Notorious Pleasures (Maiden Lane #2)(90)

“But that can’t be!”

“Said so himself,” he assured her. “Got it from Anne’s own lips as she lay dying.”

“That girl always was a ninny, God rest her soul,” Mater muttered. “Did you tell him point-blank that you didn’t do it?”

“Yes, and he point-blank did not believe me, perhaps because of my recent actions with Lady Hero.”

“That’s an entirely different matter,” Mater said.

“Is it?” he asked. “To Thomas I doubt it is.”

“Anne was his wife. Lady Hero is only affianced to him. Besides…” She trailed off, biting her lip.

Griffin narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously. “Besides what?”

She waved an irritable hand. “It’s not my secret to divulge.”

“Mater.”

“Don’t growl at me.” She locked gazes with him for a moment, then looked away. “He can be so foolish sometimes.”

“Tell me.”

“It’s none of your business, Griffin.”

“If it involves Hero, it is. I love her.”

Her face softened immediately. “Oh, do you?”

“Yes, unfortunately,” he said. “Now tell me.”

“It’s just that Thomas took up with a rather risqué lady last season, a Mrs. Tate. He tried to hide it from me, of course, but I saw nonetheless. He couldn’t keep his eyes off her when he’d see her at a ball or some other such place.”

“Thomas has a mistress? Damn it, I knew it! He was following her at Harte’s Folly.”

“Rather more than a mistress I think, although perhaps he doesn’t know it himself,” she said somewhat obscurely.

Griffin’s anger was building. How dare Thomas marry Hero already encumbered by a mistress? “Has he broken it off?”

“That’s just it,” Mater replied. “I thought he had when he proposed to Lady Hero, but now I think he’s seeing Mrs. Tate again.”

“To punish Hero,” Griffin growled.

“No, I don’t think so. I think he’s formed a tendre for the woman.” Mater shook her head sadly. “I love Thomas dearly—he is my firstborn son—but he can be so very boneheaded. He should let Lady Hero go.”

“Ah.” Griffin tossed back the rest of the brandy. “But I’m afraid that doesn’t matter to me in any case.”

“What do you mean?”

“She doesn’t love me.” He tried to smile and failed. “She won’t marry me.”

“Humph.” Mater frowned ferociously. “She might say she doesn’t want to marry you, but I don’t for a moment believe she doesn’t love you. A woman like Lady Hero does not let a man into her bed out of the bonds of wedlock unless she’s fallen head over heels for him.”

He looked down at his glass, unable to meet her gaze. He suddenly found it hard to speak. “She’s hiding it well if she does love me.”

“If only we had more time,” his mother burst out. “I’m sure she’d come to her senses if Thomas would just wait to marry her.”

“It’s Wakefield who is pushing the marriage.” Griffin shook his head. “And in any case, I truly don’t think she’ll be changing her mind. I have business to finish here, and then I’ll be leaving for Lancashire.”

“But you can’t leave!” Mater cried. “Don’t you see? If you just give her time—”

“I can’t stay and watch her marry Thomas!” he hissed, the pain surfacing despite his efforts to keep it submerged. He glanced at her and then away again at the pity in her eyes. “I simply can’t.”

“Griffin—”

“No.” He cut the air with the blade of his hand. “Just listen. I’ll finish my business, and then I’m moving north permanently. I’ll either transfer my business north somehow or have my agents act for me in London. I’m not coming back.”

She watched him silently, but tears swam in her eyes. He could see them clearly.

It was more than he could bear.

“She doesn’t love me. I have to accept that fact and go on.” He picked up the decanter and a glass and strode to the door. He paused there, his back to her.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

And then he fled to his rooms. If he was lucky, he’d be insensibly drunk in an hour.

Chapter Seventeen

The queen returned to her rooms that night with a heavy heart. Her suitors were right: She must make a decision and choose the perfect man to wed, but the thought filled her with sorrow. She went to her balcony and saw that the little brown bird was already perched there.

Queen Ravenhair picked up the bird and found about his neck a string with a tiny mirror tied to the end. She untangled the mirror and held it up—and of course saw herself reflected in its surface. And then she knew the message: She was the heart of her kingdom….

—from Queen Ravenhair

Hero absently turned the diamond earring over in her fingers late that afternoon. She had retired to the sitting room with a pot of tea, now cooling on the low table in front of her. The room smelled of roses, because a giant vase of the flowers sat on the corner table. They were pale pink—her favorite—but she glanced away from the sight of them.