but then to have to return home and pretend he was just a family friend—” He swore under his breath.
“I’m sure that was very difficult.” She tried to imagine how a boy as fond of his “father” as Marcus had clearly been would handle hearing of his true heritage from a lot of nasty children. “Any other boy might have been rather intrigued to hear that his father was royalty.”
“Not if he’d ever endured having the man pinch his cheeks or demand reports on his studies. As a boy, I hated Prinny’s visits. Father would closet himself in his library, Mother would turn all flirtatious, and I was left to my tutors and told to stay out of my mother’s bedchamber.”
His fingers tightened into fists on his thighs. “By the time I found out what all that meant, Prinny had married Caroline. For a while, he was absent from Castlemaine. I got a new little sister, and Father and Mother seemed to be getting along. I really thought we were rid of the old goat. Then I came home on holiday at thirteen to see him back in his usual spot at Mother’s side, and I—” He swore under his breath. “I lost my temper and told him he was a vile whoreson.”
“I suppose that’s understandable.”
“Not to the prince.” His tone would have chilled fire. “He demanded that I apologize, and I refused. So he banished me to our dungeon for three days.”
