Chapter Eighteen

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

The Next Morning, The Duke of Southbury's Study

G riffin couldn't concentrate on the ledger in front of him. He'd counted the figures nearly half a dozen times already, but each time, thoughts of Meredith and their exchange on the balcony last night made him lose his concentration. It was the first time she'd ever told him anything real about her marriage.

I was a terrible wife. I wouldn't put another man through that.

Those words haunted him. They'd kept him up last night and kept him from balancing his ledgers today. What could she possibly have meant? She'd refused to tell him and he hadn't pressed her. He'd known she would only demure further.

Why was she convinced she'd been a terrible wife? From all accounts, it sounded like Maxwell had been an awful husband, sending her off to the country soon after their wedding and never visiting. Meredith had never told Griffin that much, but Ash had. Maxwell had left Meredith alone in the country to rot. Just as her father had during her childhood. Finding herself in that position again must have been devastating for her.

Griffin understood why she cherished her freedom. Of course he did. But a husband who truly valued her, truly loved her, would never take away her freedom. He would never take away her freedom. Yet she still refused to contemplate such an arrangement. And she called him stubborn?

She'd been young when she married, perhaps too young, but she had to know not all marriages were like what she'd had with Maxwell. The old man had practically been a stranger to her when they wed.

Of course, Griffin hadn't stayed around long enough to witness it. The day after Meredith informed him of her engagement, the day after they'd argued about it—Griffin had gone off to war. He'd purchased a commission in His Majesty's Army. After all, what else was the spare son good for? He'd stayed on the Continent for years. Long enough for Maxwell to die of old age.

But even after Griffin's return, Meredith's life with Maxwell was a subject she would never discuss, a barrier she would not let Griffin past. He knew there had always been something about her marriage that wasn't right. Other than the obvious. After all, it was no secret that she'd never loved Maxwell. But there was something else. Something Meredith was ashamed of. And her reticence to discuss her marriage wasn't just because Griffin had begged her not to marry the old man. There was something about her marriage she didn't want Griffin to know. And every time Griffin thought about it, he had the same notion. If that son of a bitch, Maxwell, wasn't already dead, Griffin would dig him up and beat him soundly for making her doubt herself for one moment, for causing her a second's unhappiness.

It killed Griffin to think about it. Because he knew the reason she'd married Maxwell was his fault. At least partially. He hadn't been able to stop her from going through with it. Because he hadn't told her the truth. He hadn't told her how desperately he loved her. And Griffin hated himself for that failure. Every single day. Telling her may not have made any difference, but at least she would have known the truth, and he wouldn't be in this maddening situation now.

It had been a night much like last night. Spring air. A ballroom. A balcony. Meredith, eighteen years old and ravishing in pink silk, had come in search of Griffin. He'd been out near the balustrade…alone.

"There you are," Meredith said when she found Griffin on the Billinghams' verandah.

Griffin turned and gave her a huge smile. "Meredith." His chest always felt less tight when she was near him. She was like standing next to a spring breeze. Fresh, beautiful, and always welcome.

"Still planning to go tomorrow?" she asked as she floated over to stand in front of him. "I cannot talk you out of it?" she teased.

"I'm going," Griffin assured her. He'd planned to go on a tour of the Continent. For years his mother had been insisting upon it, but he'd never wanted to leave Meredith. Now that she was out in Society, she seemed perfectly happy, but he was still loath to leave her.

Only he needed to go. He needed to go and return before any would-be suitors asked her to marry them. Because next year, after he returned from the Continent, after Meredith had had a Season, at the Cartwrights' Midsummer Night's Ball, Griffin intended to ask Meredith himself. But first, he wanted her to enjoy her Season. As a debutante in London, she could be young and carefree. God knew she hadn't had an idyllic childhood. She hadn't had the chance to enjoy all the pleasures London had to offer. She deserved to have fun. She deserved the best of everything. And most importantly, she'd already promised him that she'd tell him immediately if anyone proposed.

Of course, there was no reason to hope she'd say yes to his proposal. Not yet, at least. Meredith had always treated Griffin as a friend. Nothing more. But the timing had never been right. One didn't simply declare oneself in love with one's long-time friend. There were more subtle ways to handle such delicate affairs. And Griffin had a plan.

Once he returned, he intended to quietly court Meredith, slowly make her realize that they were more to each other than friends. It would take patience to win a woman as wonderful as Meredith. And he had patience in spades. He'd already waited all these years. What would one more hurt? He wanted to make her dream come true.

"I'm going to miss you terribly, you know," Meredith said, snapping him from his thoughts.

Griffin returned her smile. "We can write. Every day if you like."

"Of course I'll write you, Griffin. But there's something I must tell you before you go." Her pretty face clouded over.

He stepped closer and searched her visage. Something was wrong. "What? What is it, Mere?"

Her words were barely a whisper. "I'm going to marry."

A vise gripped his chest. What had she said? Marry? No. No. He must have heard her incorrectly. He cocked his head to the side, his heart thundering. "Pardon? You mean someone has proposed?"

"No. It's more than that. Father told me last night. He's already signed the marriage contract."

That sounded like Meredith's prick of a father, signing the contract first and informing his daughter of her impending marriage after the fact. But all Griffin could think of were two words. Two words that could not be true. Could not be real. Meredith…marry.

"What? Who?" he'd managed to choke out. This couldn't be happening. One moment, he'd had all the time in the world to make things right with her, and now it was as if he were drowning, struggling for air, struggling for thoughts, let alone words.

"The Duke of Maxwell." The words shot from her lips like bullets from a gun. And they might as well have pierced Griffin's chest. They hurt so badly.

"Maxwell? You must be joking." Meredith? Marry? No.

Meredith frowned at him. "He's a duke," she pointed out. "Father said it's what Mama wanted."

A memory had come to Griffin then. A memory of fourteen-year-old Meredith sitting next to him in the grass by the pond in Surrey. They were fishing. " Father says I'm to marry a duke ," she'd said all those years ago.

Damn it. Griffin hadn't thought of that day in years. He'd assumed it had just been idle talk. Something a father told his young daughter offhandedly one day. Griffin had never actually believed Lord Trentham had meant it.

Griffin reached out and grabbed Meredith by the shoulders. His fear made his grip rougher than he'd intended. "You cannot marry Maxwell," he ground out, shaking her slightly.

"What? Why?" Meredith's face was a mask of confusion.

"Your dream, Meredith? Remember your dream? A handsome young man falling to one knee at the Midsummer Night's Ball?"

Tears shone in her eyes. "You remember that?"

"Of course I remember it. You deserve that, Meredith. You deserve all of your dreams to come true."

She shook her head sadly. "That was just the silly ramblings of a girl, Griffin. You know how these things go. Marriages are often like business arrangements. Besides, Maxwell is a duke ."

"You keep saying that, pointing out that he's a duke as if it means something." Disgust sounded in his voice. He could hear it. He couldn't help it.

"It does mean something," she shot back.

"I never thought it did…to you." His voice was angry, ac cusatory. This couldn't be happening. He was in a bad dream, and he would wake up at any moment. "What about Ash? What does he say?" Griffin knew he was grasping at nothing. What could Ash do to stop his father? Nothing. But Griffin couldn't just stand here and allow this to happen.

"Ash says it's up to me. He said he'd help me run away if I choose to."

"Then run! Run, Meredith!" Griffin scrubbed a hand through his hair and paced away from her.

Her angry, panicked voice sounded behind him. "Are you mad? Ash was only jesting. I can't leave. Where would I go? I'd be ruined."

"But you don't love him." Griffin's voice was more severe than he'd meant it to be.

Meredith's humorless laughter cracked off the stone balustrade. "Love? What if there's no such thing as love, Griffin?"

"Marry me then." The words flew from his mouth. He turned back to face her, fell to one knee, and grabbed her hand. "Please, Meredith, marry me. We'll go to Gretna Green. Tonight. Please, I ? —"

She'd wrenched her hand from his and took a step back. "Now who is being flippant?" Her face had turned to a mask of stone. "Marry you out of pity? Never."

"It's not pity, Meredith, I ? —"

"Stand up!" she yelled, tears falling from her eyes. She was sobbing and Griffin's heart was breaking.

Her tears brought him to his feet.

"I never thought you of all people would do this to me," she cried.

"Do what? Offer you something better than marriage to an old man?"

"I didn't tell you about this to ask your permission, Griffin. Nor did I expect you to understand. But I never thought you would fail to support me when I needed it. I never thought you, of all people, would make me doubt myself. Didn't you hear me, Griffin? The contract has already been signed . I have no choice."

Griffin clenched his jaw. But his fear and anger and hopelessness spurred him on. "Is that what you want? A loveless marriage to an old man you barely know?"

Meredith's jaw was clenched too, and the tears had stopped. Now, anger blazed in her storm-colored eyes. "I. Have. No. Choice. And if you cannot be happy for me, or at least pretend to be, then go." Her arm shot out, and she pointed directly toward the French doors at the far side of the verandah.

Griffin nearly crumpled to his knees then. He could think of a thousand other things he needed to say, and they all began with "don't do it because I love you madly," but he couldn't push the words past his lips because somehow, somehow he knew. Meredith would marry Maxwell no matter what Griffin said. She had already made up her mind. She would never go against her father's wishes. Even though that awful man had never deserved her loyalty, Meredith loved her father. Lord Trentham had chosen a duke for her, and she would marry him, old man or no. He'd further ensured her compliance by telling her it was what her deceased mother wanted. Lord Trentham knew precisely what he was doing.

And in that moment, Griffin realized—knew in his soul—that Meredith was lost to him. Telling her his feelings now would only make things worse for her. But he'd be damned before he would pretend to be happy for her.

"Then I'll go," he said quietly, holding his breath, filled with all the pain and longing in his heart as he turned and made his way unerringly toward the doors.

Griffin had gone to the Continent. But not to travel. Instead, he went to war. For one simple reason. Because he was clearly lacking in courage. He hadn't even been able to bring himself to tell the woman he loved how he felt. He'd been about to say those words that night. He'd been about to blurt out how much he loved her just before she'd ordered him to stand. What in the hell had kept him from it if not fear? A coward didn't deserve Meredith's love.

Besides, would it even matter? Griffin was no duke. He was only the spare. Hadn't that been pointed out to him time and again by his father and brother throughout his entire childhood?

The sick irony was, Griffin had won many medals for courage in battle. Fought through rain, and sleet, and snow. He'd done things on the Continent he'd never dreamed of and seen things that still haunted his sleep. And there had been more than a small part of him that hoped he'd never come back. He couldn't bear the thought of seeing Meredith with Maxwell. It made his stomach churn.

Oh, he'd written her. He'd written her, and she'd written back, and they'd both pretended as if that night on the verandah had never even happened. It was their one unspoken rule. In their letters, he never mentioned the war, and she never mentioned her marriage. All nice and tidy and bloody well fake .

But a fake relationship with Meredith was better than no relationship at all. So they'd written about the weather, and his rations, and the latest on dits within the ton , and how the flowers were faring at Maxwell's country estate. And one day, in a letter from his mother, Griffin received the news that Maxwell was dead. Not long after, the war was over, and Griffin made his plans to return to England.

He'd rushed home, knowing Meredith would have to live in mourning for a full year, but intent on setting things straight and declaring himself the moment he could. Only when he came home, Meredith promptly informed him that she never intended to marry again.

And so he'd settled into life by her side once more. Content to be in her company if he could not hold her in his arms. Hopeful that one day, somehow, some way, she would change her mind.

Patience. More patience.

But now she was pushing him to marry. And he couldn't marry anyone but her. He'd told her as much last night. She had to have known he meant her . And this time, she'd run away from him.

It didn't matter. He didn't know how he would tell her or what he would say. He didn't know how she would react or how he would explain everything. For the first time in his life, he didn't have a plan.

But there was one thing Griffin knew for certain. It was bloody well time to tell Meredith the truth. At last.