“I know you know who I mean,” Eleanor said.
“Yes, I bloody well know who you mean,” Hart snapped. “She should not have come here.”
Eleanor waited a beat, as though expecting Hart to say something like My love, I can explain.
Hart could explain, if he chose. Angelina Palmer had been his mistress for seven years. He had ceased to go to her once he’d started courting Eleanor. That had been Hart’s decision, and so be it. But Angelina, it appeared, in her jealousy, had scuttled here to tell Eleanor Hart’s dirty little secrets.
“She felt sorry for me,” Eleanor said, answering Hart’s silence. “She told me she’d followed me about when I was down in London last, and watched me. She learned all about me—remarkable, since I knew nothing at all about her. She saw me be kind to a wretched old lady in the park, she said. I remember I’d given a poor thing a coin and helped her to shelter. Mrs. Palmer decided that this made me a kind young woman, one who should be spared a life with you.” Eleanor’s eyes were full of anger, but not with anger at Angelina Palmer. At him.
“I admit that Mrs. Palmer was once my mistress,” Hart said stiffly. “You deserve to know. She ceased to be my mistress the day I met you.”
Eleanor’s look turned deprecating. “A pleasing half-truth, the kind at which Hart Mackenzie excels. I’ve seen you say such things to others; I never dreamed you would to me.” Her color rose. “Mrs. Palmer told me about your women, about your house, and hinted at the sorts of things you do there.”
Oh, God, oh, damn, damn, damn, damn, damn. Hart saw his world falling away, the fiction that he could be anything other than a blackguard bastard crumbling to dust.
“All in the past,” Hart said in a hard voice. “I have not touched another woman since I met you. I’m not that much of a monster. I gave it all up, Eleanor. For you. Angelina is a jealous and coldhearted woman. She’d say anything to keep me from marrying you.”
If Hart had thought the speech would have Eleanor smiling and forgiving, he was wrong, oh, so wrong.
“For heaven’s sake, spare me,” she said. “You believe that hiding the truth is not the same as a lie, but it is. You have lied and lied, and you are still lying. You planned my seduction so carefully—Mrs. Palmer told me how you decided on me, how you finagled invitations to every gathering I went to, sometimes with her help. That you hunted me as a man tracks a fox, that you played upon my vanity and made me think I’d caught your eye. And I was stupid enough to let you.”
“Does that matter?” Hart cut in. “Does it matter how I wanted you, or how we met? Nothing after that was a lie. I need you, El. I told you that in the summerhouse. I didn’t lie about that. My dealings with Mrs. Palmer are over. You never need worry about her again.”
Eleanor looked at him in cold fury. “If you believe jealousy has made me angry, you are very wrong. I was not shocked to find you’d had a mistress—many gentlemen have them, and you are so passionate, Hart. I can forgive a past mistress you have not visited since you started courting me, or even some of the risqué games you played, which she decided she should not describe in detail to a lady.”
“It’s bloody evident you can’t forgive me, since you threw the blasted ring at me.”
“That is the crux of the matter, isn’t it? Everything is about you. The entire world revolves around Lord Hart Mackenzie. I should do as you wish, because I fit into a certain place in your schemes, and so does Mrs. Palmer. You treat us equally, each of us occupying certain niches in your cupboard of life.”
“Eleanor…”
Eleanor held up her hand, her voluble nature taking over. “What’s infuriated me is the other things she told me of. About your tempers and your rages. How you cycle between hot and cold, how Mrs. Palmer is never certain what you’ll want from her from day to day, or what your mood will be. She told me she started bringing other ladies into the house, because his lordship was growing bored. She knew that she had to assuage your ennui by any means she could so you wouldn’t leave her. You made use of her, and she scrambled to please you. And in the end, you threw her over because you no longer needed her.” Eleanor stopped, her face red, her breath coming fast. “How could you be so cruel to another human being?”
Hart stepped back. “Have I got this right? You want to break our engagement because I’ve been rude to a courtesan?”
The pinched look around her mouth told Hart that this was the wrong thing to say. “More than rude. You played upon her, as you play upon everyone—as you played upon me. It should make no difference whether a person is a courtesan or a street girl or an earl or an earl’s daughter.”
Every word was a blow, because every word was true. They cut him, and Hart struck back. “Perhaps I am not as egalitarian as you.”
Eleanor flinched, and Hart knew he was losing her. “Cruelty is cruelty, Hart,” she said.
“And when have I had a chance not to be cruel?” Hart shouted. “If I am, it is because that’s all I ever learned how to be. It is how I survived. You’ve met my father; you know what I grew up with. You know what he did to my brothers and me, what he made us into.”
“Certainly, blame your father all you like—and I know how awful he is. I have experienced it firsthand. And I’m very sorry for you, believe me. But you have choices. The choices you make are your own, not your father’s.” Her eyes narrowed. “And don’t you dare punish Mrs. Palmer for what she’s told me. She is terrified of you—do you know that? She knows you’ll never forgive her over this, that she’s lost you forever. Yet, she found the courage to come and speak to me.”
Even then, though, in his amazing foolishness, Hart convinced himself that he could still win.
“Yes, to turn you away from me,” he said swiftly. “Obviously, she is succeeding. She might have come to you as a poor soul, but I assure you that Angelina Palmer is a manipulative bitch who will do anything to get what she wants.”
Eleanor’s eyes widened. “I’ll thank you to believe I know my own mind. Of course Mrs. Palmer is cool and manipulative—she has had to be, a woman in such a position, alone in the world, with you as her only support. But you did not see her. She knew that by telling me, everything she had with you would be at an end. She was resigned to it. Resigned. You think me an unworldly young woman, brought up by a naive gentleman, but I know much about people. Enough to see that you broke her. She devoted herself to you—she would do anything in the world for you—and you broke her. Why should I not think that you will do the same to me?”