Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

N ormally when Finn went to his country estate just outside of London for his annual gathering of friends, he was carefree. He forgot whatever troubles were going on in his life and just enjoyed himself. But he’d been at the estate for days now and all he could think about was his last few moments with the Hellion. God, he wished he knew her name. He knew her taste, he knew the feel of her hands moving against him, he knew the way she sounded when she let out a quiet sigh of pleasure.

But he still knew nothing at all and he couldn’t stop tormenting himself. He dreamed of her. He was distracted from all events at the estate. He even found himself trying to talk about fighting with friends, not because it was a shared pastime, but because he wanted to know if any of them had information about the woman beyond what he knew, himself.

He tried to refocus on the present for the tenth time in an hour and glanced across the parlor where the party were talking and laughing. He found his sister in the group, standing with Ramsbury. Standing very close to Ramsbury, staring up at him as they seemed to speak quite seriously.

He frowned. When Ramsbury glanced down at her, there was something in his expression. A longing as hard as his own that hit Finn in the chest. What was going on there? Had he missed something just beneath his own nose?

Marianne executed a brief curtsey and left Ramsbury’s side. As the earl watched her go, his mouth a thin line, Finn made his way across the room to him.

“That’s a hangdog expression,” Finn said carefully as he reached him. “Is there anything you wish to discuss with me?”

Ramsbury’s scowl deepened. “You’re one to talk,” he snapped. “You’ve been moping about since our arrival. Is there anything you wish to discuss with me ?”

Finn stiffened. In truth, he did wish he could bring up the subject of the Hellion with Ramsbury. He needed to tell someone that he longed for a woman whose face he’d never fully seen and whose name he didn’t know. That he was drowning and had no idea where to swim to find safety again.

But what a fool that would make him. He had no future with the woman, she didn’t want him, if her continued rejections were any indication.

He cleared his throat. “I’d be more interested in talking to you about my sister.”

Ramsbury looked at him and to Finn’s surprise his friend’s expression was suddenly desperate and filled with pain. “I cannot. Excuse me.”

He pivoted and stalked away, Finn staring after him in shock. He’d known Ramsbury for a lifetime, but never seen him like this. He turned and found Marianne next. She was standing at the fireplace, absently worrying a little figurine that normally rested there. He moved to her and forced a smile.

“Have I thanked you yet for organizing another successful gathering for my friends?” he asked.

She glanced up at him with a wobbly smile of her own. “I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself. You’ve seemed off lately. Is there anything you wish to discuss?”

He blinked. He’d been about to ask her the same thing, press about whatever was going on with Sebastian. Make sure it wasn’t something that could threaten the well-being of his beloved sister.

“It seems there’s something off in the air lately,” he said with a sigh. “Perhaps everyone is feeling it.”

“Hmm.” She was noncommittal in that response and turned the figurine in her hand.

He slipped it from her grasp gently and placed it back on the mantel. She glanced up at him a second time and this time she held his gaze. “If you need me, you know I’m here, don’t you?” he asked and meant it.

Her lips parted and she seemed to struggle with something for a moment. But then she reached up and patted his cheek. “I know. The same goes for you.”

The conversation should have assuaged his worry. Marianne was distracted, but she’d just recently lost a friend. Perhaps that was what she and Ramsbury had been discussing. He was seeing something else because he was so tangled up in his own romantic issues. There was no use looking for trouble. He had enough already.

“Why don’t we dance?” he suggested, and motioned to where a few of the others were mangling a country jig while someone played piano for them.

She took his arm and her worries seemed to evaporate, so he forced his own to do the same. “I’d like that.”

“ W hat do you think about a match on Tuesday?”

Esme blinked and forced herself to pay attention to Ripley as he looked over a schedule on his desk in the back of his boxing club. “I’m sorry?”

His brow wrinkled. “I know you came to the club to spar, but usually you want to discuss fights to be made. You had the exhibition recently, but you haven’t had a real match since you won that night against Hilde Parson down at Seven Dials. I’d think you’d want to get out there and there’s a space available in a round of matches coming to the Dog and Pony Hell.”

She shook away her distractions and nodded. “Who would be the opponent?”

He flipped through the pages. “Viall is trying to build up Murder Mary.”

She rolled her eyes. “Murder Mary. I fought her back at the beginning, if you recall.”

“I do. You put her on her arse after five minutes.” He laughed. “I knew I’d picked the right woman to train after that night.”

“She hardly has a left hook at all.” Esme sighed. “But yes, I’ll take the fight. The blunt will be nice.”

Ripley leaned back in his chair. “You’re miles away.”

She pursed her lips. She was, even though she’d never admit to him or to Jane or to anyone else where her mind took her. But since Finn’s departure from London a week before, she hadn’t stopped thinking about him. It was ridiculous, for surely he’d erased her from his memory. After she’d rejected his request for a fuck twice? A man like that had certainly written her off and moved on to someone willing.

“Esme.”

She looked up at Ripley. “Do you ever think of getting out of it all?”

He held her gaze for a moment. “I did get out of it all. Took my blunt and started the boxing club so I’d stopped getting punched in the head.”

“You just teach others how to take that punch.” She said with a laugh.

He smiled a little. “You’ve been doing this a while, Es. Most women don’t last more than a few years in the circuit. And you’ve set aside a lot of blunt doing it and living as simply as you and Jane do. So if you’re starting to think about moving on, letting go, it makes sense. You’ve nothing to prove.”

She bent her head. “Sometimes I try to picture what would come next, but it’s always blank. I had the idea I’d be some fop’s wife for so long back when I was someone else. I could imagine that life forever. And then I started doing this and it saved me. But when I look to the next thing it just seems…”

“I know.” Ripley drew in a long breath. “I know what it seems like. So think on it. What would you like to be next? You don’t have to know today or tomorrow, but preparing for the future is never a waste of time.”

She smiled and then got up. “I’ll go punch the bags a bit. Will you write up that information on the fight so I can give it to Jane when I get home?”

He shifted slightly. “I will. I’ll write her a little note, too.”

Her smile widened as she exited his office to go into the half-empty fighting area where a few other ladies were sparring and practicing for their own bouts down the line. “She always loves that,” she called back to him.

If he answered, she didn’t hear it. She focused instead on the heavy bag hanging from a beam on the ceiling. She slung a half-hearted punch at it and felt it shiver in response. She thought of Ripley’s question. What did she want in the future?

A brief image of Finn kissing her jumped to her mind. Finn holding her down on a bed as she rose beneath him in writhing pleasure. She blinked the unwanted image away. That wasn’t possible. There was no future there, no matter how many times she dreamed of the man.

She had to move on. That was all there was to it.

T he ball was in full swing but Finn was hardly attending. He looked around the room for what felt like the fifth time and then shook his head at his butler, Bentley. “I don’t see her. Where could Marianne be?”

They had been looking for his sister for almost ten minutes, since there had been a question about the location of an extra case of wine she’d had set aside for the gathering. She never shared these little details with Finn and no one else on staff seemed to know what arrangements she’d made.

“You’re looking for your sister?” one of the partygoers asked from his elbow.

He turned and found it was an old school chum, Inglewood. “You’ve seen her?”

“I think she followed Ramsbury onto the terrace a bit ago. He was acting very strangely.”

Finn pursed his lips at that statement, but didn’t respond. Instead he weaved his way through the ballroom, Bentley on his heels, and peeked out onto the terrace. He didn’t see Marianne or Ramsbury anywhere.

“Perhaps she went into one of the parlors off the other side of the terrace, my lord,” Bentley suggested.

“Yes.” Finn shook his head, for he was beginning to get a very odd feeling. “Let’s go down the hall and check them.”

They left the ballroom together and moved up the hallway together. Finn opened each door as they did so, but found them all empty until the fourth chamber. There he stepped inside and froze.

Ramsbury lay across the settee before the fire, a lady pinned beneath him. But it wasn’t some widow from the shire who had come to the ball, it wasn’t a stranger he’d smuggled into the house for an assignation. It was Marianne. They were kissing passionately, her clothing half down, his trousers unfastened and so low on his waist that it was obvious what was happening.

They noticed him then and both gasped. Marianne turned her face into his shoulder, Ramsbury blocked her as if he could protect her. Protect her when he was ruining her.

“Marianne?” Finn watched as her fingers gripped harder against Ramsbury’s arm even if she refused to lift her face.

“Delacourt, please…” Ramsbury began.

But Finn didn’t let him continue. Incandescent rage washed over him as he crossed the room to the man he’d called friend. The man he’d only ever asked one thing of, and that was not to trifle with his sister. He’d always known Marianne had tender feelings for his friend, he hadn’t wanted her to be hurt. But now she would be. He cocked his fist back and swung, landing the punch across his friend’s cheek and knocking him off the settee onto his arse on the floor.

Marianne let out a screech as she lifted her gown up to cover her chemise and held it there.

Ramsbury stared up at him as he worked his jaw back and forth. “That was the best punch you’ve thrown in years.”

Finn shook his head. “Don’t try to joke your way out of this.” Without looking over his shoulder he said, “Bentley, get out. Say nothing of this, do you understand?”

“Yes, my lord,” Bentley said, his voice shaking as he exited the room and shut it behind him. At least Finn trusted his servants wouldn’t betray him.

“Finn,” Marianne began, her pale lips trembling.

Finn shook his head. There were tears in her eyes. Pain he hadn’t prevented and it would surely only get worse now. “Don’t say a word until you’ve fully dressed.” He wanted to make his tone gentle for her, but he couldn’t in his shock and horror. So he turned toward Ramsbury, who was still on the floor. “Get up, you foul fuck, and turn your back so my sister may have some privacy.”

Slowly, Ramsbury did as he’d been told and then reached down to fix his trousers. Finn growled out his anger and then turned his back on them both. He tried to draw breath, tried to calm his racing heart and mind.

“I need help buttoning,” Marianne said softly. “Sebastian, will you?”

Finn pivoted and stepped toward her. “There is no way in hell that Ramsbury is going to button your dress, Marianne.”

If he expected his sister to crumble, she surprised him. She met his gaze without hesitation and lifted her chin with a strength he hadn’t fully given her credit for. “Then we’re at an impasse. You have ordered me to dress. I cannot do it by myself. I doubt you want to go calling for servants to come in and have even more of them see what you’ve witnessed. And I have no interest in you buttoning my clothing, Phineas. I assume you don’t either. It seems a bit too intimate for siblings, does it not?”

He flinched at the idea. She had him there. And since he had no argument, he threw up his hands. “Fine, bloody hell, let him button you.” He pivoted on Ramsbury. “But I swear on everything that is holy, Ramsbury, if you go too far?—”

“I think we can all agree it’s a bit late for that. I have no intention of doing anything untoward to Marianne with you glaring daggers into my soul.”

Finn turned his back again because watching his friend dress his sister seemed like something he shouldn’t see.

“Do everyone a favor, Delacourt, and light some lamps or set the fire,” Ramsbury said softly. “I doubt you want to have whatever conversation is coming next in the dark.”

“No, we only soil things in the dark, don’t we?” Finn snapped. “You only sneak around in the dark ruining my sister.”

“Finn, light the fire, for heaven’s sake,” Marianne said, and now her voice was trembling.

Finn drew another long breath and moved to the low fire. He threw in a log and stirred the flames with the poker. Behind him he heard Marianne and Ramsbury talking in low tones. He pursed his lips in frustration. “Stop whispering, you two.”

When Finn turned back to light a few lamps, he found Marianne had already returned to the settee. She was seated with her back straight and hands folded in her lap. Waiting for judgment, he supposed. He had no idea how to meter it at this point and he was suddenly exhausted by this, by everything.

“I’m doing my best not to shout and draw the attention of over fifty people gathered in our ballroom,” he said at last when he found words. “So I will ask that you two do not trifle with me, do not lie to me. What the hell is going on that I would find you two in such a situation?”

“I tricked him,” Marianne began. “He thought I was someone else.”

Finn stared at her, at the idea that she would be so duplicitous. That she would force herself into such a situation when she had always been so shy, so locked to the wall where she hid. He supposed they had both done quite a bit of hiding after their mother’s death. He winced at the thought.

“That’s not true,” Ramsbury said softly, drawing Finn’s attention. He was staring at Marianne and in that moment Finn saw something in his eyes. He saw that his friend, the consummate rake, cared about her.

“Sebastian.” Marianne rose and stepped toward him. “Don’t. Don’t.”

He shook his head. “You are too good, Marianne. Too good for me, certainly. I won’t let you do this.”

Now all Finn could do was stare from one to the other as what was truly happening here became increasingly clear. “So she lied.”

“To protect me,” Ramsbury said. “Yes. What you walked in on is exactly what you think it was. I engaged in ungentlemanly behavior with your sister. I knew the consequences to our friendship if you were to find out. I did it anyway because my attraction toward her was irresistible.”

Finn swallowed hard. “He took advantage.”

Marianne shook her head. “ Never . Never once. I know it’s hard for you to see me as a woman with feelings and needs and a heart,” she said. “But I am those things, Finn. I didn’t want to have so many regrets and missed opportunities when I’m at the end and looking back. Sebastian has been my friend for so long. And I’ve…I’ve cared for him as more than a friend for nearly as long.”

And there it was. The thing he’d always known was true, the thing he’d always tried to protect her from. And yet, as he looked at Ramsbury, it was apparent he’d misunderstood a great deal in this situation. But he still needed to manage this. To distance them, to give himself time to process what to do next. How to handle this. How to handle everything, because in that moment his entire life felt out of control.

“Go up to your chamber, Marianne,” he said softly. “I’ll explain to those at the party that you were stricken with a headache. The result of all your hard work to make this ball so successful, no doubt.”

“You’re banishing me,” she whispered.

“No.” Finn met her gaze. “I’m allowing you a chance not to have spying eyes on you when your hair is half down thanks to him. Not to be forced to pretend that this untenable situation hasn’t happened. And giving myself an opportunity to calm down before we speak about this again.” He moved forward. “Please, Mari. Just go.”

She looked toward Ramsbury, a world of unspoken communication moving between them. Then she lifted her chin and strode from the room as she’d been asked. He noted she didn’t shut the door behind herself.

“Still protecting you, it seems,” Finn said as he moved to do what she hadn’t. When he turned back, he leaned against the barrier and shook his head. “You betrayed me. Betrayed my singular request of you.”

“I did.”

Finn waited for more, but Ramsbury remained quiet now. “That’s all you have to say?”

A long silence hung between them and Ramsbury shifted. “Is there anything I could say?”

“I don’t know.” Finn threw up his hands as frustration overcame him. “For years and years, I’ve stood by you. I never judged your worst impulses. Hell, I sometimes indulged in them. I knew who you were, or at least I thought I did. And I asked you this one thing, out of respect for me and our friendship.”

“I know,” Ramsbury said.

“So tell me you regret doing this, tell me you’re sorry you did something that will change our friendship irrevocably.”

The silence stretched out even longer this time. A lifetime. Then Ramsbury’s expression collapsed a fraction and he said, “I’m—I’m not sorry that I touched Marianne.”

And there it was. What he now suspected put into words, at least as close as he thought he would get given the circumstances. There had been an affair between his innocent sister and the biggest rake in England. But it was more than that. On both sides. Now what would come of that…remained to be seen. He sighed. “In the morning, you’ll leave at dawn. I don’t care where you go, but you won’t be here. I’ll make some excuse about an emergency that called you away.”

“I understand.”

Finn shook his head. He had a thousand reasons to be angry at this situation and yet one feeling overwhelmed the others. He was envious. His sister and his best friend seemed to have dived headfirst into something they were willing to risk their worlds for. And Finn couldn’t help but think of the Hellion and how she wouldn’t even risk her name.

He pivoted and moved to the door.

“Don’t be hard on her,” Ramsbury called out. “She doesn’t deserve that.”

Finn stopped moving. Marianne had tried to protect Ramsbury. Now he returned the favor. “No,” he agreed softly. “She doesn’t.”

Then he left the room and shut the door firmly behind him. He staggered as he made his way back toward the ballroom. He had no doubt Ramsbury would follow his order and leave in the morning. And Finn would talk to Marianne and they would come to some understanding. But nothing would ever be the same. The only thing that would remain as before was that he would spend his days pretending. Pretending everything was well, all while he tried to find some way to resolve the damage that had been done.

And that was nothing new at all.