Page 64 of Rose and the Rogue
“What are you not telling me, Adrian? Why would the parents of a girl caught in an upsetting scandal not leap at any chance to end the problem?”
He would have to tell her everything. “It’s more than upsetting, and there’s a reason Rosalind Blake views me as worse than being alone.”
“Go on.”
So he told her. Told her about the stupidity of his youth, how he set so much store by the words and deeds of old schoolmates just out of Eton, young men who thought they knew everything just because they’d gotten a school-leaving certificate. How Adrian might technically be considered an adult but was really still a foolish boy. How he allowed himself to be drawn into the sort of mischief that was only “mischief” for privileged boys, but was destruction for anyone who got caught in the way. Like the young woman who his group of friends had decided to target—a shy girl living in Windsor, pretty and chaste and far too trusting.
Adrian had bet that he’d be the one who took her virginity, and he specified the date he’d do so, just to show off. It became a game, him against a few others, and for a few weeks, that girl had thought she was the most popular prize in Windsor…and she was, just not in the way she thought.
It hadn’t been difficult to seduce her, and Adrian had almost convinced himself that it was harmless fun. He’d even managed to think that there would be no lasting consequences…until he did collect his winnings (using a letter from her that admitted the deed). Within a day, the word was out throughout the town, and though Adrian’s name was bandied about (along with the other young men who’d bet), he never suffered a bit of censure. But he never saw her again, and he left the town shortly after, fleeing back home to the family estate, where no one knew what he’d done.
“She left Windsor. She left England, actually,” Adrian finished his story. “It was worse than just a dalliance, because everyone knew she’d been ruined because of a wager. Not because someone wanted her so much he couldn’t wait. Or any other version of the tale.”
“The poor girl.”
“She wasn’t that poor afterward,” he added. “We paid her off.”
“We?”
He admitted, “I got the money from Father. I had to tell him what happened to get it.”
“And he never breathed a word of it to me,” she said.
“He didn’t want you to know. He knew you’d be disappointed.”
“What was the girl’s name?”
“Alba. Her father worked for the college. He resigned his post after…” Adrian shook his head. “She never told her parents it was me, even with the rumors, she refused to give a name. She didn’t want any connection. She just wanted to get away.”
As he spoke, he couldn’t shake how history was repeating itself, despite all his attempts to live his life differently.
“If she never told her father, how did he know who to press for payment?”
“He never did. Alba managed to get in contact with Carlos. Everyone in Windsor knew that we were friends, and even though I’d fled home after the scandal, Carlos stayed on. He was the go-between. And honestly, I’m rather surprised that he still kept me on as a comrade. He was furious with me.”
“Perhaps he is a better friend than I’d given him credit for,” she said grudgingly. “I always thought him to be a rabble-rouser.”
“Oh, he is. But he’s probably a lot smarter than I am, even if he never completed his studies.”
“And now things have come full circle.”
“But they shouldn’t!” Adrian burst out. “That’s what doesn’t make sense. I never bet on Rose. I’d kill myself before ever doing that with any woman. But Blake must have heard about those past rumors, not to mention all the other accounts of affairs since then. And the duels. I’ll own up to affairs and duels. But the betting…no.”
“Yet that’s what Mr. Blake is using as a reason to forbid a marriage. And I must say that any parent would take pause after hearing such a thing.”
“Turns out my name and money and otherworldly magnetism isn’t enough in the end,” he concluded, his voice heavy with sarcasm. “I’ll have to find some young lady who’s mercenary enough to not care about any of it, so long as she gets her title and her pin money.”
“So that is why you’ve never considered the opinion of your class since then. I wondered why you’d changed so much after finishing at Eton. Why you ignored all our advice to set yourself up for a society marriage and carry on the line. Why you went wild and mocked all the husbands and gentlemen by having affairs with their wives.”
“I suppose so. I never thought of it like that.”
“It seems quite obvious in retrospect. So the task that is set before you now is to convince the Blake family that you do love Rosalind, and are worthy of her.”
But Adrian shook his head. “It’s too late.”
“What sort of son have I raised?” she asked, getting up from the table. She went out the door and left him alone to brood.
* * * *
