The Lady Forfeits Read online

  She reached up once again and this time touched the silky black softness of his hair as it fell rakishly across his forehead. Long seconds passed and she held her breath in anticipation as he looked deep into the depths of her clear and steady blue gaze, down over the delicacy of her nose and across the creamy pallor of her cheeks, before lingering, settling, on the parted swell of her lips.

  She felt the intensity of that gaze almost like a caress as her heartbeats quickened and a warmth spread from her breasts down to between her thighs. She wanted, needed, to be close to him, wanted so much to hold him, to banish, even briefly, the pain he was obviously suffering—

  ‘No, damn it!’ Gabriel suddenly grasped the tops of her arms and put her firmly away from him, his expression savage as he continued to glare down at her.

  Diana stumbled slightly as she felt the coldness of his rejection, her humiliation complete as he turned his back on her to walk across the room and stand in front of one of the huge bay windows looking out over the stables.

  What had she expected? That they would somehow be united by the uncomfortable atmosphere that existed in this household? That she would be the one to whom Gabriel turned for comfort because of the strain he felt at being back here?

  If Diana had expected either of those things to occur, then she obviously was as naïvely idealistic as he had just accused her of being; he had made it more than clear that he would not be here at all if not for her interference. Something he was very unlikely to forgive her for…

  She straightened her shoulders. ‘Perhaps now might be a good time for you to leave me the privacy in which to wash and change for dinner.’

  Gabriel drew in a deep and laboured breath as he clearly heard the hurt beneath the coolness of Diana’s tone, a hurt he knew had been caused by his rejection of the warmth and comfort she had so freely offered him.

  As much as he might long to accept that offer, to just accept the comfort of Diana’s body and forget everything but their mutually satisfying physical release, he could not bring himself to do it—and not just because he wished to wait until after they were married.

  The mere thought of consummating their relationship for the first time in the oppression of this house was enough to dampen all arousal. No, better by far that she should suffer a little hurt now than that either of them should ever be haunted by that particular memory.

  He drew in a ragged breath. ‘You still have absolutely no idea what is going on in this house, do you, Diana?’

  She looked confused. ‘You have told me some of it and I know there is an unpleasantness of atmosphere here.’

  Gabriel gave a hard, humourless laugh. ‘If only that were all it was.’

  ‘Then talk to me, Gabriel,’ Diana encouraged. ‘Let me share this with you.’

  ‘So that you can attempt to fix it? Just as you have fixed so many other things for your own family since your mother abandoned you so cruelly?’

  She flinched, stepping away from him. ‘You are the one who is being deliberately cruel.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Diana. This house and the people in it make me feel like being cruel.’ Gabriel ran an agitated hand through the heavy thickness of his hair.

  Diana’s heart instantly softened again at this explanation. ‘I understand—’

  ‘You understand nothing!’ He gave a sudden hard bark of derisive laughter. ‘God, I have been back in this house only a matter of minutes and already I feel as if I am suffocating!’

  ‘Then confiding in me can surely only help to ease your suffering.’ Her hand once again rested on the rigid tension of his arm as she looked up at him pleadingly.

  ‘Do you seriously believe that?’

  ‘It cannot do any harm.’

  ‘You are wrong, Diana. So very wrong.’ Gabriel shook his head, at the same time knowing that if they were going to stay here, even if only for tonight, then it would not be fair to leave her in ignorance of the past any longer. There was another person in this household who would be only too delighted to regale her with a different version of events. ‘Very well.’ He became very still. ‘You have asked to know and said that you wish to share this with me.’

  Diana could not help but notice how his mouth had become an uncompromising line, his eyes once again like hard onyx. Knowing that he was not in possession of his usual arrogant control at this moment, she thought that his mood was now such that his previous taunt about her mother’s abandonment was likely to fade into insignificance under the avalanche of what he was about to tell her.

  Gabriel gave a wry smile as he saw the apprehension in her gaze. ‘Or perhaps you have changed your mind and would now prefer not to know?’

  Diana swallowed hard, a small cowardly part of her wishing to say, yes, she had changed her mind, that she did not want to hear what he was about to tell her, yet at the same time knowing that nothing in this household would make sense until she heard what he had to say…

  Her chin rose proudly. ‘I trust I have never shied away from hearing the truth, my lord.’

  He bared his teeth in a pained grimace. ‘I have no doubt you will want to run from this particular truth.’

  Her apprehension grew even as she continued to meet his gaze with steady resolve. ‘Nothing you tell me now will change my opinion of you.’

  ‘Which is?’ he asked curiously.

  She moistened her lips before answering. ‘I know you to be a man who feels a deep obligation in regard to your guardianship of my two sisters and myself. That Lord Vaughn, who was an officer and is a gentleman, holds you in high regard.’

  ‘None of what you have said so far is your own opinion of me,’ he pointed out.

  Perhaps that was because it seemed wiser, with their own acquaintance so new, for Diana to acknowledge how others regarded him. Her own feelings towards the man to whom she was betrothed were still too tenuous to be voiced. That Gabriel was both arrogant, and impatient of the foibles of others, Diana already knew. That he chose to keep his own emotions firmly hidden from prying eyes behind a wall of hauteur, she was also aware—but as to how she personally felt towards him?

  She found herself drawn to his unmistakable good looks. Quivered when he took her into his strong arms and pressed her body against his hard and muscled one. Trembled when he kissed her with those sensually sculptured lips. Was filled with a yearning desire when he touched and caressed her with assured and yet gentle hands.

  Things that she had no wish to share with him right at this moment!

  ‘Do not trouble yourself to look for an answer when it is obviously so difficult for you to find a suitable one,’ Gabriel said bitterly as he saw how Diana was struggling to find an answer that was not too insulting.

  She looked uncomfortable. ‘Perhaps you should just tell me what you feel it is I need to know?’

  ‘Where to start?’ he mused darkly.

  ‘The beginning?’

  Gabriel looked at her. ‘That would be eight years ago.’

  Eight years ago? At the time of the scandal that had ripped Gabriel’s life, and that of his family, apart?

  His jaw was tightly clenched. ‘I have told you of the scandal that resulted in my being disgraced and disinherited.’

  ‘Yes…’

  He nodded tersely, no longer looking at her. ‘What you also need to know, if you are to make sense of the tensions that now exist in this household, is—’ He broke off, suddenly breathing quickly.

  ‘Gabriel, if you would rather not—’

  ‘The fact that you forced us both to come here no longer leaves me any choice in the matter,’ he said grimly.

  Diana gave a shiver of apprehension. Gabriel had been honest with her from the first; he had not hesitated to tell her the worst of himself as well as the best, but even so she knew from the fierceness of his manner now that what he was about to tell her was so extreme, so immense, that it could destroy her regard for him for ever…

  Chapter Nine

  ‘Jennifer Prescott, the wife of my Uncle C
harles, is the same woman I was accused of seducing and then later abandoning when she announced she was expecting my child.’

  Diana felt as if she had received a heavy blow to her chest as she took an unsteady step backwards, her breath arresting in her throat, all the colour draining from her cheeks as she stared up at Gabriel in dazed incomprehension. Then she stumbled until the backs of her knees hit the bed and she sat down abruptly upon its softness.

  It could not be true—could it?

  The young and beautiful woman married to Gabriel’s uncle was the same woman who had accused Gabriel of seducing her eight years ago? Worse, Charles Prescott was the man his father had paid handsomely to marry her in Gabriel’s stead because he believed that woman was expecting his son’s child?

  It was too incredible.

  Unbelievable.

  And yet, was it really so unbelievable a solution? By marrying Charles Prescott, that young woman had still married into Gabriel’s family, thereby resulting in her child being born into the family, too. Except the child had not survived…

  Besides which, this knowledge now made perfect sense of the open hostility between an icily scathing Gabriel and the outraged Jennifer Prescott.

  She raised startled lids to find Gabriel looking across at her with a watchful and narrow-eyed intensity, his jaw arrogantly challenging, his shoulders stiff and his hands tense at his sides.

  That wary tension told her more clearly than anything else could have done that the words she spoke next were crucial, not just to the here and now, but to any continuing relationship between them.

  But imagining Gabriel and the beautiful Jennifer Prescott engaged together in intimacy was—

  No!

  Having seen the other woman for herself, and acknowledged her beauty, did not mean Diana should now not believe Gabriel’s claim of innocence. Admittedly, it was difficult to imagine any man being immune to that dark and exotic beauty, but if he said he was, then once again she had no reason to doubt his word. Just as she had assured Caroline two days ago, if there could not be love between herself and Gabriel, then surely they must at least have honesty?

  Diana either trusted and believed in the word of the man to whom she was now betrothed, or she did not. It was that simple. She stood up to cross the room and stand in front of the window that looked out over the stables and extensive grounds, her thoughts racing as she attempted to come to terms with what she’d been told.

  Gabriel’s insistence that he was innocent of that past scandal had not changed. It would, she was sure, never change; he was a man who stated the truth, and be damned with whether anyone chose to believe him or not.

  She chose to believe him. She must!

  Her gaze was very clear and direct when she finally looked across at him still tensely waiting for her response. ‘I believe I owe you an apology, Gabriel.’

  ‘What?’

  Diana gave a slight nod at his shocked explosion. ‘I should have realised that you had another reason other than the past tensions between your mother and yourself for refusing to visit Faulkner Manor.’

  Gabriel stared at her wordlessly. For such a coolly composed and self-contained young lady, Diana succeeded in surprising him far more often than he would have wished. He had expected her initial shock at his disclosure concerning Jennifer Prescott, and in that he had not been disappointed. However, he had expected either tears or angry accusations to follow, not that she would apologise to him!

  In acting so maturely, she had made a mockery of his own anger and resentment at once again finding himself at Faulkner Manor…‘My uncle’s marriage to Jennifer Lindsay, as she was then, is not a subject on which I have ever wished to dwell,’ he told her.

  She looked at him sympathetically. ‘I can understand that.’

  ‘Can you?’

  ‘But of course,’ she said. ‘Not only were you not believed eight years ago, but the woman who made the accusation was accepted into your family whilst you were banished. That must have seemed doubly cruel.’

  Cruel to the point that Gabriel had left, vowing never to step foot inside the Manor again. And yet here he was, not only back in his childhood home, but welcomed back—if Jennifer Prescott’s obvious shock and dismay at his reappearance could be called a welcome—by the very woman who had once set out to completely destroy his life.

  ‘Yes, it was,’ he agreed.

  ‘Were your uncle and aunt acquainted before your father arranged their marriage?’

  ‘I presume so,’ he said.

  ‘But you do not know for sure?’

  ‘I don’t see how that’s important, to be honest,’ Gabriel said. ‘Charles has always been a frequent visitor to Faulkner Manor and Jennifer’s family lived nearby. Usually he came to ask my father to make him a loan they both knew would never be repaid. But what could my father do? Charles was always in debt to the loan sharks, but he was my mother’s brother and her only living relative.’

  ‘Those circumstances would have made it difficult for your father to refuse him, certainly.’

  ‘Impossible,’ he reiterated.

  ‘And is your uncle a handsome man?’ she asked pensively.

  Gabriel frowned. ‘I fail to see what my uncle’s looks have to do with anything.’

  Diana shrugged creamy shoulders. ‘I was merely curious as to whether or not there is a family resemblance between you and him.’

  ‘Why?’ Gabriel’s impatience with her questions was barely contained.

  Why, indeed? Diana mused. Things were so much more complicated than she could ever have realised before coming here. Jennifer Prescott was an undoubted beauty. The fact that both she and her husband resided at Faulkner Manor, running the house and estates whilst Gabriel’s mother remained in her rooms did, as Gabriel had accused earlier, make his aunt the mistress of this household. And the other woman’s obvious shock and dismay when she realised Gabriel had come here had been plain to see.

  But as well as all of those things was a question that no one seemed to have provided an answer to as yet…

  Now that Diana had met Jennifer Prescott—and, she admitted uncomfortably, taken an instant dislike to her—it was a question that greatly intrigued her. Namely, if Jennifer Lindsay had not been expecting Gabriel’s child eight years ago, then whose child had it been?

  She smiled at the enormity of her imaginings. ‘No doubt your uncle is a portly gentleman of middle years—’

  ‘On the contrary, he’s an extremely handsome rogue of middle years,’ Gabriel drawled drily. ‘In fact, I believe Charles was considered something of a catch until his penchant for gambling put him beyond the pale as far as the marriage-minded mamas of society were concerned.’

  ‘I see…’

  He gave her a frustrated look. ‘What exactly do you see?’

  Diana was not entirely sure; she needed to spend more time here, to observe Mrs Prescott—and perhaps her husband if he should return to Faulkner Manor whilst they were still here—to fully put into words what was at this moment only the beginnings of a suspicion.

  She shook her head. ‘Perhaps we have spoken of this enough for now. There is still some time before we are expected downstairs for dinner—would this not be a good time for you to visit your mother?’

  ‘It would, yes.’ In truth, whilst Gabriel now wished very much to see his mother again, he also admitted to an inner feeling of reluctance to do so. His relationship with his mother had always been closer than the one with his father, but it was a closeness that had ceased to exist the moment he’d left home. Not a word or a letter had been exchanged between the two of them in all that time. As such, and in spite of Alice Britton’s assurances in her letter that his mother longed to see him again, he still had his doubts.

  ‘I shall be perfectly content in your absence, Gabriel,’ Diana assured him briskly. ‘Indeed, I would welcome the time in which to wash and change before dinner. After all…’ her lips curved in anticipation ‘…Mrs Prescott must not be allowed to think you are
to marry an unfashionable young lady!’

  Gabriel scowled. ‘Mrs Prescott can go hang herself for all I care about her opinion on anything, least of all the woman I am to marry.’

  Diana’s smile was rueful. ‘This is something between us two ladies, I believe, Gabriel.’

  ‘Have a care, Diana.’ He looked troubled. ‘She is a woman whom I have learnt at my cost it is dangerous to cross.’

  ‘I may have lived all of my life in the country, Gabriel, but I assure you that I am not without a certain knowledge of my own sex. As such, I believe Mrs Prescott will quickly learn that I am not a woman without thoughts and ideas of my own.’

  Gabriel looked at her admiringly. He could not help but be aware of the steely determination in her manner, the same strength of character that had stood her in such good stead during all those years of caring for her father and two sisters and had encouraged her to accept his own marriage proposal. The same force of will that had enabled Diana to travel into Cambridgeshire completely against his wishes.

  To his surprise, he suddenly found that he could no longer feel any anger towards her in that regard, accepting the explanation that she had believed she was acting in his best interests. And perhaps she had…

  And perhaps Gabriel had delayed his visit to his mother for long enough! ‘Your fortitude is to be admired, my dear.’

  She gave him a confident smile. ‘We may be marrying for convenience rather than love, my lord, but that does not make me any less loyal to you and our betrothal.’

  He had no doubts about that when he acknowledged that Diana had travelled into Cambridgeshire alone, but for her maid, simply because she considered it was the right thing to do. Just as she showed every indication of remaining here, despite now knowing of the true unpleasantness of the situation that existed here.

  Gabriel could not help but feel scornful of the young man who had so recently rejected the love and regard in which Diana had so obviously held him, even more so because his own respect for her was growing by the minute.

  ‘I am not sure I deserve such loyalty, Diana,’ he murmured huskily as he reached down to take her hand in his before lifting it to his lips and placing a kiss upon her lace-covered palm, folding her fingers about that kiss before releasing her hand.