Page 124 of A Very Bellamy Christmas

She could not mean her mouth-breathing earl, could she? That made no sense. If she loved Townshend, then why would she have refused him?

No. There was someone else. Somebody ineligible? Perhaps even someone who had died?

“You speak from experience,” he said. It was not a question, and she did not respond.

Andrew burned to know, but her eyes hadn’t just shuttered, there might as well have been stone walls and a deep moat around her.

She had not been in love. She was protecting herself because she was still in love.

Disappointment stabbed him—startlingly sharp. How could he, of all people, marry a woman who loved somebody else?

“Finish your story,” she said, so cool and distant that Andrew wondered if he had imagined her brief, raw-eyed desperation.

“Mariah begged her father to let her out of the betrothal, but he was adamant. So I went to him.” He grimaced at the memory. “That…did not go well. He spoke to Chatham, who was slowly taking up his duties but hardly up to his pre-injury strength, and Chatham came to me. I had no pride; I begged him. He insisted the marriage was a matter of honor to his father and to Mariah’s family. But that was not all—or even most—of the reason. You see,” he said, his lips twisting at the memory, “Chatham was in love with her as well. It was inconceivable to him that Mariah might prefer me. He was the duke, and I was the younger cousin with nothing but a rundown northern estate, beholden to him for my money and his ward in the matter of my inheritance. I had always idolized him—worshipped everything about him—and neither of us could accommodate the sudden change in our positions. That I could demand something that was supposed to be his.” He gave an unhappy laugh. “When he did not capitulate, Mariah went to him and begged him to release her. Still, he would not relent. Rather than give in to our pleading—and unbeknownst to Mariah and me—he changed the wedding plans. Instead of a grand ceremony in St. George’s, he acquired a special license, and they married three days after we had confronted him with the truth.”

Andrew stood and poked at the fire. He stared at the sparks for a long moment, willing his blasted memory to give him even a glimpse of Mariah’s face.

He saw…nothing.

Andrew slammed the poker onto the hook and spun to face her. “One more day and we would have been on our way to the Scottish border.”

An expression of unease had settled on her face.

Andrew was glad. He didn’t want what came next to be an utter shock to her.

“Chatham believed that was the end of it. But I made sure that it was merely the beginning of my revenge. You see, Mariah didn’t just hate him, she feared him.”

Her eyes widened. “He was cruel to her?”

“Sylvester never lifted a hand to her. He is not a violent man. It was something else she feared.” Andrew shoved a hand through his hair and stared at the ceiling. Just how did a man say such things to an innocent—a virgin?

You never had any trouble telling them to Mariah.

He dropped his hand and forced himself to meet her gaze. “I told Mariah that Sylvester had unnatural appetites in the bedchamber.”

Her lips parted in shock.

“She went to him filled with terror and loathing. Not only for that, but—and I regret having to admit this—Mariah could not see past Chatham’s scar. I could have helped her overcome her revulsion at his appearance. But rather than tell her about my cousin’s honor and decency, I encouraged her disgust. She cried when Chatham came to her on their wedding night and he vowed not to touch her until she welcomed him into her. Instead, she came to my bed. Night after night.”

Andrew stared at her, waiting for the loathing he expected.

But it never came. Instead, he saw a mingling of sadness and pity.

Rather than feel gratitude, he was even more determined to make her see what a revolting cad and scoundrel he really was. “But that is not all. Mariah was already with child on her wedding day. We were careless and it was inevitable we were caught. Rather than show remorse, we taunted him with the fact that Mariah had already been pregnant when they married.” He loosened his clenched jaws. “So, in that regard, Mariah and I had won. Or so we believed. My cousin banished me that very night. I did not go willingly. Sylvester had me dragged to his coach while Mariah watched, sobbing. And that was the last I saw of her. She died in childbed seven months later. I hated him for keeping me from her and for more than eleven years I made that hatred the center of my life.”

Andrew felt exhausted, but also relieved that somebody other than Chatham knew of his infamy. He forced himself to meet her gaze. “That is how I carried on until this past summer, when I almost destroyed Lady Shaftsbury’s life in pursuit of my revenge.” He lifted his hands. “And there you have it.”

She eyed him warily. “Your cousin has forgiven you?”

“Yes,” he said shortly. “As little as I deserve it.”

“And you have forgiven him?”

Andrew lifted an eyebrow. “You astonish me, Miss Martin. Do you think he has done something unforgiveable? She was his legal wife, after all.”

“Forgiveness isn’t about right and wrong, my lord. It is something you give regardless of right and wrong.”

Had he forgiven Chatham? He thought so, at least mostly. Although he did on occasion experience a twinge of unarticulated resentment, like a pebble in one’s boot.

“For the most part,” he said when he saw she was waiting.

“And what about you, my lord?”

“Me?”

“Have you forgiven yourself?”

He opened his mouth to deny he felt any guilt, but that would be a lie.

Mariah had been pregnant with his child. And while she might have died from her pregnancy, regardless of the father, there was no denying that months of struggle and strife had left her fragile and weakened even before he had been banished. What had her life been like, alone with Chatham? She would have suffered horribly; he knew that instinctively. Not that his cousin would have been cruel to her, but she would have missed Andrew just as much—nay, more probably—than he’d missed her. After all, Andrew had had the War to keep him busy. What had Mariah had except her marriage to a man she hated?

If Andrew had stepped aside—if he had not poisoned her mind against his cousin—would Mariah have, in time, looked past his scars to see the man beneath?

You know she would have. She was not a cruel woman. Not until you made her that way.

Andrew met Miss Martin’s shrewd, not unsympathetic gaze, and realized she was right. He had blamed himself.

And he still did.