Once Upon a Scandal Read online

  A wave of dizziness washed over Emma. It had happened here at Vauxhall on a warm summer night. Stupidly, she had struck off alone along a deserted track, much like the one she entered now.

  There were no lanterns here, and gloom lay thick over the gardens. Clutching the tiger mask, Emma walked slowly, aware of the beating of her heart. Surely it was only her imagination that caused her eerie sense of foreboding. Scores of little pathways crisscrossed the gardens. This could not be the same one. The coincidence would be too hideous.

  Her feet splashed through a puddle, soaking her slippers. She scarcely noticed the cold wetness. Ahead, something white glinted through the darkened trees. The same ghostly gleam she had glimpsed that other night. Then, as now, the merry splashing of a fountain masked the distant noise of the orchestra.

  She forced herself to keep walking, though a pall of horror descended over her. As if it were yesterday, she remembered her delight at stumbling upon an airy little temple with stone pillars. The same temple that loomed before her now, with dark ivy climbing up the white marble and inside, the statue of a goddess.

  The temple of Daphne.

  Earlier, a bored attendant had pointed out the pathway to her. Emma had never dreamed it was the place of her nightmare. She had never known the name of it, one of many rustic shrines scattered throughout the gardens.

  It was an appalling mischance. Her blackmailer could not have known the implications of the rendezvous he had chosen. Or could he?

  Ice prickled down her spine. Had he been watching that night? Had he seen Lord Andrew violate her?

  Her stomach crawled. Was he even now observing her from the nearby bushes? Or from the murky depths of the temple?

  She could not go on. Her feet were rooted to the ground. Every instinct screamed at her to run. To run as far and as fast as she could. To flee the danger of the present as much as the demons of the past.

  But to do so was to lose Lucas. Her love for him gave her strength. She had to fetch that letter and burn it.

  Gripping the heavy tiger mask, she cautiously approached the temple. She glanced around, but saw only the darkness of the trees. Slowly she mounted the marble steps, half expecting to find a man slumped on the stone bench within, his head in his hands, the gold trim on his blue uniform glinting in the shadows … .

  He was weeping. Deep, wrenching sobs of raw emotion. She paused, paralyzed by compassion and awkwardness. Never before had she witnessed such undisguised pain in a man. He thought he was alone, unobserved.

  She backed away. He must have caught her movement, for his head shot up and he stared, his face wet with tears.

  With a jolt, she recognized him. Lord Andrew Coulter. She had thought him a handsome and entertaining man, always smiling, ever ready with a witty remark. But not now. Now his expression showed a harsh, unsightly anguish.

  He said nothing. The moment seemed to pulse with some unnamed intensity, something savage, beyond her ken.

  She took a clumsy step backward, bumping into a column. “I—I”

  He lunged off the bench. Before she could even recoil in surprise, he seized her by the waist and propelled her down onto the stone floor, at the base of the statue. His body slammed onto hers. For an instant, she lay there, stunned. Then she panicked, lashing out with her fists, sucking in air for a scream.

  His hand clamped over her mouth. “God help me,” he said in a guttural tone. “Don’t fight … .”

  Breathing hard, he yanked up her skirts. The shock of it galvanized her. Shoving, kicking, biting, she battled his feral attack. His relentless fingers tore at her undergarments. Cool air slapped her naked flesh. Then a brutal thrust of his hips hurled her into a hell of fiery pain.

  She thought he’d plunged a knife into her. Tears stung her eyes, tears of agony and hysteria. Her fists beat against his straining muscles, but he was oblivious to her blows. Grunting and muttering, he rammed into her, again and again and again.

  “I want—I need—a woman—only this—nothing more—nothing—”

  He jerked and cried out, panting harshly. Then he rolled off her and lay prone on the floor of the temple, his face buried in his arms. While she huddled at the base of the pedestal, shaking and burning … .

  Emma trembled now, dizzy from the memory. She stood inside the shadows of the temple, gazing at the very spot where Andrew had raped her. The pale square of a folded paper lay on the floor, beneath the statue of the beauteous Daphne, begging her father to save her from Apollo’s passion.

  The old feeling of helplessness choked Emma, along with a rising rage, a tempest of anger at the man who had ended her innocence. He had not even seemed to notice her weeping that night as she’d dragged herself to her feet, clutched the torn gown around her blood-smeared thighs, and stumbled away to her carriage.

  My abominable behavior has tormented me ever since … I am damned to the fires of Hell.

  The words he had written fed her fury. He knew nothing of torment. Nothing of suffering scorn, of facing pregnancy alone and in disgrace, through no fault of her own. “Curse him,” she said aloud.

  And now, just when she’d found happiness once more, Andrew was reaching out from the grave to hurt her again. Him, and whoever sought to use the ruinous apology he had committed to paper. “Curse them both!”

  Half-blinded by tears, she dropped the tiger mask and snatched up the letter. She rushed out of the temple, down the steps, and into the moonlight. She paused only long enough to ascertain that she possessed the genuine letter. Crushing it in her palm, she headed for the trees. Her only thought was to find a lantern on a deserted path. She’d burn the evidence. And Lucas would never know. He would never, ever know.

  Suddenly, as she ran headlong down the shadowed path, she saw him.

  Despite the gloom, there was no mistaking the peacock-blue of his costume or his tall, princely form. He had discarded his mask. He surged toward her, the haste of his strides betraying his concern.

  It was too late to flee. But Emma didn’t care. She wanted only to feel her husband’s arms around her, safe and warm and strong.

  He fulfilled her wish, enclosing her in his embrace. “Emma? You frightened me. Why were you running? What’s wrong?”

  “Oh, Lucas, I saw it,” she whispered brokenly. “The place … where he forced me.”

  Like a protective band, his arm muscles stiffened around her. The breath came out of him in a harsh gust. He pressed her cheek to his chest, his fingers stroking back the hood and threading into her hair, tilting her face up for his healing kiss. “My God. What possessed you to go there?”

  “I—I just went for a walk … .” She couldn’t tell him what she had done. She could never tell him, though her shoulders drooped from the weight of her lies.

  “Who was he?” Lucas said in a low, hard voice.

  She shook her head in bitter despair. If only he knew, the truth was written on the ball of paper clutched in her hand. The terrible truth that would destroy him and his family. “Please, I beg of you. Don’t ask me anymore.”

  A long moment passed. A lively tune played in the distance, where people laughed and danced and made merry. It seemed a world separate from this moonlit place in the trees. “I can’t help myself,” Lucas said gruffly, rubbing his cheek against the top of her head. “I wish to God I’d been there to protect you.”

  “Yet if you had been, I wouldn’t have Jenny. She makes the memory bearable.”

  “And us, Emma. Don’t forget that bastard’s act of violence brought you and me together.”

  Radiance trickled into the darkness of her soul. Lucas spoke as if she mattered to him. Dare she hope he could forgive her? She lifted her head, searching out his dark gaze in the moonlight. “I owe so much to you,” she whispered. “You taught me how wonderful a man’s touch can be.” Emma paused, her heart overflowing as she reached up to caress his hard jaw. “No, not any man. Only you. I love you, Lucas.”

  The tightening of his hands on her back acknowledged her avo
wal. Yet his eyes were strangely watchful. “Then tell me.” The words sounded dragged from him. “What have you done with the tiger mask?”

  The chill of reality invaded Emma. The burden of her secret weighed upon her conscience. She had intended to claim she’d been robbed and throw herself upon his mercy. But the lie died on her lips. She lowered her head in shameful despair, praying he would never find out, even if it meant him losing faith in her, never trusting her again.

  He let go of her abruptly. As she looked up, he brushed past her and plunged down the path toward the distant temple. Her heart leapt into her throat. A pinprick of light moved in the gloom of the shrine.

  The blackmailer.

  “No.” The wind caught her whispered moan as she ran after Lucas. A stone cut into her slipper. Heedless, she followed him, but it was too late. He pounded up the steps of the temple. A moment later, he hauled out a man clad all in black and holding a lantern in his gloved hand.

  She knew him at once, though a dark cap covered his sandy hair. “Woodrow,” she said in anguish.

  He gazed at her across the small, moonlit clearing. The music of the fountain played into the quiet night air. His shoulders were bowed, his chin lowered. “Emma,” he said, holding out his hand in supplication. “My dear Emma.”

  Sickened by his betrayal, she stood mute. He had put her through hell. Because he wanted to shatter her marriage.

  Lucas gave him a hard shake. “Tell me what this is all about. Has my wife been passing stolen goods to you?”

  “Good God! No!” Woodrow paused, his chest heaving. With slow, thoughtful movements, he set down the lantern on the marble step. “I—I wanted you to blame her. If you must know … I was blackmailing her.”

  “On what grounds?”

  “I was in possession of a letter”—he paused as if the admission pained him—“from the man who had dishonored her.”

  “No,” Emma moaned. “Please.” Willing him not to go on, she crushed the balled-up letter.

  Neither man seemed to notice her distress. They faced each other like combatants on a battlefield.

  “A letter,” Lucas repeated in a strange, raw voice. “From whom? Damn it, man, who?”

  Woodrow’s expression took on a certain satisfaction. “I’m afraid … it was written by your brother. Lord Andrew.”

  Turning her head away, Emma squeezed her eyes shut. She could not bear to look at Lucas. To see the pain on his beloved face. She could sense his agony as if it were her own.

  “You lie. You lie. I’ll kill you for that.” Then his harsh tone was directed at her. “Emma? Is this true?”

  She opened her eyes. He stood in the moonlight, his features stark and noble, the man she had grown to love. The last time he’d been betrayed, he had fled England for seven years. And in a cruel flash of insight, she realized that without honesty she was unworthy of him.

  Wordlessly, she held out the crumpled letter.

  He took it from her, walked away, and propped his foot on the step, smoothing out the wrinkled paper against his thigh. By the light of the lantern, he read silently, shadows hollowing his cheekbones. It seemed an eternity passed before he lifted his head and turned his haunted eyes to her.

  “My brother … did that to you … here.” His voice sounded lost, bewildered, ashamed. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I couldn’t.” The barrier of the past stood between them now. Gazing at him, she felt his torment along with her own helpless anger. Damn Woodrow. He had succeeded in his plot. How could he, when she had trusted him for so long?

  Lucas looked at her as if seeing her for the first time. As if realizing all she had suffered. And then without touching her, he turned to Woodrow. “Why did you have this letter?”

  “Andrew gave it to me. At Talavera. As he lay dying … in my arms.” His voice broke as if from the strain of emotion. “I would have cut off my right arm to save him. He was my life … my love.”

  Mired in disbelief, Emma stared at him.

  He’s a sodomite. He prefers men to women.

  Lucas seized Woodrow by the black lapels of his coat. “You bastard! What the hell are you saying?”

  “I loved him. I loved your brother with all my heart and soul.”

  “And with your body?”

  “With all that I was.”

  Lucas released him abruptly and stepped back. Pacing in agitation, he rubbed his brow. “No. Surely I would have known.”

  “Not about that.” A trace of smugness on his face, Woodrow sat down on the step. “It started when we became friends at Eton. One night, we had a bit much to drink … and it just happened. Neither of us planned to make love. Neither of us had any experience, either.” He paused, his head in his hands. “Forgive me, Emma. I shouldn’t speak of such things with a lady present.”

  His misery touched Emma in spite of her shock. But she resisted feeling sympathy for him. For all his pain, Woodrow had knowingly betrayed her. “Never mind propriety,” she said sharply. “I would hear your explanation for Andrew’s treatment of me.”

  “It’s my fault, I fear, though inadvertently so. You see, I fell deeply in love with him and wanted to continue the … the affair. But Andrew fought against his own nature. He feared his family discovering such a secret. Until that night here at Vauxhall.” Woodrow’s voice shook. “Yes, we met that night. We had a brief encounter here … but the struggle within him was too great. He ordered me to leave him. And so I did.”

  Emma tasted the saltiness of blood. She had bitten her lip. Numbness shrouded her body. In her mind’s eye, she could see Andrew sitting on the bench, his face buried in his hands. She could hear his wrenching sobs. And this time, she could sense his despair, too. His hopelessness. He had been in the grips of a monstrous dilemma, torn by a love and longing that society considered to be evil, deviant, punishable by death.

  Lucas’s shoes crunched on the gravel around the fountain. “So,” he said in an oppressive voice, “you let him rape an innocent girl.”

  “No.” Woodrow sat up straight. Repugnance darkened his voice. “I didn’t know what had happened until later, much later. We were due to depart for our regiment early the next morning. Andrew arrived drunk, scarcely able to walk, and in so desolate a temper I feared he would harm himself. And he did, in the end.”

  “What do you mean?” Emma whispered.

  “He was withdrawn for the next month, in the blackest of moods. I blamed myself, of course. And I feared the worst when we met the French at Talavera. Andrew wanted to die. We were separated during the fighting, yet whenever I caught a glimpse of him, I saw him take chance after chance, riding into the thickest of the fighting, until at last he went down, felled by a French saber.” Woodrow bowed his head a moment before continuing. “He confessed all to me as he lay dying. That he had forced himself on you. That he had been frantic to prove his virility with a woman. Any woman. And you had the misfortune to be there.” Woodrow fell silent, weeping soundlessly, his face contorted.

  Emma sank to her heels. Andrew’s actions made a tragic sense now. And knowing the story brought a certain lifting of relief inside her. “You should have given me his letter. Why did you keep it from me?”

  “It was wrong of me. I beg your forgiveness. You see, I couldn’t bear to relinquish the last words he had written.” Woodrow paused, wiping his eyes while gazing beseechingly at her. “When I found out you were carrying his child, I befriended you. At first, I wanted to assuage my own guilt over the terrible turn of events. But when Jenny was born, she brought light into my bereavement. Andrew lives on in her. Surely you can understand how precious she is to me.”

  “And so you threatened my wife,” Lucas stated harshly. “You pretended to leave town, and then sent her a blackmail note—you would give me the letter if she did not steal the tiger mask. Either way she would be forced to betray me.”

  Woodrow gave a jerky nod. “When Emma said she wished to stay with you, I could not bear it. I had no choice but to win her back ho
wever I could. Otherwise, it meant losing Jenny. Perhaps forever.”

  “There is no ‘perhaps’ about it. You are never to come near my wife—or my child—again.”

  Desolation twisted Woodrow’s face. He sprang up from the step, the starkness of horror in his wild eyes. “No. Please. You can’t mean that—”

  “I do, indeed.”

  Hearing the cold rage in his voice, Emma stood up. “Lucas, there’s no need to be so severe. Jenny regards Woodrow as a father—”

  “I am her father now. By the blood of my brother.”

  Emma hugged her arms to her breast. She had never heard him speak in so flat and icy a manner, not even on the night of their wedding. It was as if all warmth in him had died. There was no joy in his claim to Jenny. Nor had he mentioned he was also Jenny’s father by virtue of his marriage.

  He opened the glass door of the lantern and set the letter ablaze. The paper curled and darkened in his hand. He did not release it until the flame burnt down to his fingers and surely blistered him. Then he dropped the charred letter to the ground and crushed it beneath his heel.

  He looked at Woodrow, who stood with his face in his hands. “The tiger mask. Where is it?”

  Woodrow lifted his head slowly, his eyes dull. “I—I don’t know.”

  “The devil you don’t. Emma must have left it for you.”

  “It wasn’t here.” He spread his hands wide in obvious bewilderment. “I—I looked all over the temple, but someone else must have gotten to it first.”

  Lucas grabbed the lantern and stalked up the steps. Emma hastened after him. The shrine was small, the statue of Daphne at one end and the bench at the other.

  “I remember dropping the mask right there.” Emma pointed to the base of the pedestal. The white marble glowed softly through the darkness.

  “There’s nothing back here but a few dead leaves.” Lucas held up the lamp, lighting the gloom behind the statue. “Damn. He must be lying.”

  Emma tagged behind him onto the steps. Only to see Sir Woodrow trudging away, his shoulders slumped, his posture one of abject misery.

  Lucas made a move to pursue him, but Emma stopped her husband with a hand on his rigid arm. “Let him go,” she said. “Woodrow doesn’t have the mask. Someone else must have taken it.”