Page 21 of A Deal with the Rebellious Marquess
Of course, he needed to marry and that added its own complications. She would not settle for being a married man’s mistress. She would not be the wedge between another woman and that woman’s husband. Neither did she think he was the sort of man who would have such an arrangement, although she knew many peers did. Such arrangements seemed sure pathways to disappointment and failure.
Perhaps he’d left because he’d realised the relationship was impossible not only romantically but practically. He’d not been comfortable with her case against Lord Orion Bexley. He’d been clear about that from the start and when she’d brought it up again that last afternoon, he’d not been enthusiastic. Her line of reasoning and proof should have excited someone who claimed to be interested in the dam situation.
To his credit, he’d listened as she’d requested. He’d asked pertinent questions and he’d pressed for explanations, but he’d not been imbued with the eagerness she’d hoped solid proof would engender from him. There were even points where she’d sensed he was horrified. At her? At her discoveries? It was hard to tell, further fuelling her suspicion that something was off.
He had softened though, at the end, when she’d shared the situation at the newspaper and how the Bexley story fit into her predicament. But he’d still walked out of her office as suddenly as he’d walked into her theatre box, without warning, without reason.
Fleur paced her office, looking down on to Fleet Street, home to many of London’s great newspapers and publishers. It was early evening. Clerks were starting to go home, vendors were working hard to make a few final sales before the day was done. She wondered what Jasper was doing. Was he preparing for an evening out? Had he, perhaps, resigned himself to his fate? Would he spend the night waltzing with girls off his mother’s list? Those broad shoulders and tousled hair would be wasted on a debutante. She’d been attending balls in order to carry on discussions and encourage interest in legislation. She spent a large part of those evenings looking over her shoulder hoping to see him. She had not.
Fleur turned from the window at the sound of a knock on her door. ‘Mrs Griffiths, this has come in.’ The clerk left a large envelope on her desk. In her experience, large envelopes were usually promising. She opened it and sat down to read. It was an offer for a couple of the smaller newspapers Cowden had recommended she sell up north. This was good. The board would be pleased to have such rapid results. It was a sign that their presses were coveted, valued. She looked at the offering price. Yes, definitely valued. The buyer was willing to pay the asking price. No negotiation involved. Was that cause for celebration or for alarm? Who didn’t negotiate?
She knew the answer to that: someone who wanted something urgently, no questions asked. But shewouldask questions. Mainly the question of who? Fleur scanned the document for the name of the party or parties involved, her gaze landing on the name at the bottom of the proposal: the Earl of Wincastle. She could not recall him from personal acquaintance. Perhaps he was an acquaintance of the Duke of Cowden’s? How like him it would be to send a buyer in her direction. She glanced at the copy ofDebrett’ssitting on the bookshelf. This was one of those times when looking someone up would be necessary. She could not take this offer to the board of directors uninformed.
Fleur retrieved the tome from the shelf and set it on her desk, flipping to the section on earls and then towards the back to the ‘W’s.
‘Wincastle... Wincastle,’ she murmured, her finger running over the columns. There it was.
Wincastle, also a title currently held by the Marquess of Meltham.
Her gaze froze. Her mind raced. Wincastle was Meltham? She knew what this was, an attempt to silence the stories about Lord Orion Bexley, his brother. How convenient for him that he could do just that so close to home by purchasing those presses.
She very nearly did not check the cross-reference. It was enough to know that Wincastle was a guise for Meltham and that Meltham was her sworn enemy. It was nefarious enough, this idea that the Marquess would attempt to covertly silence her, but some inner voice urged her to do it, perhaps out of habit to leave no piece of information unclaimed.
Fleur found the listing for Meltham. It was large and contained a detailed family tree going back several generations. The Marquess of Meltham was a well-established title. Her finger scrolled down to the most recent limb of the tree.
David Harold Arthur Bexley, b. March 2nd, 1782, d. Aug. 19th, 1840. Married to Mathilda...
She hurried past that to their ‘issue’. Two sons. Jasper Bexley and Orion Bexley. Jasper... Hmm... A somewhat uncommon name and now she’d encountered it twice in a short time. She read further.
Titles associated with the marquessate: Earl of Wincastle, Baron of Umberton.
She sat down hard on the desk chair, letting the shock sink in.Jasperwas Umberton. And if Jasper was Umberton, he was alsoMeltham. The realisation of what that meant was stunning, overwhelming on so many levels. That made her lover, her confidant, a man whom she’d understood to be her ally herenemybecause at the core of it all, he was Lord Orion Bexley’s brother.
Common sense argued that it couldn’t be otherwise. Brothers would support one another, like Adam and Keir and Garrett had supported one another, though they had been a brotherhood of businessmen, rather than blood relations. Cross one of them and you crossed all three. Hadn’t Captain Moody warned her that morning in Newcastle that to tangle with Lord Orion Bexley was to tangle with the Marquess? That was to be expected. But she’d made a miscalculation. She’d also expected everyone would play fair, that the Marquess would approach her directly, that she would see him coming and, when he did, that it would be an approach through an open confrontation,notthrough stealth and seduction.
Oh.Seduction.Oh, God.
She moaned, recalling the Harefield ball. She cringed. Shuddered. In hindsight she’d been stupid and careless in her loneliness. She’d slept with him. Well, sort of. A romp against a fence wall didn’t necessarily constitute ‘sleeping’. He’d been eager to accommodate. Now she understood why. It was a first step towards working his way into her confidence, the first step in binding them together.
And it had worked. Shelikedhim. He was handsome and intelligent and intuitive. As a result, she’d been attracted to him and she’d trusted him with her body, with her secrets. She hadn’t talked to anyone in depth about what she knew about Lord Orion Bexley, preferring to keep her own counsel. But with Jasper, she’d laid it all out voluntarily. What a fool she’d been!
Now she knew why he’d left. He’d had no reason to stay. He’d got what he came for. Was he even now laughing at her? Thinking what a prank he’d pulled? Flirt with a lonely widow, listen to her stories, give her a little fun against a fence and she’ll tell you anything? Had he taken her information and bolstered his defences so that she’d never get past them? Never get to his brother as Captain Moody had predicted?
Recriminations came hard and fast. Somehow, sheoughtto have known. If it had just been the sex, she might not feel so badly. But it was everything that was attached to it. It hadn’tjustbeen sex. Beneath the self-recrimination simmered another logic. She might have trusted too soon. But he had betrayed. And betrayal was a far bigger crime than trusting. One ought to be able to trust by default. People ought to be honest as a basic, expected practice. That he’d not been spoke more poorly of him than it did of her.
Later, when her anger had passed, she’d take solace in that. This was the very crime she’d railed at Adam’s ghost for. He’d betrayed her, too.
Fury simmered. Her words had no effect. Adam was not here to be scolded. But Jasper was and she wouldnottoleratehisbetrayal. Not when she was so close to justice. Not when she had so much personally on the line—all of which she’d sat here in this very room and outlined for him as if he were a trusted friend. She stood up and grabbed her coat. At least now she knew where to find him: Meltham House on Portland Square. There was going to be a reckoning. No one played Fleur Griffiths for a fool and got away with it.
Chapter Twelve
There needed to be a reckoning. Orionhadto account for his time on the Bilberry Dam commission, yet, despite knowing how desperately that accounting was needed, Jasper was loath to have the conversation. It was why he hadn’t gone straight to Orion’s favourite club off St James’s and dragged him out immediately after he’d left Fleur’s office for the last time.
That reckoning was also why he’d decided to leave Fleur. This was war, this was shame. Neither were conditions upon which a relationship could be built. How could he face her if she was right? That was the shame—that he’d been ignorant of his brother’s role in the dam’s demise. And if she was wrong, there would be shame on her side, too, or resentment. The scandal would always be between them as a competition one of them had lost.
He hoped it would not be him. He was the Marquess. He was supposed to protect his family and his people. But people had died and possibly because of a position he’d put his brother in by arranging for a spot on the commission. Beyond the shame of what he perceived as his own culpability, how could he possibly consort with the enemy? Whether she was right or wrong, he had an obligation to protect his brother and by extension the family. But as much as he didn’t want her to be right, he also didn’t want her to be wrong. She had much at stake and he appreciated how difficult her position was.
In the weeks since he’d left her, he’d done what he could for both Fleur and for Orion. He’d had his solicitors prepare an offer for the northern newspapers in an attempt to mitigate publicising the suspicions being raised against Orion. It would help them both; she needed the sale, and he needed the silence.
