Candace Camp - Impulse

It was not a comfortable dinner party. The eldest Lady Bridbury was haughty and frigidly polite, obviously displeased at being forced to break bread with a former groom. Jeremy looked quite pale and contributed little to the conversation, while Cam was about as voluble and expressive as a rock. It was left to Angela and Mr. Pettigrew to utter a few inanities about the weather and the landscape. Angela’s mother contributed by describing the latest condition of her health. Angela was relieved when the elder Lady Bridbury rose, indicating that the ladies could retire. She spent only a few minutes with her mother and grandmother in the drawing room, listening to her grandmother complaining bitterly about what the world had come to, what with grooms eating with earls, before she pleaded a headache and retreated to her room.

It was some time later, when Kate had helped her change into her nightclothes and had herself retired, and Angela was sitting up reading in the hopes that it would help her to fall asleep more easily, that there was a light tap at her door and Jeremy stuck his head in the door.

He gave her a small, set smile. “Hallo. Mind if I come in?”

“Of course not.” Angela laid her book aside and motioned him toward the other chair. Though she and Jeremy were very fond of one another, they had never been the sort for cozy late-night chats. She remembered the way he had seemed through the evening meal. “Is something wrong?”

Again he gave her a forced smile. “Wrong? No, I just wanted to talk to you.” He paused, scrutinizing his hands for a moment, as if they contained the secrets of the universe. “Well, actually.” He sighed. “Yes. There is something wrong. I—Cam talked to me again this afternoon about the possibility of your marrying him.”

Angela grimaced. “I told him very plainly this morning that I would not. I cannot think what he hopes to accomplish by badgering you about it.”

“Uh, well, I believe he feels that I could, ah, persuade you to accept his proposal.”

Angela gave him a flat look. “Is that why you came here tonight? To try again to convince me to marry him?”

Her brother’s stricken look was all the answer she needed.

“Jeremy! I told you. I thought you understood.”

“I do! Really, I do. It is not that I don’t realize how you feel or that I don’t think you are right. I do. It is outrageous to ask you to marry him in order to save us. To save me.” He jumped to his feet and walked across the room and back, jingling his watch chain nervously. Finally he stopped in front of her and said in a tight, quiet voice, “It is simply that my need is so pressing, I had to try again. Angela, please, reconsider. It is wrong of me, I know, but I am begging you.”

Sympathy and frustration swelled painfully in Angela’s chest. “Oh, Jeremy, if it were anything else … but I cannot marry again.”

“I—I am sure Cam would not be a husband like Dunstan was. He—he seems a decent sort, even if he is, well, what he is. But, you know, if we lived in another place, like the United States, say, his rank would not even matter.”

“It is not his rank! You know that.”

“Of course. I mean, I understand perfectly that even if he were a duke, you would not wish to marry again. The thing is, you see, I—I’m in a rather desperate situation.”

“I know!” Angela clasped her hands tightly together in her lap, fighting against the tears that sprang into her eyes. She could not bear Jeremy’s obvious agony, yet she was horribly certain that she would always regret it if she gave in and did what he wanted. “I want to help. I wish I were brave enough to do it for you. But when I think of marrying again, of being subject to my husband’s moods and whims. And, Jeremy … it would be worse, I fear, because Cam already hates me. He thinks I was lying to him, back then, when Grandpapa caught us. He thinks that I never really cared for him, that I was only toying with him. He thinks that I married Dunstan because Dunstan was rich.”

“Tell him the truth, then.”

“I have tried! He will not listen to me. He doesn’t believe me. He just wants his revenge.”

“Yes, and he will have it, one way or another,” Jeremy agreed bitterly. He looked away, unable to meet her eyes, and said, “Angela, I am begging you. It isn’t just the money, though God knows that is bad enough. It—There is more. If you do not marry him, he has threatened to reveal … Well, he knows something about me, and if he tells everyone, I will be ruined. Not just me, either. Rosemary will be destroyed. The children, too. The whole family will be tainted by the scandal.”

Guilt gnawed at Angela. She knew that whatever scandal might come would be that much worse because of the scandal her own divorce had caused four years ago. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, tears welling from her eyes and beginning to course down her cheeks. “I am so sorry.”

“He will tell everyone,” her brother went on grimly, “what his investigators discovered about me. You see, he had men poking into everything, looking everywhere, finding all the family’s weak spots. I was the weakest.” Jeremy closed his eyes and swallowed hard. “They—they followed me to a club I sometimes frequent and … and they followed some of my friends from the club, also. They tracked me down to a flat where, uh, someone I know lives, and they questioned all the people who live around there. Oh, God, Angela, he knows that I have desires that are … not normal. Lascivious, sinful. Illegal. Ever since Eton, I—Well, there was a boy in the upper form, and we—”

He broke off, and Angela stared at him. “I don’t understand. Jeremy, what are you talking about?”

“I loved him!” he cried out fiercely. “He was a boy, but I loved him. I let him—We lay together. We had carnal knowledge of each other.”

Angela gaped. “Of a man?”

“Yes. I tried to stop. I really did. After school, I tried to keep away. Then, when I met Rosemary, I thought it was actually over. I loved her. I really did. I still do. I thought that a miracle had happened, that God had answered my prayers. I was attracted to her. I was able to … to bed her.” He blushed fierily. “Oh, God, I cannot believe that I am discussing this with you. You must hate me.”

“No! Oh, Jeremy, no, I could never hate you.”

“Well, I hate myself. I haven’t any will. I cannot stay away from that life. Despite my love for Rosemary, despite the children we conceived, I keep going back there. And Monroe knows. So will everyone, if you do not marry him.”

He heaved a sigh and sank down into the chair. “Forgive me. I’ve made such a mess of everything. Now our entire lives are at Cam Monroe’s mercy.”

“You have had some help with that.” Angela’s eyes flashed, and she clenched her hands. “Damn him to hell for this!”

She whirled and stalked to her door, rage building in her. She flung open her door with a crash and charged out.

“Angela!” Belatedly Jeremy jumped to his feet. “No, wait! Where are you going? Come back.”

He started after her, but by the time he reached the doorway, she was already down the hall and pounding on Monroe’s door. Before Cam could even get out an “Enter,” she had turned the knob and thrown the door open.

Cameron was sitting at his desk, and he turned at the noise of her entry. His eyebrows lifted when he saw her, and he rose slowly to his feet, watching her. “Angela …”

This, he thought, was much more the woman he had known. Her hair was no longer up and restrained, but flowing like a copper fire down her back. The color was high in her face, and her eyes glittered with strong emotion. There was passion in her once more, even if it was the passion of anger. She was dressed for bed, and though her dressing gown revealed nothing more than the dresses she wore during the day, it carried the suggestion of intimacy. No man but a family member or husband would see a woman in this attire. Desire stirred in Cam as he faced her, awaiting almost with eagerness the storm she obviously carried inside herself.