Page 95 of The Forbidden Lord
“Of course. I wouldn’t put it past Nesfield. He won’t propose a duel—he knows he wouldn’t win. Instead he’ll hire footpads to accost Ian in some dark byway?—”
“He never said anything about murder! Surely he wouldn’t—” She broke off in horror. A man who would threaten to send a young woman to the gallows if she didn’t do his bidding would certainly not hesitate to have someone murdered.
She took a shaky breath. “In any case, I don’t know who it is. It mightn’t be Lord St. Clair at all.”
“Or it might be. I don’t think Ian would carry off an heiress, but who can know for certain?” He leaned forward, his face taut. “Even if it isn’t Ian, you were helping that snake Nesfield see to some poor man’s ruin. Why?”
“Sophie is my friend,” she said stoutly, seizing on the explanation she’d given Lady Dundee. “I … I didn’t want to see her married to some … some?—”
“Fortune-hunter? What rot! If your friend was in love with the lowliest sheep-herder, you would have gone to the ends of the earth to help them find happiness. I know you. You believe in such idiocy.” His expression tightened. “What happened to your aversion for lying? Am I to believe you took on a masquerade you loathed, dressed in provocative gowns, and paraded yourself in front of every man in London merely to help your friend? I don’t believe it!”
“I don’t care what you believe!”
“You’dbetter. Because I’m returning to London as soon as I leave you at your father’s. Ishallget to the bottom of this, if I have to strangle Nesfield to do it!”
Panic descended on her. “You can’t! Talk to Lord St. Clair if you must, and Pollock, too. Warn them to keep away. But please, don’t go near Nesfield!”
He clasped her shoulders and shook her. “Why, damn it? What has he threatened to do to you?”
Tears coursed down her cheeks. “I … I can’t … tell you! You can’t do anything about it and if I tell you?—”
“Is it your father’s living? Is that it? He’s threatened to take away your father’s living? Damn it, Emily, I can give your fathertenlivings, wherever he likes!”
“It won’t matter!” She stared distractedly about her. “Lord Nesfield knows things about me … he says he’ll …”
No, she couldn’t tell him. He would rush back to Lord Nesfield for certain then, no matter how much she begged. Jordan was the sort to act, and he would never accept that he couldn’t prevent the marquess from having her prosecuted. So he’d blunder in and threaten Lord Nesfield and accomplish nothing but her ruin. She could think of only one way to prevent that.
She clasped his coat. “I’ll marry you, Jordan. I’ll be your mistress … I’ll do whatever you want! Just don’t go to Nesfield! Take me back to London with you, and I’ll … I’ll talk to him myself!”
He was staring at her now as if she were some loathsome insect. Releasing her shoulders, he tore her clenched hands from his coat, then fell back in the seat. “‘Things?’ What kind of ‘things’ does Nesfield know about you that are so heinous you’d offer to be my mistress to keep from having them exposed?”
“It doesn’t matter. We’ll get married, and then perhaps he won’t …” She trailed off. “What am I saying? He hates you. If we marry, he’ll be even more likely to use what he knows against me.”
Jordan was looking at her with such wariness, her heart twisted in her chest.
“Besides, you don’t want a wife with dark secrets, do you? It’s one thing to lower yourself to marry a mere rector’s daughter, but God forbid you should marry a woman who keeps things from you, who might be a thief or a … a murderer.”
“That’s enough.”
“I’d ask you to trust me,” she whispered. “But you won’t do that, will you? Not the mighty Earl of Blackmore. No, you must know everything, have control over everything. You would never be so foolish as to trust somebody else.”
“Damn you, Emily, shut up!” His eyes blazed, like two torches in the blackest night. Then he rapped sharply on the ceiling. “Go on to the rectory, Watkins!”
The coach rocked, then rumbled forward. She stared at Jordan. “What are you going to do?”
He didn’t answer. A disquieting stillness had come over him, tense and frightening.
“You’re going to speak to him anyway. Even though I’ve asked you not to. Even though you promised not to if I gave myself to you.”
That made him flinch. “I should never have made that promise. Nothing good has come of it.”
“You’re going to break it then.”
“Don’t you see? I have to. It’s for your own good. Nothing you’ve said has changed my mind about this situation. I’m leaving you at your father’s and returning to London.”
He glanced away. “But I’ll be back. No matter what you think of me, Emily, I won’t abandon you. I don’t need the tie of some dubious emotion to do right by you. We’ll be married, no matter what Nesfield says or does or?—”
“If you speak to him on my behalf, there will be no marriage.”
