Chapter Three

CHAPTER THREE

C atherine gasped in horror, but Jemima only laughed at the Duke's announcement, the sound like tinkling bells.

"Is this a joke, Your Grace?" Jemima asked good-naturedly, clearly imagining that their visitor could not be serious as to make such a strange statement.

Catherine looked sharply at Jemima, urging her to hold her tongue. Old family friend or not, this man did not seem like someone to make harmless jokes or casual chit-chat. With his mask and his lack of conversation, he could be sinister, and she quailed at the thought of Jemima inadvertently falling into his unpredictable clutches.

"That is certainly the most singular purpose claimed by any of our guests so far this Season," Catherine stated directly without any attempt at humor. "Are you going to explain yourself properly to my sister and me?"

The Duke seemed nonplussed at her response, the furrow between his eyebrows deepening. She was only too glad at the possibility of evoking the same sense of unease in him that his announcement had triggered in her.

"Well, well, well," Lord Sedgehall murmured, sounding pleased as he set the document down on a table. "We should certainly discuss this further, Your Grace. Our predecessors showed some forethought in this, didn't they?"

Having now snatched up the paper, Catherine read it quickly, her eyes scanning with astonishment the somewhat scrawled but still-legible handwriting. The seal of Viscount Sedgehall at the bottom was genuine, as was her grandfather's distinctive signature, dated a quarter of a century ago.

It seemed to her that two old men had once sat down over a bottle of brandy and carved up the destinies of their future grandsons or granddaughters as if they were merely arranging to put their best mares up to their stallions.

Catherine shuddered to think of Jemima being disposed of in such a cold-blooded manner. If the Duke of Redbridge was as rich as she guessed from the cut and fabric of his black suit, then their father would be only too glad to marry Jemima off to him.

Well, Catherine would not be so easily swayed, and she was more than ready to defend Jemima. But when she looked up, ready to rush to her sister's rescue, she saw that the Duke's deep blue eyes were fixed on her rather than her younger sister or her father.

"It is no joke," the Duke declared solemnly. "I have heard that you are an uncommonly intelligent and capable woman, Miss Wright. I would particularly like to discuss this matter with you if your father permits it."

"What do you mean, Your Grace?" Catherine blurted out, a new kind of panic rising in her stomach. "Women are not counters in a game, existing only to be exchanged by men playing at a board."

"Are they not? It seems to me that women and men are both counters on such a board, although the players are not human. Fate shifts us this way and that, or God, perhaps, if you listen to the priests. Either way, the players have no great consideration for the counters."

It was a peculiar and fatalistic speech for a young man, sad as much as bitter. As he spoke, Catherine saw hints of a vulnerability in him that briefly tempered her anger at importunate men.

But still, he had come here with the arrogance of "claiming" one of her father's daughters as his wife, just as a farmer might browse cattle from good stock at a marketplace. Her anger rose again, fueled by fear as well as outrage.

"Male or female, if the counters refuse to be moved, the game cannot proceed," she countered.

Catherine wished to dissuade the Duke from his cause rather than to hurt him, but she was still willing to see him suffer before sacrificing her sister or herself on this strange altar set up by long-dead men.

"Even if the counters had any say, there can be no winning or losing if the game stalls forever—no progress, no learning, and no growth. Or so it seems to me. I need a wife in order to establish myself in Society. As my grandfather already made such a fitting suggestion, and my grandmother approves, why should I not accede to it?"

The Duke seemed to believe his own words. Catherine then realized she would like to have stern words with his grandmother, too. Before she could answer him, a maid brought in a tea tray and laid out cups and saucers for the sixth time that day. Silence reigned in the room until Betsy had departed.

"Your grandmother is a wise woman, Your Grace," Albion interjected. "Your proposal makes perfect sense to me. I suggest that you and I discuss the matter privately in my study first. Then, perhaps you and Catherine can reach some understanding together."

"An understanding? What understanding?!" Catherine tried to protest, but the Duke was already on his feet, following Lord Sedgehall to the door.

To her left, Jemima was laughing again, having picked up the scroll and read its contents for herself, appearing still not to comprehend the earnestness of their strange visitor and the danger he represented.

"Why do you think he wears a mask?" Jemima asked innocently once the men were gone. "Smallpox, perhaps? Although it would be odd if it were only on one side of his face. He has nice eyes, doesn't he? I think he's shy?—"

"Oh, Jemima!" Catherine shook her head at her sister's naivety. "We don't know anything about this man. Maybe he has a scar from a terrible duel, or a large birthmark, or signs of some…unmentionable disease. He might just want to appear mysterious. What you think is shyness could be easily arrogance and disregard for the feelings of others."

"I don't think so," her sister answered. "I believe he's shy, and kind, and needs a wife, just as he says."

"You don't know men!" Catherine retorted. "You think they're all like the dashing heroes in your novels, but they're not. You must not start imagining yourself in love with the Duke of Redbridge."

"I'm not going to imagine that at all, Catherine." Jemima laughed. "He's not interested in me, anyway. He wants you . Weren't you watching him or listening at all just now?"

The Duke of Redbridge wanted her ? The thought sent a terrible thrill through Catherine's body. She had felt nothing but contempt for the men who had pursued her since she had debuted seven years ago. Their weakness and lust had been only too apparent to her eyes, even when partly hidden with sentimental words or bouquets of flowers.

This masked young nobleman was somehow different, although she could not say exactly how. It might be that his wants currently seemed more complex and opaque than she had expected. But surely all men only wanted the same thing from women in the end? A short conversation would likely show the Duke in the same light as all the others.

"Well, I don't want him," Catherine declared, taking up her teacup with a slightly unsteady hand. "I shall tell him so to his face."

"Well, well, well…" Lord Sedgehall murmured again as they settled into the comfortable leather chairs on either side of the fireplace in his study, two glasses of good brandy on the table between them. "So, you wish to marry my eldest daughter, I gather?"

Hugh nodded, glad that this man seemed so understanding of his position and willing to be guided by the wishes of the previous generation. His grandmother had been right about Lord Sedgehall's keenness to see his daughters married quickly. It boded well for the success of Hugh's plan.

"I have heard that your eldest daughter is a good match for a man in my position. My wife must be fit for the title, and my grandmother says that there is little that Miss Wright could not accomplish if she set her mind to it."

Lord Sedgehall guffawed and took a sip of his brandy. "Yes, that's true, although there's also little she will do once she has set herself against it. I pity the man who tries to tame my daughter, but she is a rational woman and open to reasoned argument, if not from me."

There was an odd mix of pride and sorrow in Lord Sedgehall's voice as he spoke of Catherine.

"I would seek to persuade her to accept my proposal rather than seek to overrule any natural inclination," Hugh said. "Whatever dreams she might have about her future husband, there would be many compensations and advantages to setting these aside and becoming the Duchess of Redbridge—rank, jewelry, money…"

Lord Sedgehall's eyes gleamed at the mention of the material benefits of such a union. The Dowager Duchess had also evidently been right about the Sedgehall estate's financial troubles. Hugh doubted that his grandmother had ever been wrong about anything.

"I feel duty bound to warn you that Catherine dreams of no future husband," Lord Sedgehall said bluntly. "She has turned down all the marriage offers she has received in the last seven years."

Hugh swirled the brandy around his mouth thoughtfully. It was well that he would not be seeking to usurp some other existing prospect. But Catherine's reluctance to marry could be an obstacle. At five-and-twenty, her father could hardly force her down the aisle.

"You think that Miss Wright would refuse my proposal? I assure you that I am quite determined in this matter. In beauty as in blood and reputation, there can be no more appropriate wife for me than your daughter. I have no desire to go hunting for the same qualities in London's ballrooms when I can fix the matter with two conversations this very day."

"Well said, Your Grace. Your fixity of purpose does you credit. My daughters are indeed of impeccable stock, excellent education, and fine physical form. If Catherine rejects your proposal, I would urge you to take Jemima. My youngest daughter is an acknowledged beauty, far less willful, and five years younger than her sister. She has many suitors, but we have not yet settled on one in particular."

Hugh nodded, remembering Jemima's rosy-cheeked, round face. It would feel wrong in some ways to bring such innocence into his cursed life, but a wife was a wife, and she would grow up in time.

Then, he pictured Catherine again as he had first seen her in the drawing room, with her wild dark blonde hair and slightly disheveled dress. She was certainly just as beautiful as her younger sister, but also fiercer and stronger. He felt drawn to her in some way, as he had never felt drawn to a woman before.

The thought crossed Hugh's mind that Catherine's appearance this afternoon was almost that of a woman unexpectedly just pleasured by her lover. He could not help imagining himself as the man who had ravished her into such a state but then forced himself to stop. If she refused his offer, such fantasies could never be fulfilled, and there was no purpose in frustrating himself.

"Miss Jemima is very beautiful," Hugh agreed. "I can understand her success in Society. But I am a man of thirty years, and I believe that my…lifestyle and character would better suit a woman who is a bit older and with more experience. If Miss Wright can be persuaded to have me, she would very much be my first choice."

"That sounds very sensible, Your Grace, and I will do whatever I can to help. It is my dearest wish to have both of my girls well settled with good husbands long before I am in my dotage. You know, presumably, that I am not a wealthy man?"

Hugh shrugged, not wishing to reveal every detail that his grandmother had told him about the Wright family and the Sedgehall estate. It was, in any case, nothing to him.

"I made a poor investment in the north some years ago, and the workers' unrest has drastically cut the returns I expected on my capital," Lord Sedgehall revealed. "As that was the money I planned to set aside for my daughters' dowries, I've been left in a quandary."

"I see," Hugh said, only from politeness.

"With Catherine having refused all offers and being almost six-and-twenty, I rather assumed that she would remain a spinster. I can scrape together the money for a decent dowry for Jemima, but it would be a struggle to provide for both girls?—"

"I require no dowry," Hugh quickly interrupted, as Lord Sedgehall was doubtlessly hoping that he would. "I have no sisters or other marriageable female relatives to provide for, and my fortune is ample enough to set Miss Wright and any children we might have up for life."

Again, Lord Sedgehall's eyes shone. He had probably expected some negotiation on this point, and paying no dowry for Catherine at all was likely beyond his best hopes.

"I am glad to hear that the Redbridge estate has continued to prosper over the years. Your grandfather was a fine man of business—of course, as was your father—God rest both their souls. It sounds as though you have proved yourself the worthy successor of their efforts."

"My uncle, Edwin Vaughan, has also done a great deal to ensure good management of the estate," Hugh admitted. "I came into the title young. My uncle and my grandmother have both done a great deal for the family."

Lord Sedgehall's brow creased slightly as he tried to recall the circumstances of Hugh's succession. "Of course, you did," he muttered after a moment of reflection. "There was that terrible fire. The whole ton was in mourning for months, as I recall."

"I wouldn't know." Hugh shrugged. "I was kept at Redbridge for a long time afterwards, with physicians and nurses. I've never spent much time in London or out in Society."

"Well, when you're a married man, I'm sure that will change," Lord Sedgehall said. "The right wife can be a great boon to a man."

Hugh nodded in agreement. He wondered with dark amusement when his prospective father-in-law would finally get round to mentioning the matter of his scarred face.

"Do you always wear the mask?" Lord Sedgehall finally asked, as though Hugh had magically implanted the thought in his mind. "I suppose it was the fire, wasn't it?"

"Yes, the fire. I always wear the mask in company."

Hugh's polite but clipped answer gave no indication of how hard his heart beat when the subject of his scarred face was raised. The marks on his face always felt like a public, undeniable brand of his guilt as the carrier of the curse that had killed his family. When people stared at him, he felt as angry as if they were publicly accusing him of murder.

To Hugh's relief, Lord Sedgehall moved on quickly without further probing. He would not be provoked to any angry outburst this afternoon.

"Well then, I think I shall go explain all this to the ladies," Lord Sedgehall said. "Catherine can take any initial displeasure out on me. You can then return tomorrow morning after she has had time to think the matter over and hopefully come round to the idea of being your bride and the Duchess of Redbridge. Shall we say eleven o'clock?"

There was a smile of real satisfaction on Lord Sedgehall's face as he talked. The chance to marry off his difficult eldest daughter without having to pay a penny clearly outweighed many other considerations, including the acquisition of a reclusive son-in-law with a scarred face.

"Very well, I will come back tomorrow at eleven o'clock and will hope to formalize my betrothal with Miss Wright. I trust you will assure your daughter of my best intentions and all the privileges of her future position as my wife."

Lord Sedgehall nodded. "You may rely on me to convey your proposal in the most favorable light, Your Grace. This marriage would clearly benefit both families and estates. While she might initially resist the idea, Catherine has the intelligence to accept this, too, I'm sure."

"Until tomorrow, then." Hugh bowed his farewell to Lord Sedgehall in the study.

There was nothing else left to say. He returned to the hallway, where the butler was already waiting at the front door with his coat and hat.

This call had not been a pleasant experience, by any means, but it had still proceeded better than Hugh had anticipated. He was leaving with relief and the sense of a task at least partially accomplished.

Lord Sedgehall had immediately taken his side. Persuading Catherine might require greater effort and courage, but Hugh was no coward. He was prepared to meet with resistance and overcome it with reason, reassurance, and resolve.

"I'll see His Grace out, Elford." An authoritative feminine voice suddenly drew him out of his reverie. "You may go."

"Very good, Miss Wright." The butler nodded and walked away.

Hugh was surprised when Catherine closed the front door and put a hand on his arm to draw him into a smaller sitting room off the main hallway. While shocking for an unmarried young lady of good breeding to lay hands on a gentleman, it amused Hugh, and he allowed himself to be steered by her.

"In here, please, Your Grace. I believe we need to talk. Now."

Her long blonde hair was still hanging down her back, and her feet made no noise on the floor. Hugh realized that she had removed her shoes and was walking around in her stockinged feet as though it were perfectly normal, something he had never seen a woman do. Except perhaps Rose.

A memory of his sister making barefooted cartwheels across the front lawn of Redbridge Hall, her golden-red hair fluttering freely in the breeze, flashed in his mind. What would Rose have made of Catherine?

No, he could not allow himself to ponder that question.

"I have already fully explained my intentions to your father, Miss Wright, and we are in agreement. I believe he intends to talk to you himself before I return tomorrow. It would be best for you to comply with his wishes."

"No, it wouldn't," Catherine retorted immediately. "It would be best if you tell me exactly what is going on and show me basic respect by treating me like a woman of five-and-twenty rather than a child subject to my father's will. What exactly did you and my father just agree on in the study?"

"That you should be my wife," Hugh said simply.

He quickly realized that he had made a major error, as those few words set Catherine's green eyes ablaze with fury.

"I will not be your wife!" she declared. "I do not intend to be any man's wife. How dare you? I don't even know your name."

"I meant to say that your father and I agreed that I should propose to you, Miss Wright, and that he would support it. Believing you to be a woman of intelligence and good sense, I trust that you will also see the benefits of such a marriage and agree to it quickly."

"I will not agree to any marriage!" she said as clearly and decidedly as she could without raising her voice and drawing attention. "Did my father not tell you that I have always refused to marry?"

"But men and women of the aristocracy have a duty to marry and produce children in order to continue their lines," Hugh pointed out, deploying one of the arguments that had played on his mind over the years and eventually convinced him of his duty to marry. "My heirs would also be the heirs of my father and my grandfather, whom I loved."

"I would give my father no such tribute," Catherine replied with a contempt that shocked him. "And what about your mother? Wouldn't your children be her heirs just as much as your father's?"

"My mother died when I was born," Hugh explained, feeling unexpectedly stirred up by her words and actions that afternoon. "If I had known and loved my mother as I did my father, then yes, I would see my sons and daughters as her heirs, too. My name is Hugh, by the way."

"I see," she said shortly, looking away from him. "I'm sorry about your mother."

Hugh spotted the tears in her eyes, a strange but touching contrast to her abrupt, commanding manner.

"Would you want to give your mother heirs?" he asked, following a hunch. "They would be her grandchildren as well as your father's."

Catherine was still for a long time, and Hugh could see that she was thinking and fighting for control of her feelings. He knew only too well how that felt.

"I think we are both outsiders," he added, putting words to something that had been rising within him since he first laid eyes on her. "Aren't we? We're both struggling with the expectations of others."

"I cannot marry," Catherine repeated, her tone desolate.

"Your father suggested that I might marry Miss Jemima instead," Hugh told her, thinking that she might be relieved to hear this, even though he regarded that option as less than ideal.

"No!" Catherine gasped, her eyes opening wide. "You cannot marry Jemima. She is too young and doesn't understand anything about men."

"I agree, but I must have a wife and a fitting mother for my children. The connection with your family is a good one, and I see no preferable means of finding myself a woman of suitable caliber. If I cannot have you, then Miss Jemima is the obvious alternative."

Catherine looked torn by conflicting emotions, as though she had been suddenly cast out to sea in a storm. Hugh wished he could reach out and steady the rudder of her vessel, but she was too far away.

"Then I will marry you, Hugh," she conceded, at last, with far more sorrow in her voice than the joy that Society would expect from a bride.

Still, with him as her bridegroom, perhaps it was only apt that Catherine gave herself to him in sorrow rather than in joy. This woman also had her own tragedies and her own inner pain, he sensed. He felt an increasing conviction that they were in some way alike.

"I am honored by your acceptance of my proposal, Miss Wright." Hugh bowed.

He was then astonished to feel her hand reach out and touch his mask as he raised his head. He quickly covered her fingers with his own and lowered their hands, afraid that she meant to rip the mask off his face and reveal his scars.

"Don't," he uttered sternly.

"I only wanted to feel what it was made of. Is it silk?"

"Yes. Silk is the softest on my scars. I was in a fire a long time ago," he explained.

"You don't have to wear it for me," Catherine told him unexpectedly, with a challenging tilt of her chin. "You can take it off if you want. I have already agreed to marry you, haven't I?"

"Aren't you afraid?" he asked. "Many people are—perhaps most people."

"I have no reason to be afraid of you, Your Grace. It is true that I never wished to marry, but you have convinced me. This is the right step for all of us in a very complex situation. I am not afraid, and if I am to lie with you as your wife, I will wish to look upon your face."

No woman had ever said such a thing to him, certainly not the paid companions he had brought to his bed in his youth. Nor the widowed Lady Brightling, with her veiled features and acute self-consciousness of the large purple birthmark on her face.

Despite Hugh's assurances, Lady Brightling had only ever wanted to make love in total darkness, her anxieties far worse than his own. In the daylight, she would always be masked or veiled. Theirs had been a long affair, and loving in its own way, but limited in the end by their mutual inability to look at one another in the light.

While Hugh was now at a loss for words in the face of Catherine's declaration, his heart and loins suffered no such stalling. A strong surge of desire flowed instantly through his veins at the very idea of bedding the woman before him.

"Are you absolutely certain?" he asked, instinctively stepping closer to her, and admitting once more that her disheveled state attracted him strongly, reminding him of bedroom play. "You will want to see my face when we lie together?"

Looking into her eyes only made his heart race faster and his desire burn stronger. There was still a conflict playing out on the face of the woman who had just promised herself to him. She was not afraid of him, but she was afraid of something, and could not hide it any more than she could hide the longing that was widening her eyes and flushing her cheeks.

Catherine wanted him to kiss her, he strongly suspected, but she was also afraid of that kiss.

"You've never been this close to a man before, have you?" he murmured, barely holding back his longing to embrace her passionately.

She shook her head.

"Don't be afraid," he breathed and then leaned forward to kiss her cheek lightly, and then her ear, whispering her name as he did so.

As Hugh dropped a series of light kisses on her throat and neck, Catherine made an involuntary sound of breathless, pleasured surprise. But then, he stopped, knowing that if he let his lips stray down to the pale flesh exposed by the loosened ribbon of her bodice, he might not be able to stop himself. Those temptingly round breasts must wait for his attention until the proper time.

With a distinct effort, Hugh stepped away.

"You're going?" Catherine asked, her face flushed and confused in a way that aroused both his tenderness and his lust all over again.

Her response only confirmed his conviction that he must leave the house immediately.

"I must go now, Miss Wright. I will be back in the morning to make the necessary arrangements with your father. We should arrange the wedding as soon as possible."

At her nod, he let himself out of the room and then away into the street.