Marguerite Kaye - Regency Rogues - Candlelight Confessions

‘I didn’t realise,’ Deborah said falteringly.

‘Few people do. All they see is a beggar. Just another beggar. Proud men, reduced to holding out a cup for alms! Can you imagine what that does to them? No wonder so many cannot face their families. And they are portrayed as deserters, drunkards, criminals.’

The scar which bisected his eyebrow stood out white against his tan. The other one, which followed the hairline of his forehead, seemed to pulse. How many other, invisible scars did he bear? His suffering made hers seem so trite in comparison. The grooves at the side of his mouth were etched deep. His eyes were fierce, hard. Deborah trembled at the sorrow and pain they hid, such depths, which made shallows of her own suffering. ‘I just didn’t know,’ she said simply. ‘I am quite ashamed.’ The truth was so awful, it made her conscience seem like a paltry consideration. ‘I wish now that we had taken more from that house in Grosvenor Square.’

Her vehemence drew a bark of laughter from Elliot. ‘Believe me, over the last two years, the Peacock has taken a great deal more.’

‘So it is a war of attrition that the Peacock is waging, is that it? And of vengeance?’

Deborah’s perception made Elliot deeply uncomfortable. He was not accustomed to thinking about his motivations, never mind discussing them. ‘What do you know of vengeance?’ he asked roughly.

Enough to recognise it . Deborah hesitated, surprised at the strength of her urge to confide, but the very idea of comparing their causes appalled her. Besides, his voice held an undertone of aggression that warned her to tread lightly. He obviously thought he had said too much already. She could easily empathise with that. ‘The painting that we stole,’ she said, seeking to lighten the subject, ‘you knew about it because of your spying, didn’t you?’

‘You’ve no idea how much ransacking and looting goes on in the higher echelons in wartime. That painting was a bribe.’

To Deborah’s relief, some of the grimness left his mouth. She asked him to explain; when he did, she encouraged him to tell her of other bribes, relieved to see the grooves around his mouth relaxing, the sadness leaving his eyes. The battered armchair in which he sat, she had rescued from a lumber room at Kinsail Manor. His legs, in their tight-knit pantaloons, stretched out in front of him. If she reached, she could touch her toe to his Hessian boots.

‘I’ve said too much,’ Elliot said, interrupting himself in the middle of a story, realising abruptly how much he had revealed, how little he had talked to anyone of his old life before. It had been too easy to talk to Deborah. He wasn’t sure what he thought of that, accustomed as he was to keep his own counsel. His instincts were to retreat. ‘I must go,’ he said, getting to his feet.

How did he close his expression off like that? Ignoring the flicker of disappointment, Deborah rose, too. ‘You have certainly said enough to make me realise how shockingly ignorant I am. I shall not look on those poor souls with their begging bowls in the same way again.’

Outside, it was grown dark. Elliot lit a spill from the fire and began to light the candles on the mantel. ‘I’d like to call on you again,’ he said.

Deborah bit her lip. It would have been so much easier, had he not chosen to confide in her, if he had not given her so many reasons to wish to know more about him. To like him. In another world, in another life, Elliot was the kind of man she would have …

But there was absolutely no point whatsoever in thinking like that. Slowly, she shook her head. The pang of loss was physical, a pain in her stomach. ‘I live a very secluded life.’

‘I’m not suggesting we attend Almack’s together. We could go for a drive.’

Why did he have to make it so difficult? ‘I can’t, Elliot. I am perfectly content with my own company.’

‘So content that you need to break into houses and climb down ropes to make you feel alive?’

Deborah flinched. ‘I thought you understood. That was an escape from reality, merely.’

‘I don’t understand you.’ Elliot cast the spill into the fire. ‘One minute, you are hanging on my every word, the next, you imply that you never want to see me again.’

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t think that you would expect—I never considered us continuing our acquaintance after last night. I should not have encouraged you to confide in me, but I was so caught up in what you said and—I should not have,’ Deborah said wretchedly. ‘I’m sorry, Elliot.’

‘And what about last night? You are sorry about that, too, I suppose? Dammit, I was not imagining it, the strength of attraction between us. Why are you hell bent on ignoring it?’ Frustrated and confused, Elliot pulled her roughly towards him. ‘You can’t deny it! I can feel your heart beating. I can see it in your eyes that you want to kiss me just as much as I want to kiss you.’

‘No. Elliot, please …’

He was so sure, so certain that if he could just kiss her, it would rekindle the flame that had flared between them last night, but he had never in his life used persuasion on a woman in that way, and would not do so now. Elliot threw himself away from her. ‘I apologise,’ he said curtly. ‘I have obviously completely misjudged the situation.’

‘No,’ Deborah whispered, ‘it is I who did so. Last night, I gave you to think that I would—when I could not. Cannot. You have nothing to apologise for.’

It went against the grain to leave her like this but she left him no option. ‘Your servant, Lady Kinsail.’ Elliot sketched a bow.

‘Goodbye, Elliot.’ He was gone before she had finished saying the words, the front door slamming behind him. Deborah could not resist peering out into the gloom through the window, but he did not look back.

Alone in the parlour, she squared her shoulders. It had cost her dear, not to kiss him. It had cost her even dearer, that look on his face when she behaved so contrarily, but it was for the best. Elliot was not Jeremy, but it made no difference. Never, with Jeremy, had she come close to feeling what Elliot made her feel, but that just made things worse. She did not want to feel anything.

‘It’s over,’ she said to herself, pulling the curtains across the window. It would have been easier, knowing Elliot less, but it was too late for that now. Knowing him better simply made her more certain she was right. But staring into the flames of the fire, Deborah couldn’t help wishing that things were different.

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