Page 96 of The Heiress's Daughter
They drove in silence through the streets until they reached Hyde Park. There were already quite a few people around, but nowhere near the numbers that came at the fashionable hour. Lord Randall passed them at a spanking pace, taking them to an area that was quiet and relatively deserted.
Clarissa was glad he hadn’t tried to talk while they were moving. She’d been nervous enough at the prospect of the conversation and where it might lead, but when he’d come to collect her and she prepared herself for an undignifiedscramble to climb into the curricle, he’d simply put his hands around her waist and lifted her—just lifted her—apparently without effort, and she knew she was no lightweight.
It completely scrambled her brain.
The horses slowed to a walk, and when they came to a large tree overhanging the path, he pulled in under it. He secured the reins and turned to her. “Now, is this about our betrothal?”
Clarissa nodded.
“You want to call it off?” He seemed quite tense.
“I’m…I’m not sure,” she managed. She hadn’t slept a wink during the night, thrashing around and tangling the sheets, a turmoil of questions tumbling over and over in her mind, as she rehearsed what she was going to ask him and what she would say if he said this or that. So many possibilities. In the darkness of the night she’d felt quite eloquent: now she could barely think of a word to say.
“You know that I am fully committed to it?”
She scanned his face worriedly. “Really? Are you sure?”
“I am. But you still have doubts? Questions? About me?”
“Yes.” She didn’t know how to phrase the question, but to her relief he did it for her.
“Is it because of my reputation?”
“Yes.” He was making it easy for her, for which she was very grateful.
He nodded, as if in confirmation. “Very well, I promise I’ll be honest with you.” He fell silent for a moment, then said, “People talk. Gossip. And I’m afraid I’ve used that to my advantage.”
Clarissa looked at him in surprise. It wasn’t at all what she expected. “To your advantage? How can gossip be an advantage?”
He gave her a rueful smile. “It’s a long story, and not very interesting.”
“I’m interested,” she said softly. She folded her hands in her lap and waited.
He thought for a moment, then began. “It probably started with my father. After my mother died—I had just turned eleven—he…” He shook his head. “I thought they were deeply in love, and perhaps they were, but after she died, he became a byword for…womanizing. So much so that even before I’d left school he was known as Rake Randall.”
He glanced at her. “Yes, like me. It didn’t much affect me—I was at school, and then at university. But then he died…”
She laid a sympathetic hand on his arm, but said nothing.
“When he died, I inherited his title and his estates—everything. And when I came up to London, a naive young man, eager to get a taste of the high life, I was…hunted. Matchmaking mamas and their daughters. Not interested in me as much as the title and the fortune. But what young man—I was one and twenty—wants to marry and settle down before he’s even had a taste of life’s possibilities? Certainly not me. So I learned to flirt, but be evasive.”
Birds twittered in the tree overhead. Clarissa pretended to look for them while she considered what he’d told her. She could understand his desire not to be tied down at a young age, but how did flirting lead to his being labeled a rake? There was surely quite a difference. She asked him.
“Oh, that was only the start. I began an affair with an older woman—she was not much older than I, except in sophistication. She was an unhappy and very beautiful wife whose husband neglected her shamefully.” He grimaced. “At least that’s the tale she told me. I certainly fell for it.”
“He didn’t neglect her?”
He snorted. “Who knows whether he did or not? I realized later that she was trying to spark his jealousy. He caught us together—in retrospect I believe she’d tipped him off. He flew into a jealous rage, and there was a huge scandal and a duel, which we both managed to survive, though I was wounded in the shoulder. I, being the one at fault, deloped,but I think he would have happily killed me. Luckily for me, he was a poor shot.”
She gave him a troubled look. It all sounded quite sordid. But he was only twenty-one.
“And B—the woman concerned—wasn’t the least bit discreet. She loved all the drama and spread the gossip with great glee. Somehow, through her deliberate indiscretions—and no doubt to needle her husband—I gained a reputation as a superb lover. That, added to my tendency to flirt”—he shrugged—“and I became Rake Randall as well.”
Clarissa thought about what he’d told her, then shook her head. “No. There has to be more to it than that.”
“Oh, there was, though I never again dallied with a married woman. Nor have I ever seduced an innocent.”
Clarissa bit her lip. Could she believe that or not? She wanted to, but…
