Page 78 of More or Less a Countess
This was no dream. It was a nightmare.
They’d been married for two days, and he hadn’t made love to her. Their marriage remained unconsummated, and her virginity, if not her innocence, very much intact.
He’d given her pleasure tonight, the kind of sweet, aching pleasure Violet had thought only existed in dreams, and then he’d slipped out again without taking his own release, and without making her his.
She lay still, her limbs melting into the soft bed, her body still humming with ecstasy from his touch. Sleep tried to pull her into its arms, to wrap her in soft, gray oblivion, but she’d never been one to ignore the whisperings of her mind, and her eyes remained open, her unblinking gaze fixed on the heavy silk draperies hanging from the canopy above her.
Nick’s face, when he’d seen those sketches…oh, she couldn’t bear to think of the hurt, the betrayal in his eyes when he’d raised his gaze to hers. Tears leaked from the corners of Violet’s eyes and kept falling until they dampened the hair at her temples.
I’m sorry I’m not a better man.
Violet gasped at the pain of it, the irreparable tear it left in her heart. She rolled over onto her side and clutched a pillow to her chest, her furious tears scalding her cheeks, falling so fast now she thought she might drown in them.
It would be easier that way—easier to curl up and weep while her husband lay alone in his bed believing his bride preferred another man to him, that she didn’t care for him—but Violet had discovered long ago she wasn’t destined to tread the easiest path.
She’d had to struggle to get anything that had ever mattered to her, and nothing had ever mattered to her as much as Nick. She wanted all of him, his body and his heart, and not just this ghost who crept into her room and then disappeared again before she could see his face, as soon as the darkness gave way to dawn.
Violet slid her feet to the cold floor, dressed herself, and sat on the edge of her bed with her fingers wrapped around her sketchbook. She waited until the patch of sky in her window lightened to a pale gray, then she rose, slipped out her door, and padded silently down the hallway to Lady Westcott’s room.
It was early still—far too early to disturb her ladyship in her bedchamber—but Lady Westcott opened on the first knock, and she didn’t look surprised to see Violet standing there.
“Good morning, Lady Dare.” She stood aside and gestured for Violet to enter. “You’re awake early this morning.”
Violet didn’t mince words. “I never went to sleep. I’ve done something dreadful, Lady Westcott, and I—I don’t know how to fix it. I need your help.”
It was an ominous enough declaration, but Lady Westcott didn’t blink at it. “Something dreadful? How unfortunate. Perhaps you’d better sit down and explain it to me.”
Violet took a seat on a settee, pulled the sketches of Nick and Lord Derrick from her sketchbook, and handed them over to Lady Westcott. “I did the one of Lord Derrick months ago, and haven’t thought of it since. The other…” Violet hesitated, her face flushing with misery. “I’d known Lord Dare for less than a day when I drew it. I don’t see him that way at all now, and haven’t for some time, but—”
“But Nicholas saw these sketches, and now he believes you’re in love with Lord Derrick.” Lady Westcott gave her a sharp look. “Areyou in love with Lord Derrick, Lady Dare?”
“No. I never was. I mistook friendship for love, but what I felt for Lord Derrick was nothing more than a childish infatuation. I know that now. I tried to explain it to Lord Dare, tried to tell him—”
“But he didn’t believe you. No, he wouldn’t, I’m afraid.” Lady Westcott met Violet’s gaze, and her gray eyes were shadowed with pain. “Nicholas’s elder brother, Graham—has he ever told you anything about how Graham died?”
“No, never. That is, I know his death was sudden and tragic. Nick’s never spoken of it to me, but if he cared for his brother as I care for my sisters, he must have been devastated by the loss.”
“He was. We all were, particularly my brother, the previous earl. He doted on Graham—we all did. Graham was…well, it’s difficult to do justice to him in words, but he was the best of men. He was killed by a highwayman on his way back here, to Ashdown Park to assist his father with repairs to the estate. Both my brother and Nicholas blamed themselves for his death—the previous Lord Dare for calling Graham here, and Nicholas, well…because he lived, I suppose. Graham was meant to be the heir, of course—Nicholas never expected to become Lord Dare, and he’s never felt worthy of the title.”
Violet’s body went cold.
That ugly scene in the carriage between Nick and Lady Westcott yesterday—the throb of despair in Nick’s voice when he spoke of his brother, that dark laugh when he’d said he was nothing more than a poor substitute for the true heir.
“Nicholas tried to become everything to his father after Graham’s death. He came back to Ashdown Park and did all he could to be the son my brother demanded, but nothing he did was ever good enough. It breaks my heart even now to think of how hard he tried.” Lady Westcott’s voice roughened, and she trailed off.
Violet took Lady Westcott’s hand in hers. “He gave up, and went off to Italy?”
“No. I could see what his father was doing to him, and I sent Nicholas away to the Continent before it could destroy him. My brother wasn’t a wicked man, Lady Dare, but the death of his wife when Graham and Nicholas were young, and then Graham’s sudden death…life ruined him, and he took his misery out on Nicholas.”
Violet squeezed Lady Westcott’s hand, her eyes burning with tears for her husband.
Two years of struggling with his grief, two years of living in the long shadow cast by his brother. Two years in Italy, hiding from the pain of his father’s disappointment, and two years of believing he wasn’t worthy of his father’s love. The title, the estate, the expectations—all of it thrust upon him by the sudden, tragic death of a beloved brother.
It must have tasted like ashes in his mouth.
“You must understand, Lady Dare. I love Nicholas with all my heart. I never wanted or expected him to try to take Graham’s place. I’ve only ever wanted him to find his own happiness, but Nicholas’s father tainted everything for him, even the way he sees himself. These drawings…” Lady Westcott picked one up, and her hand was shaking. “They confirm his deepest fears. I know you never meant to hurt him, my dear, but when he saw these he would have felt, once again, that he was to be forced into another man’s place—that you judged another man as more worthy of your love than him.”
I’m sorry I’m not a better man…
