Page 22 of Just About a Rake (Ladies Who Dare #5)

A fortnight.

Fourteen days.

Too many hours.

Leonora stopped before the door of the drawing room. Time truly dragged when one had no person to spark life into each moment. And no sparks sparked Leonora’s life at the moment. The hours bled into one another, colorless and dull. It felt rather jarring that the world continued while she was utterly devoid of spirit.

Devoid of him .

No sharp, witty barbs thrown her way, no stolen touches or intimate moments of ecstasy. None. Gone was being understood in a way that made her feel breathless. Gone was the anticipation, the awareness that somewhere—perhaps around the next corner, perhaps in the next heartbeat— he would be there. Well, if she were honest, a smidgeon of that anticipation still lingered, but it carried a more desperate edge rather than the pulsing beat of excitement. This must be what a woman felt being ravaged and discarded by a rake. And yet, at the theatre...

Shush, Leonora.

But that moment... that moment when he’d grasped her wrist and pushed Calstone away from her...

She clutched her breast. It meant... something . And at the same time, did it also mean nothing ?

Leonora shook away the thought, inhaled a deep breath, and entered the drawing room to which she had been summoned and stopped short when she came face to face with three figures: Heart, the duchess, and the marchioness—her mama.

“Leonora, dear,” the marchioness, Lady Heartly, said. “Please come have a seat.”

Her gaze darted between the three people. It didn’t take a brilliant mind to understand that certain introductions were to be made today and certain truths were to be revealed. On the one hand, she welcomed the truth. On the other hand, she couldn’t help but feel a twinge of wariness, too.

Leonora crossed the room and lowered herself into a chair unhurriedly, flushing as those three pairs of eyes burned into her. Inside, her heart pounded.

The marchioness cleared her throat. “Heart has told us that you overheard a conversation between us when you were a child. I cannot even imagine what you must have been feeling over these past years.”

Leonora shook her head, unwilling to add to their worry. “I know why you did it, so please, do not feel any guilt on my behalf.” Their burden had been far heavier than hers, and they had carried it for far longer.

The marchioness nodded. “And as you have correctly deducted, the Duchess of Crane is your mother.”

Leonora’s gaze flicked to the woman in question. Her mother. She had thought once they were officially introduced, she might feel an instant sort of mother-daughter connection. But there was no such extraordinary feeling.

“Leonora,” the duchess said, her voice soft but proud. “You’ve grown into a beautiful young woman. You must have so many questions for me.”

Questions? Leonora’s gaze dropped to where the woman rubbed one finger over the other before meeting her gaze again. She didn’t have any questions, in fact. Perhaps in the past, but not anymore. She loved her family, and the Duchess of Crane wasn’t part of it. She hadn’t been for the past twenty years. She had merely birthed her.

All Leonora had wanted was the truth, which she now had. As for the rest, she could surmise what had transpired between the duchess and Heart. A rake had seduced an innocent lady, or perhaps the other way around, and when the consequences came in the form of Leonora, that rake failed to do the right thing, which left the lady with limited options.

It was a tale that might be considered as old as time.

The duchess’s family might even have had a hand in how it had all played out in the end. Perhaps they wouldn’t have welcomed the idea of her marrying the rake who had ruined her anyway. However, it didn’t matter to Leonora. In time, they might build a relationship, and she was certainly open to that—would be delighted, in fact—but at the moment her mind was rather stuck on someone other than her real mother.

“Leonora?” Heart said gruffly. “Are you all right? Do you want some tea?”

Right. Leonora cleared her throat and shook her head.

Then she suddenly recalled something that Dare had said at the lake. “I do have some questions, now that I think about it.” Not questions that had anything to do with the distant past, rather a more recent past. But first, she turned to the marchioness, “Are you not supposed to be in Wales, Mother? I witnessed your early morning meeting with the duchess that time in the park.”

The marchioness jolted. “Oh. That. Yes.” She let out a little cough behind her hand. “I heard Cassandra planned to return to London and grew concerned. But now that it has come to this, I plan to travel back to join your father in Wales as early as tomorrow.”

Ah. Well, Leonora had suspected as much. Her gaze found the duchess’s. “Dare told me you paid him a visit.”

The woman’s eyes widened. “He told you that?”

Leonora nodded. The duchess seemed oddly surprised. Why would he not? Before she could ask her next question, however, Heart shot a heated glance to the duchess and growled, “I thought you said he agreed to stay away from Leonora if you handed him the deed of that other fellow.”

Wait, what? Leonora’s heart threatened to stop.

“I did,” the duchess murmured. “He accepted the condition without hesitation.”

Leonora froze.

The words rang in her ears, hollow and heavy all at once. Accepted the condition without hesitation? Deed? That other fellow? But her heart only latched onto the first part. Accepted the condition. And Heart said Dare had agreed to stay away from her.

The truth settled in her chest like a stone. She knew it as surely as she knew the sun would rise each morning—this condition was their leverage to keep them apart. Heart’s reaction had already been a giveaway, but any lingering doubt crumbled at the duchess’s pinched expression.

Leonora’s breath caught.

And then, her heart moved to the most devastating part of the statement. Without hesitation.

That blasted rogue! How could he do this to her?

Drat it. Her heart threatened to burst as everything started to fall into place. Heart and the duchess had meddled in her affairs. They had made a deal with Dare. And the cad had accepted.

Without hesitation.

Leonora rose to her feet, drawing all eyes back to her. “When was this?”

The duchess’s brows furrowed. “A fortnight ago. I was only...” Her voice trailed off as Leonora balled her hands into fists, pretty certain from the expressions on all three faces looking back at her that the composure in her own had cracked.

This was why she hadn’t even caught a glimpse of his shadow at any event. He had made a deal for the thing his cousin was in search of. The deed.

This is what you get for falling in love with a rake, Leonora.

Curse it all!

She’d fallen in love with a rake even though she had never intended—nor even attempted—to reform him. But then, she hadn’t intended to fall in love with him either. Yet even if she had set out to reform him, she would have failed, simply because she had no desire to change anyone. She’d understood all this and had still fallen supremely hard.

Her family hadn’t made it any easier, either. “How could you do such a thing?” Leonora demanded from the duchess.

“Leonora,” Heart warned, his brows scrunching even more.

Hah! “That tone will not work on me today, Heart. You knew about this, too. How could you stoop to such low tricks?”

“Heart didn’t know until after the fact,” the duchess said. “I was merely trying to look out for you.”

“I can look after myself.” She sent her a pointed look. “I’ve been doing it for years.”

“Nevertheless, Dare is no good for you, Leonora,” Heart said. “The man is a lothario. Cassandra did you a favor.”

A favor? How could this be borne? “You ruined the thing that mattered most to me!”

“The thing that mattered most?” Heart sneered. “You mean your chaste friendship with that libertine? He must not have thought it mattered so much, since he walked away from you so easily.”

A vise tightened around her heart.

“Heart is right, Leonora,” the duchess said, casting a brief, knowing glance at Heart, who responded with a grunt. “A man like Dare will only cause you grief. The last thing we want is for our past to repeat with you. It’s better to stay away from him before it’s too late.”

“You mean before I’m seduced and must give up a child?”

Heart leaped to his feet. “Leonora!”

“What is it, Heart?” Leonora challenged, shoulders set. “You sorely underestimate me. You must know I’m not the sort of woman who bows to convention. If consequences arise from my associating with an infamous rogue, I shall face it the same way I face everything in my life—with boldness and without fear. You have no right to meddle in my relationships.”

“When it comes to your reputation, I have every right,” he boomed. “I have not protected you from fire and brimstone for twenty years only for it to be ruined by that blackguard!”

“Dare knows,” Leonora said flatly. “He knows I am a by-blow. He knows everything.”

The marchioness gasped.

“You told him?” Heart demanded, his face growing multiple shades of red. “ Him ?”

“I didn’t spell it out, but he guessed. How could he not, when the duchess who resembles me so well calls on him to warn him off? Not a fortnight ago—before that. Weren’t you there as well? He guessed. I didn’t deny it.”

The duchess’s brows gathered together.

Heart cursed and dragged both hands through his hair. His eyes looked almost hopeless. “Do you know what you’ve done?”

“That’s enough,” the marchioness said firmly. “Calm your temper. If the earl knows, he knows. There is nothing to be done about it now.”

Leonora agreed. This was enough. She couldn’t believe they would do something so underhanded as to try to control her associations in this way. And Dare! Did he truly care for her so little that he would agree without hesitation? She shouldn’t be angry or disappointed or even heartbroken at the fact that he didn’t love her. After all, she had known what she was getting into when she had flirted with him. When she had seduced him. However, quietly acquiescing like an obedient, well-behaved lady without speaking to the man himself was simply not an option.

Face to face.

Heart to heart.

She turned on her heel and marched off.

“Leonora!” Heart called after her. “Where the devil are you going?”

She stopped at the door to look over her shoulder. “If it was the past you didn’t want me to repeat, you are too late,” she smiled as his eyes widened, “for it has already repeated itself.”

*

Ah, what hellish damnation.

He missed that little temptress.

A fist slammed into Dare’s jaw. His head snapped sideways, pain exploding along his cheekbone, snapping him back to the present. The taste of blood filled his mouth.

“You’re not focusing, cousin,” Drake taunted. Roars went up all around the warehouse, as they circled each other, both shirtless and bloody. The sting of his knuckles registered only faintly. He had lost track of how many punches he’d thrown.

He took comfort in the fact that Drake looked a bit worse.

“You’ve been challenging me every day for a fortnight,” Drake continued, rolling his shoulders. “Aren’t you tired?”

“You lied to me.” Knuckles cracked. “I’m venting.”

Drake spit out blood and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I withheld the truth.”

Dare sneered. “Omission might not be an outright lie, but your intention behind the omission makes it one. You used me.”

“No,” Drake corrected with a smirk. “You are using me. I wish to return to Brighton in this lifetime.”

“Then return.”

“Then hand over the deed.”

Dare’s fist flew through the air, aimed straight for his cousin’s face. Unfortunately, Drake ducked, and in the next instant, his knuckles connected with Dare’s ribs, sending a jolt of misery up his side.

The man had confessed to letting a word slip here, a threat there, all leading the duchess back to London—where she would find her daughter flirting with a rake. His cousin’s network, and his damned calculations, were deuced frightening.

He bit out a laugh through clenched teeth. “When I’m satisfied, I shall give it to you.”

“You won’t be satisfied until you return to her side,” Drake countered. “I did you a favor, cousin.”

“Don’t speak nonsense.”

“Admit it—you made a mistake.”

No. It couldn’t have been a mistake. Distancing himself was for the best. Leonora would marry the perfect man. A man like Calstone. A man worthy of her. A man the exact opposite of him. He... it didn’t matter what he did, so long as he didn’t hurt anyone like his father hurt his mother. He’d die before he’d do that.

But he also didn’t want to let go.

I must.

Another blow from Drake cracked against his jaw. He cursed, ducking to the side before straightening and rolling his neck left and right. He didn’t like pain. All his life, everything he had done was in service of avoiding it. And yet, the only thing more tolerable than the throb in his heart that had started to bloom in that secret library and had sprouted roots the moment he took that deed, was taking blows from Drake.

It will pass with time. He had to believe that. Anything else...

He dared not contemplate.

In the meantime, while he waited, he would torture his cousin for keeping the truth from him this entire time. That he’d known Leonora was the Duchess of Crane’s child with Heart. That he had mocked him from the shadows. That he had tried to blackmail the woman into handing over the deed and failed.

The thought still made him want to reduce all Drake’s properties to ashes.

Drake struck again, but this time, he was ready. He countered with a sharp jab to his cousin’s gut, sending him staggering back. He didn’t stop. The crowd roared with each hit and spat curses whenever one of them missed. It wasn’t an official match. There would be no victor at the end of this.

And Drake had the nerve to say Dare had made a mistake? The only mistake he’d made was not beating Drake to a damn pulp.

Admit it.

Dare bent over, clutching at his leg with one hand and lifting his hand with the other. He dragged in several breaths. “Time.”

A mocking smile answered him.

Arse.

Drake wiped the sweat from his brow. “Not going to admit it?”

This again. He straightened, clenching and unclenching his fists. “What the hell do you know anyway?”

“You’ve never been this out of sorts with a bird before.”

“That’s because she’s not a bird, so watch your bloody language.” What bird? She was a witch. A temptress. A miracle.

And he had left nothing but dust in his wake when he left.

Had she been worried? Had she been attending balls in the hope of catching him there? Had she been disappointed when he hadn’t shown up? How many times had he stood before the doors of a house, the sounds of a ball or party or musicale drawing him forward, light spilling from within, before turning on his heel and walking away?

Admit . . .

Every single time, every single step had been a mistake. However, he hadn’t been able to bring himself to step through those doors and into the light.

He hated this.

Hated himself for becoming like this. But what the hell was a man like him supposed to do? Hide his leopard spots beneath a coat of wool? Pretend his infamous reputation did not exist? Don a halo and hope no one noticed the horns?

“Do you know that my mother loved that man?” Drake asked, circling him, interrupting his spiral.

Was he talking about the late Duke of Crane?

“I could never understand how someone could love a monster,” his cousin went on. “I still don’t.” Dark eyes, black as night, landed on Dare. Eyes Drake had inherited from the late duke. The man cracked his knuckles. “Are you a monster?”

What kind of question was that? “You know my father—”

“I’m not talking about your father,” he cut Dare off. “I’m talking about you.”

“I’m not a monster. My father wasn’t either.” His failures had just led to his mother’s death, but a monster? No. He was a man with tragic flaws.

“If you’re not a monster, then stop being so hesitant and go catch the little bird you set free.”

“I can’t promise I won’t betray us.” He laid his truth bare across the charged air of the warehouse even though the jeers once goading them to fight had subsided. This was his burden—the burden of his past set in the balance against the bright possibility of her future.

A dismissive snort. “Says who?”

“History.”

Drake nodded, walked over to a crate, and sat down. “The sins of the father turn into the flaws of his son.” He leaned back, tilting his chin up, eyes blazing with challenge “Or not.”

“Spit it out if you have something to say.”

“The past repeating itself isn’t up to your father, it’s up to you. If you don’t like it, change it. Forge a new course for your offspring.”

Dare’s brows furrowed. The past repeating itself isn’t up to your father, it’s up to you. What the devil was he supposed to do with those words? Christ, they pressed onto his chest like a thousand red bricks. They gripped him in such a numbing vise that he stood frozen, torn between the familiar, cold comfort of certainty and the blinding, terrifying thought that maybe—just maybe—he could change things.

Could he change things?

Could he make himself a different man? One worthy of something more than just the burden of his bloodline? More than the shadows of his father’s sins? Leonora—beautiful, brilliant, and far beyond his reach—could he be the man she deserved? A man who wouldn’t tear apart everything they could build, but would instead be the one to hold it together?

He clenched his fists, pulse pounding in his temples.

No, he wasn’t like his father. He couldn’t be. And if he was to ever to become the man he could be—a man worthy of her—he had to try.

And try hard.

For her. For himself. For a chance to leave the darkness, to rewrite the future instead of repeating the past.

It was up to him. Yes. But damn it, what if he failed? What if he failed her? His offspring? Himself?

He cursed. Getting ahead of yourself there, Dare?

Who was to say she would still have anything to do with him?

But if, by any chance, she felt for him what he felt for her... He might not be a man worthy of her yet, but he could start becoming that man. He would continue becoming until his very last breath, and hope to God it had been enough, that he had not failed. That he had succeeded.

A certain parrot’s cry flitted through his head. The earl is an idiot. The earl is an idiot.

Christ. He was an idiot.

“Actually, mate, it seems you won’t have to go hunting after all.”

Hunting? He swore this mouth of his cousin’s was deuced vexing. Birds. Hunting. Why the hell did it remind him of his parrots and alligators? Toss a monkey in the mix, too. Memories he could do without.

Memories that also all . . . included her .

Then again, perhaps not so bad at all.

He scowled at Drake. “Why not shut your mouth and prepare to be beaten?”

“Are you sure?” He nodded to a spot behind Dare. “I’d rather not humiliate you.”

Dare glanced over his shoulder and then snapped all the way around so fast a muscle in his neck pulled. He ignored the pain. There she stood. Watching him. Her hair tumbled down the way he loved, his jacket draped over her shoulders as though she belonged to him.

Utterly riveting.