Catherine—
Marry me.
I am a lovesick boy.
I wish I could tell you with confidence that I was a lovesick man, but I am very much afraid that that is not true.
But you could be the making of me, Catherine, I know you could.
Always your Jamie.
Catherine—
Are you never to write to me again? Even to answer my marriage proposal? I think I deserve that.
James Cavendish, Marquess of Daventry.
Catherine—
Forgive my last letter. I must have sounded like a needing, petty child—exactly the opposite of the impression I want to give.
I am ashamed, most ashamed, of what passed between us when you came to my rooms. I am not ashamed of the physical act itself but instead that I greedily allowed my appetites to supersede what was truly most important—that we speak to each other, that you make me understand how I can earn your love or earn the right to love you.
I have so little wisdom in these matters, Catherine. I know my saying that casts me again as a child. But it is true.
Always your Jamie.
He continued to call at her house every day. He had not seen her at all except for that time she had come to his rooms and offered herself to him and he had done everything wrong.
Finally, on what might be his last day in London for quite some time, she was at home to him. His heart was in his mouth.
“Mrs. Lovelock.” He bowed.
“Lord Daventry.” She curtsied and nodded to the butler Chelsom. Chelsom closed the drawing room door.
“Catherine,” James said. She did not answer but met his gaze steadily.
He went on, “I am grateful you agreed to see me. I travel out of London later this afternoon. To Middlewich. My father is ill.”
“I am sorry to hear that, my lord.” She sat. A long pause came here. She smoothed her dress in her lap. Then she spoke with a strong, clear voice. “Due to our previous degree of intimacy, my lord, I felt I should inform you that Sir Francis Ffoulkes has renewed his attentions and has again asked me to marry him.”
James’ vision darkened and he felt his knees wobble.
“Sir Francis? Surely, after what he did to you, how he abandoned you, you cannot think to accept him?”
She said nothing.
“What made him ask you again?” Despite himself, James’ voice was rising in volume. “Did he suddenly realize, what every man in this country should realize, that you are . . . the most beautiful and most extraordinary woman ever to . . . I don’t know, grace the empire?” He was shouting.
Her words were quiet. “You are very flattering to me, James.”
Hope clutched at his chest. She had called him James. Much better than “my lord.”
She went on, “No, he has not realized that. What he has realized is that, despite my husband’s will, I have a sizable personal fortune. Money that I earned as an actress and invested, long before I married. Money that grew and grew over the years. Money my husband was good enough to keep separate from the injunction in his will.”
“You know he is a fortune hunter.”
“Yes.” She rose from her chair.
“You must refuse him!”
She snapped back, “What I must do is the same as what you must do. What is best for me and my family!”
He groaned. “Oh, the sins that have been committed in the name of family.”
She laughed. He was startled.
“Jamie, Jamie, whatever sins we have committed, they haven’t been in the name of family, have they?”
He liked the “Jamie” bit. And her laughing. He wasn’t so sure about her use of the past tense. And it hurt that she would call what they had done together a sin.
He went to her and folded her into his arms. He leaned over and whispered in her ear, “Kate, you tell me of this proposal to taunt me, I know. There is no need to do so. I will delay leaving London if you will come back to my rooms tonight in that old dress and brown wig. Let me hold you and kiss you and do any number of unspeakable things to you. Let me wash clean your mind of any thoughts of marrying Sir Francis. We belong together, Kate, you must know that.”
He did not know what he had said that was wrong, but she stiffened in his arms and pushed him away.
“My lord, I must ask that in the future you tender your affections elsewhere. I am sure that your grief over your father’s illness has made you forget yourself.”
“My grief?” James tore at his hair in frustration. “All my grief is for you, Catherine. I am wild with it. Sick with it.”
“Then you must go. Away from my house. And recover. And when we meet again, we will meet as friends, I am sure.”
A cataclysm of pain in his entire body and in his mind, his heart, his soul. Worse than when William had died and he had lost his brother, his hero, and his future in one fell swoop.
He made it to the door. Shaking. “I will never be friends with you, Catherine. Never.”
