A Gentleman's Gamble (Devilish Lords Book 3) Read online

  He sobered, his smile fading quickly. For a second she wished she could take back the question. She did not want to hear his apology and talk of all that had transpired with her father. She wanted to pretend for just a little while longer that nothing had changed between them since she’d seen him last.

  Yes, this moment of kindness and levity might be brief and meaningless but she wanted to hold onto it for all it was worth. For this might be her last time in the company of this man. The man she’d married. The man she…

  No, she wouldn’t let herself think it. The moment she acknowledged the extent of her infatuation was the moment she would no longer be able to pretend that she would be all right.

  It was an infatuation, she told herself. Only an infatuation. Even her inner voice sounded desperate as though it knew it was just a matter of time before she saw through the lie.

  “I came to explain,” he said, closing the distance between them until he was so close she could smell his warm scent and feel the heat from his body.

  She nearly moaned from the overwhelming urge to press herself against him, hold him close, and never let go.

  What she wouldn’t give to be the kind of helpless female that men like Jed and his friends seemed to adore. How lovely it would be to be able to throw her hands up in the air and act the part of the damsel in distress.

  But she was no princess, and he was no prince, and this was her life, not a fairy tale. There would be no happy ending for her. It had been beyond stupid of her to wish for one.

  Women like Georgie and Mary got happy endings, but surly pragmatists like her?

  They married their father’s nasty old business partners.

  “No need to explain,” she said through frozen lips. “I understand.”

  “You do?” He looked unconvinced.

  “Of course I do.” She folded her hands in front of her to keep from doing something stupid, like reaching out for him. He was here to do the noble thing and apologize for breaking his vows. The least she could do was let him off the hook. There was no use in making them both miserable.

  “Eliza,” he said gently, his gaze searching. “I took his money—”

  “I’m certain you had no other option.”

  He hesitated for a moment, clearly shocked by her easy acceptance. “You know me…you know my history,” he said slowly. “I thought you would believe…”

  He shook his head slightly as if at a loss for words. Her heart melted a bit at the surprise in his eyes. The humility and the awe, as though her faith in him were a treasured gift and not something he had earned.

  “I trust you,” she said quietly. “I never doubted that my father did something to coerce you into taking the money.”

  He opened his mouth, his eyes wide, but no sound came out. In fact, there were no sounds in the room at all save for the ticking of a clock over the mantel. It was only then that Eliza realized Henrietta had slipped out of the room, leaving them alone. “You trust me,” he repeated.

  She shrugged and let out a sigh. For a moment she managed to shove thoughts of her own wants and disappointments to the side to focus on this man who had made her feel like a valued and cherished lady for two spectacular weeks. She owed him for that and she knew what he needed to hear.

  “As you said, I know your history.” She reached out and squeezed his arm. “But the optimal word there is history. You have changed, Jed Cleveland. You were a good man to begin with but you’ve matured into someone thoughtful and strong.” She swallowed thickly at the raw emotions she saw in his eyes. “Do not let anyone tell you otherwise.”

  He gave a short nod of acknowledgement. When she went to remove her hand from his arm, he covered it with his own, holding her in place.

  She dropped her gaze to their joined hands before glancing up, her eyes widening with surprise.

  He leaned in slightly and lowered his voice until the world came down to just them. “I did not file the annulment papers.”

  For a moment she was so focused on his voice the words did not register. When they did she pulled back sharply, jerking her hand from beneath his as she furrowed her brow and glared at him. “What do you mean?”

  One side of his mouth lifted. “I love it when you look at me like that.”

  She was too busy trying to recover from the feeling that the rug beneath her feet had just been jerked out from underneath her. “Like what?”

  “Like I lost the use of my faculties and must be sent to an asylum. It’s the same look you give whenever I startle you.” He leaned in as if letting her in on a secret. “Have you never wondered why I was forever trying to shock you?”

  “I chocked it up to your childish sense of humor.” The retort was instant and the teasing so familiar she found her own lips tugging up into an answering smile. She made a forcible attempt to ease her furrowed brow and took a deep breath. “I do not understand, my father said—”

  “Your father was wrong.”

  She swallowed and took another step back. A trembling sensation had started within her and she swallowed once more as if she could keep this new feeling down by sheer force of will.

  “Explain please,” she said. It was the most she could manage given the flurry of emotions that were threatening to drown her.

  He was watching her carefully and she struggled for composure, but she had to clasp her hands together to keep them from shaking. She hated this feeling, she feared it with every muscle in her body.

  Hope. It was hope that threatened to rise up. But if she were to hope, if she were to dream…

  “I did accept your father’s money, but not for the reasons he assumed,” he said.

  There. That was why she had to keep the hope at bay. He had taken the money. Nothing had changed. He’d taken the money to walk away from her.

  Her stomach churned as that trembling sensation grew stronger. Hope was a cruel, cruel beast.

  “I told you,” she forced herself to say. “I understand. If he threatened you—”

  “You don’t understand.” His voice was uncharacteristically gruff. “I took the money for you.”

  She blinked up at him. “Pardon me?”

  “It was clear your father would threaten us every step of the way. Your plan was a good one, Eliza. You bet on the fact that your father was a prideful man. Unfortunately his pride worked against us.”

  She nodded. “He would never let me get away with betraying him. He’d rather see me ruined.”

  Jed looked pained on her behalf. She supposed her tone had been rather flat, but that was shock more than self-pity. She did not know where Jed would go with this story but that tremulous hope was there again and it took every ounce of her will to keep it at bay.

  “When your father offered me the money, I saw an opportunity.”

  She swallowed thickly. “Yes, of course. One of us ought to receive something for this foolish scheme.”

  “Exactly.”

  She would not cry. And she would not deny him a chance at a fresh start. It was clear now. He wanted her blessing, her understanding, maybe, before he took the final step to dissolve their partnership, such as it was. “Thank you for explaining,” she said through stiff lips. She started to back away once more. Later. Later she could rant and rave and cry over her own stupidity for letting her hopes get away from her, but not now.

  Her fate was sealed and she would not deprive this man a good life, not after the brightness he’d brought into hers. At least she had two lovely weeks of feeling beautiful, two kisses to remember for a lifetime.

  A distant part of her mind was telling her she ought to be angry, but all of the fight had gone out of her, it seemed.

  She was tired of fighting and weary of anger. She’d spent a lifetime being angry, blaming the world for her lot in life. It took the last of her energy to summon up a small smile. “I understand,” she said. “And I do not blame you.”

  She went to turn away but he caught her arm, holding her still. “What exactly do you understand?�
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  When she turned back to face him, he must have read it in her eyes. Her disappointment. The certainty and trust that were fading fast from her gaze. She would not blame him, she would not judge.

  But she supposed he was not the man she’d thought him to be. Then again, maybe she asked too much of people. There was no doubt she had expected too much of him.

  “Do not look at me like that,” he said. “I cannot bear it.”

  She shook her head, willing back the tears. “It is all right. Really. It’s just that I’d started to believe…” She couldn’t finish as the words choked her.

  “You believed you could trust me,” he said softly, his gaze never leaving hers. “And you can.”

  She stared at him. Afraid to believe any longer, so afraid of trusting him only to be let down. His gaze spoke more eloquently than he ever had and she saw something that gave her strength.

  It was something she hesitated to name but which seemed to energize that part of her that was strongest when life seemed to hand her the worst it had to offer.

  “I need you to hold on to that faith,” he said.

  She nodded and in that moment she pushed aside the fear, she let the hope have its way with her, and she drew in a deep fortifying breath. “I trust you,” she said. “I do.”

  He closed his eyes briefly and the intensity of the emotions that played across his features was nearly unbearable to witness. The fact that her words could have such a profound impact was humbling.

  “You trust me,” he repeated softly.

  She nodded. “I do.”

  “You have no reason to,” he said, his voice so gruff with emotion it was nearly inaudible. “Trust must be earned.”

  She nodded. “And you’ve earned it.”

  He flinched, almost as though the words hurt him, though she knew that could not be the case. “Then let me explain.”

  She shook her head quickly. She did not know his reasons, but she knew he’d done right for those he loved. That much she knew without a doubt. But at this particular moment, his reasoning wasn’t what she needed to hear. It was enough to know that he cared, and that she meant something to him. Something so much more than a friend. He hadn’t said so, but she’d seen it, and that gave her the strength she’d nearly lost. It reminded her of why she did the things she did and for whom. Those she loved. For Mary, for Henrietta, and yes, for herself. She’d have her freedom someday, in some way. She would never stop fighting, and this man would do the same. “Do you know another thing about trust?” she said softly.

  He shook his head slightly, his lips quirking up in a pale imitation of his normal, easy grin.

  “It is nothing without faith.”

  She thought he might say something. His gaze held hers and his mouth opened…but he leaned down and kissed her instead.

  The kiss was hard and fierce, saying everything he could not. It spoke so sweetly, the tears she’d been holding back came forth with a vengeance and she found herself weeping as he kissed her.

  He crushed her mouth with his, his lips moving fervently as he clutched her to him, his hands fisted in her dress as though he might never let go.

  The passion in his kiss was her undoing.

  This could be her last chance, and she meant to claim it. Pulling back slightly she said the words that were in her heart. The words that had been beating in her chest from the moment they’d taken their vows. Before then, even. She knew not the exact moment her heart had become his, only that it was—truly and forever. It was his.

  “I love you,” she murmured against his lips. “And in my heart I will always be your wife. I am so grateful I’ve experienced this.”

  His hands stilled and his body tensed beneath hers. But she was not done. Now that those solid walls around her heart had crumbled, the words came tumbling out, so quickly she wondered if he could even understand. “I know you will not be my husband for much longer, and even if you were, our marriage was not about that. And that is alright. I don’t need you to say it too, I just need you to know, and—”

  He kissed her again, cutting off her words with a fierce, crushing kiss. When he pulled back he was smiling, grinning from ear to ear.

  Then he did the unexpected. He dropped down onto one knee. “Eliza, will you renew your vows with me?”

  She stared down at him, shock making her numb to every other emotion. “W-will I…?”

  His wince was filled with laughter. “It does not have quite the same ring as will you marry me, does it?” He shook his head. “No matter.”

  “I-I do not understand,” she said.

  “I know we’ve already done this bit before, but I would like to change the terms of our arrangement, so I don’t see why we shouldn’t start all over again,” he said, excitement lighting up his handsome features and making him look younger than his years.

  He also looked…crazy.

  She shook her head, trying to unravel the insanity going on before her. “I don’t—that is, I don’t understand—”

  “I am giving you the proposal you so rightly deserve,” he said. “Call me old-fashioned but I still believe it proper for the gentleman to be the one doing the asking, don’t you?”

  He was teasing. Jed Cleveland was teasing her, now of all times. What in the bloody blazes…?

  She blinked rapidly, her mind racing and her heart pounding in an alarming manner. Despite her debilitated mental state, her body was responding as though this were real. But it couldn’t be.

  “I must marry my father’s friend,” she said. The words felt like glass in her throat and she wished she didn’t have to remind him. Remind them both.

  He frowned, but that mischievous light still gleamed in his eyes as he came back to a standing position before her, reaching for her hands which were trembling at her sides.

  “Now,” he said gently. “Why on earth would a financially independent young woman like yourself ever agree to marry an old coot whom you clearly despise?”

  “But I am not—” She stopped her protest mid-sentence as his lips curved up in a mischievous grin.

  “But you are.”

  She stared at him some more, her mind leaping and connecting and racing ahead of her so she very nearly realized the truth of the matter before he spoke next.

  “I accepted your father’s money on your behalf.” He said it quietly, gently. He said it so calmly, as though it were not the most shocking and life-altering sentence she had ever heard.

  Though his next statement eclipsed it neatly. “I love you, Eliza.”

  She didn’t know where to begin. “I…you…what?” Her voice was frighteningly shrill but that only made his smile widen, as though her screeching were music to his ears.

  He clasped her hands tighter in his firm grip. “I, Jed Cleveland, love you, Eliza Beaucraft, more than I’ve ever loved anyone or anything on God’s green earth.”

  “That…doesn’t make any sense,” she said.

  He shrugged. “Perhaps not, but there is no denying it.” Wrapping one arm around her waist, he released one of her hands to pull some papers out of his coat pocket. “For you, my dear. Yours to do with as you wish.” His gaze was uncharacteristically earnest. “If you tell me to file the papers and see the marriage ended, the money would still be yours.”

  She blinked up at him as the reality of what he was offering struck her to her core. He was offering her everything. Freedom in every sense of the word. Even more important than the financial freedom he offered was the freedom to make her own choice.

  She had not thought she could love this man any more than she already did, but he had gone and offered her everything, with no restrictions and no reservations. She drew in a deep breath as soaring hope mixed with absolute certainty. “And if I do not wish for them to be filed?”

  Joy flickered across his expression and he tugged her closer to him so her soft curves brushed against his hard chest. Her heart was beating so rapidly she distantly feared this was all some dream. Perhaps she wa
s unwell, maybe this was a feverish hallucination, or—

  “Then we shall burn them,” he said. “Together. After renewing our vows and resetting the terms of our arrangement.”

  “New terms?” she echoed.

  His grin turned wolfish and her body responded with a fierce answering heat. “New terms that have nothing to do with business and everything to do with children and loyalty and countless nights spent in our marital bed.”

  Her heart ached from the wanting—to believe him, to have the kind of love he offered, to have a marriage based on love and respect and friendship and kindness. “I can hardly believe this is real,” she said. But she wanted to. Oh, how she wanted to.

  Amusement lit his features and made his smile unbearably dashing. “No one was more surprised than I was to discover that the love of my life was none other than that standoffish wallflower, Miss Beaucraft.”

  He was teasing, his eyes filled with laughter, but it still made her frown. Surely if this were a dream he would not be mocking her. So perhaps, just maybe…

  “You are serious,” she said.

  He lifted one of her hands and held it over his heart. “I swear on my life that I mean every word.”

  “But,” she started.

  He arched a questioning brow. “You would like to argue this point, I presume.”

  She ignored his jests. “We are nothing at all alike.”

  “And thank heavens for that,” he said quickly. “First of all, I adore the fact that you are a female.”

  She rolled her eyes, even as an earth-shattering joy rose up in her. This was too much to hope for…wasn’t it? “You know what I mean,” she continued. “You’re so optimistic.”

  “And you’re a pragmatist,” he said. “I think that makes us a powerful team, don’t you?”

  “You’re always joking,” she said.

  “And you are far too serious.” He pulled her in tight and wrapped his arms around her waist, taking her breath away with the warm, comforting embrace. “Thank heavens you’ll have me around, wouldn’t you say?”