He hadn't expected to hear those words from her. He'd worked to earn her loyalty, her trust, and her affection. Maybe, just maybe, some small, irrational part of him had hoped for her love as well, but it would have made him the worst sort of hypocrite to expect it.

He wished he could move. He wished he could think of something better to say than, "I hadn't expected that."

Because, really, there had to be an infinite number of more eloquent things to say in that moment.

Kate certainly seemed to think so. She gaped at him. "That's all you have to say? I tell you-" all you have to say? I tell you-"

"No, no. I beg your pardon." Regaining the use of his legs, he stepped forward to take her hand yet again and draw her to her feet. "Forgive me. I'm...overwhelmed."

He couldn't ever remember feeling so overwhelmed.

"Oh, well." She smiled a little, a blush forming on her cheeks. "That's all right, then."

He wasn't certain it was all right. "It's a priceless gift," he told her. It was also a tremendous responsibility. "I'm grateful for it." And afraid of it. "I'll treasure it." While it lasted.

"I'm glad it pleases you," she murmured.

And then she stood there, waiting-pointedly waiting. Clearly, she expected to hear the words returned. waiting. Clearly, she expected to hear the words returned.

b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l. What the devil was he supposed to do now? What the devil was he supposed to do now?

His first instinct was to lie. So were his second and third. But his fourth and final instinct banded with reason and together they declared telling her the truth his best chance at success. Provided, of course, he managed to relate that truth in a way that suited his purposes.

Kate might, in the excitement of the moment, believe anything he cared to tell her. That would certainly work to his advantage in the short term. He could have them married by special license within the week.

But in the long run, it would be disastrous. Kate was an intelligent woman. Eventually, she would discover the lie. And then what? If she knew the marriage to have begun on a pretense, would she leave him? Despise him? Take lovers? Use her family's wealth and influence to obtain a divorce? The idea of any of those outcomes turned his stomach into sick knots.

Better all around if she understood from the very start what he could offer her, and what he could not. And then it was simply a matter of convincing her that what he offered was of far greater value than what he could not. He could do that. He'd conquered greater challenges than convincing a woman of the ton ton that love was not a prerequisite for a successful marriage. that love was not a prerequisite for a successful marriage.

"There is something you need to understand, Kate. Something..." He shook his head. He couldn't just blurt the words out. He'd never make her understand that way. He needed to start at the beginning. "Where did you first meet Lizzy?"

She made a helpless motion with her hands. "What on earth has that to do with anything?"

"Humor me, Kate, please."

"All right," she said slowly, still shaking her head in obvious bafflement. "I met her in Benton as a child."

"And?"

"And what? We were children. She was an orphan. My mother offered her a home-"

"The details, Kate. Tell me the details of the day you met her."

She blew out an irritated breath. "Very well. It was a long time ago, but..." She scrunched her face a little in thought. "But I seem to recall it was winter. My mother was shopping for...I've no idea, she's always about shopping for something. I remember that I was bored, and when I saw a little girl my own age sitting on a bench in the square, I snuck away and went to sit next to her. She told me she was waiting for someone...someone with an unlikely sounding name. I can't seem to recall-"

"Puck."

"Yes, that's..." Her eyes grew round. "How did you know that?"

"Because..." He swallowed hard. "Because that's what I told her to call me."

"I...You...You're...?" Her mouth continued to work without sound for a moment before she managed, "You knew each other? As children?"

"We both have the misfortune of having spent a portion of our youth at St. Michael's workhouse in London."

"A workhouse...but I thought..." She stepped back slowly to retake her seat. "I could have sworn Whit mentioned your father was a merchant, or-"

"He was a linen draper. He inherited a modest shop from his father, along with a comfortable house we shared with my widowed aunt and her son." He rolled his shoulders. He didn't like telling his family's story. He didn't like remembering. "Modest and comfortable weren't enough for my parents. They insisted on the best of everything. My mother even saw to it I received an education fit for a peer. She had visions of me becoming a man of law, I think. I might have at that, if my father had been as skilled a businessman as he pretended to be. We lost the shop to debt when I was eight. By the time I was nine, we'd lost everything else."

"And went to the workhouse?"

"After a time, yes." After the last of his mother's jewelry had been p.a.w.ned and the money it garnered spent. "They separate men and women upon admission, but children of a certain age are allowed to stay with their mothers. We told the mistress I was nearly two years younger so I could do the same." He smiled wryly. "We were fortunate she wasn't a particularly observant woman."

"And Lizzy?" Kate asked, her voice rather stunned. "She was with her mother as well?"

"Her grandmother. The woman was nearly blind, completely deaf, and regularly forgot who Lizzy was. Lizzy couldn't have been more than four years of age at the time. For some reason, she took to me. She was always following me about." He laughed suddenly. "She annoyed the devil out of me. She was so persistent. In her presence, her questions, her cheerfulness. I couldn't make heads or tails of her, and I couldn't make her go away."

"She grows on you," Kate murmured.

"She does. She did. She hardly gave me a choice." Day after day she'd appear at his side, relentless in her chatter, in her campaign to make him smile. She was always successful. "My mother and I looked out for her. We taught her to read from an old copy of A Midsummer Night's Dream. A Midsummer Night's Dream." The workhouse had claimed a small room as its school, but little to no education was actually provided.

"Puck," Kate said, nodding.

"She had a lisp then," he told her. "She had trouble with the 'r' in Andrew. We used nicknames instead. Puck and t.i.tania."

"She did have a slight lisp when I first met her," Kate murmured. "I'd forgotten."

"She had a weaker const.i.tution then as well," he said darkly and wished he and Kate were having this conversation later in the day so he could justify going to the sideboard and pouring a drink. "Poor food. Bad air. Lack of adequate clothing and heating. It was difficult for her. There was an outbreak of scarlet fever. She and her grandmother were two of the first to fall ill. I did what I could for her, for both of them."

That was when he'd begun sneaking into the kitchen at night to steal extra food. He took to picking the locks on supply closets as well, obtaining extra blankets he put on Lizzy at night and hid away in the morning. He'd even crept into the rooms of staff while they slept and taken money, a pocket watch, even a wedding band. There'd been a great to do when the staff discovered the thievery. Every healthy resident over the age of eight had been punished. He'd felt bad for it, but not badly enough to stop stealing.

"Lizzy recovered," Kate said quietly.

"She did, but her grandmother did not. Nor did half the inhabitants of the workhouse." He swallowed past a dry lump in his throat. "Including my parents and cousin."

Her hand went to chest. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Your aunt?"

"She survived."

"I'm very glad you had someone," she said softly.

A part of him wanted to nod and leave it at that. But a greater part of him wanted her to know everything, and all of him wanted her to understand. "I didn't have her for long. After the sickness pa.s.sed, she discharged herself from the workhouse."

"Discharged? You mean, she left left you there?" you there?"

She'd walked through the front gate while he'd begged her to take him and Lizzy with her. b.l.o.o.d.y well begged. begged. He cleared his throat. "Yes. She was grieving for her child-" He cleared his throat. "Yes. She was grieving for her child-"

"That isn't an excuse to abandon another."

"No. It isn't." But he'd always preferred to think of her as a tragic figure-a woman who'd lost her mind after the death of her husband and only child. Better something be horribly wrong with her, than something be lacking in him. He cleared his throat yet again. "At any rate, she disappeared. I waited until Lizzy grew well again and then I took her away. I thought she'd not make it through the winter."

"You brought her to Benton."

"We were merely pa.s.sing through." The money from the stolen goods had only purchased pa.s.sage as far as Benton. "I wanted us farther from London before we stopped for any length of time. Getting out and away from London had become...important to me." It had become an obsession. He'd wanted Lizzy away from the poverty, the filth, the disease. From everything that could take her from him. "I went in search of food and told her to wait in the alley behind one of the shops. I should have known she wouldn't sit still that long. I returned to find her sitting on a bench speaking with you and your mother."

"I saw you, didn't I? I did. I did did," Kate repeated. "You were staring at me from the other side of the square."

"I couldn't stop staring at you," he admitted. "It had been a long time since I'd seen a girl with hair like yours." And he couldn't ever remember seeing someone give away the shoes on her feet, not willingly.

"I realize it's not the most pertinent bit of information at the moment, but I can't help but ask, weren't there any children at the workhouse with blonde hair?"

"There weren't any children at the workhouse with clean clean hair," he clarified. "Blonde doesn't look blonde when it's filthy." hair," he clarified. "Blonde doesn't look blonde when it's filthy."

"Oh, I see. I'm sorry."

He shook his head. "What do you remember after that?"

"After your staring? I looked away for a moment, trying to get mother's attention. And when I turned back again, you were gone."

"Moved some, but not gone. I was still watching. I saw your mother hold out her hand. And I saw Lizzy take it. And leave." He'd told her to wait, told her not to leave, and she'd walked away.

"You said nothing?"

"Lady Thurston's reputation has always preceded her," he explained. "I knew Lizzy was better off."

Kate licked her lips, studying him. "You must have been very angry."

"Not at Lizzy or your mother. At life. At the unfairness...She was the last person on earth I...the last person I cared for." He'd loved her. And it had broken his heart, cleanly split it in half, to watch her walk away from him into a life he was certain he could never give her. That heartache had translated into an impotent, helpless fury. And that fury had driven him not to simply prosper over the years, but to acquire wealth and power beyond the dreams of most men. Never, never never again would he find himself in a position where he was impotent, or helpless, or heartbroken. again would he find himself in a position where he was impotent, or helpless, or heartbroken.

Kate would understand that. He opened his mouth to ask if she did, indeed, understand, but Kate spoke first.

"I remember Lizzy speaking of you. Mother had people search for anyone who might be looking for her, but...but we a.s.sumed you were a creation of Lizzy's imagination. After a time, she believed it too. I..." A line suddenly formed across her brow. "Why are you telling me this now? I'm glad to know your connection to Lizzy of course, but why now?"

He stepped forward to crouch down in front of her. "Because I want you to understand. I won't do it again, Kate. I can't. I'm not capable of it."

"Not capable of what?"

"Of what you've offered me, but-"

"What I've...You mean love?" Her face paled. "You're saying you're not capable of love?"

"There are so many other things-"

"Would you be capable of it if I were someone else?" she asked in a thready voice. "Someone-?"

"No." He reached for the hand she had twisted into her skirts. "No, there's only you."

"Only..." She swallowed hard. "Only I'm not enough."

"You are. You're more than enough. You're everything I've always wanted."

She stared down to where their hands were joined. Slowly, she pulled hers away. "You courted me, made love to me, and offered for me knowing all along you would never love me?"

She asked it quietly, but it wasn't a question, it was an accusation. He searched for the words to defend himself and found he hadn't any. He tried evasion instead. "Kate, sweetheart-"

"Why?" She shook her head. "Why did you court me at all?"

"I've told you why. I'm fond of you. I desire you. I can offer-"

"You could feel those things for any woman," she cut in, the first hints of anger tinting her voice.

"I want you. you."

"And I you. But apparently, neither of us wants in the manner the other needs."

"I..." He stood up and dragged a hand through his hair. "What the devil does that mean?"

"It means I need your heart along with...everything else. And you want everything else, but need to keep your heart."

He didn't find the workings of her mind quite so fascinating now. He found them frustrating. And terrifying beyond measure. Was he losing her? He couldn't possibly be losing her. He'd explained, hadn't he? They should be at the point of understanding now. They would would be at the point of understanding if she would just be reasonable. be at the point of understanding if she would just be reasonable.

"Kate, be reasonable. People regularly marry without...without..."

"You can't even bring yourself to say the word," she grumbled.

"Without considering matters of the heart," he bit out. It was exceedingly difficult to make her understand when she wouldn't let him finish his own sentences.

"Yes, most often because they haven't any other choice." She shook her head slowly. "I am sister to the Earl of Thurston. I've more wealth and status than I shall ever need, and a family that would never insist I sacrifice my happiness in a bid to acquire more."

"You think there is nothing I can offer you that you don't already possess?"

"There is nothing you are willing willing to offer that I don't already possess." to offer that I don't already possess."

"What of children?"

"Children would be wonderful," she admitted. "And Whit and I are both testimony to the fact they can be happily raised in a home with only one loving parent. But the possibility of that is not sufficient reason to enter into an ill-advised union."

"It b.l.o.o.d.y well isn't ill-advised." He threw his hand up in an impatient gesture. "And you may very well already be with child."

She rose slowly from her seat, as if she ached. "Should that circ.u.mstance arise, I may have to reconsider matters, but unless it does, I'll marry for love, or not at all."

"You love me. That is more than most in the ton ton can claim. Can't it be enough for now, and-?" can claim. Can't it be enough for now, and-?"

"If it were enough to earn your love in return, it would be."

"Kate, you have to understand-"

She didn't, apparently. She'd turned and walked from the room before he could finish his sentence.