Stanwood was in the gold salon, sipping delicately from a glass of brandy. In addition to having helped himself to Julian's best liquor, he was wearing another new suit of clothes-yet another courtesy of the Kettering family fortune.

A sneer spread Stanwood's lips as Julian walked into the room. "Well, Kettering? Come to your senses yet?"

Lord God, he wanted to beat Stanwood within an inch of his sorry life. "Indeed I have," he drawled, strolled casually to where Stanwood stood, and removed the brandy from his hand, prompting a nasty chuckle from Stanwood.

"If I were you I wouldn't be so quick to insult me, my lord. I have the law on my side, as you well know."

"Do you?" Julian asked, tossing the brandy into the fire and watching it flare bright along with his temper.

"Naturally. The marriage is quite legal, whether you like it or not. She is mine, and there is not a damn thing you can do about it. Now, being the generous man that I am, I am willing to overlook your gross error in judgment for a small fee. I won't press my grievance in the courts and I'll even allow the wench to call on you occasionally."

Bloody bastard. Julian flexed his fist in a mighty struggle to maintain his composure. "I advise you to hold your tongue, Stanwood, lest I rip it out of your head. The fact of the matter is, on Sophie's behalf I intend to petition the Church for a divorce."

The scoundrel reacted with a sputtering laugh of disbelief. "You what? Oh, that's marvelous! On what grounds? You have no grounds, Kettering, and even if you did, you'd not stomach the scandal!"

"Just watch me," Julian said venomously.

Stanwood gaped at him as if he had just uttered a capital threat against the king. "But . . . but you have no grounds, " he insisted wildly.

It was Julian's turn to smirk. "I will petition the Church for divorce a mensa et a thoro. Do you know what that is, Stanwood? The petition will cite grounds of extreme cruelty. And before you think to argue that, know that I have witnesses to the many bruises on her body."

Stanwood paled. "She fell!" he all but shouted, then looked frantically to the fire. "Nevertheless, what you threaten will gain you a legal separation, nothing more-it's not a divorce!"

"True," Julian said, nodding thoughtfully as he strolled nonchalantly to the middle of the room. "But then I shall bring suit in Parliament for dissolution of the marriage because of your adultery, as I am confident that you will find your way into a whore's bed before long . . ." -he paused to cast a scathing look of disgust across him-"if you haven't already." Stanwood blanched, revealing the truth in that statement, and Julian's smirk turned into a contemptuous scowl. "In the meantime, I will be watching you every minute of every day, Stanwood. My eyes will be everywhere, you may depend on it. When you breathe, I will know it. When you eat, I will know it. When you squat on a chamber pot, I will know it. And if you think for even a moment to defy me, I will bring the power of my name down on your head. No institution or man of standing will lend you money. No one will employ you. No one will house you or clothe you or feed you. There will be nowhere for you to turn, Stanwood. Do you quite understand me?"

The blackguard's chin began to tremble with his rage. "You can't do that!" he bellowed. "You don't have the power to do that!"

With a derisive chuckle, Julian folded his arms across his chest. "Try me," he drawled.

Stanwood's breathing was suddenly harsh and loud. "You can't do it," he repeated. "You and your sisters will not be able to abide the scandal I will cause! I will fight you-I can, you know-the law is on my side! Oh yes, I will fight you . . . if I want her, that is. Perhaps I don't want her any longer! Perhaps I am sick to death of the wench! What if I don't want her? What then?"

Julian shrugged indifferently, masking the cauldron of rage boiling in him. "I suppose, in that case, you may slink off and crawl back under the rock from which you came."

A curious shiver coursed Stanwood. "Don't threaten me, Kettering! You cannot win in this! The law gives her and all that is hers to me! She belongs to me, not you!" he blustered loudly, and stalked to the door.

Like hell he couldn't win in this. "Very well, then," he said casually. "Just remember-I'll be watching you. Mind that you do nothing to harm your cause," he said, and chuckled darkly. "There is, however, another way, should you choose to listen."

Stanwood faltered at the door, looking confused. "What way?"

"Fifty thousand pounds in exchange for dropping any claim to her annuity or disputing the accusation of adultery. Take it or leave it."

Stanwood bristled. "That's absurd! What of me?"

"It's your life, Stanwood. Fifty thousand pounds or a protracted fight in the courts. If you think your cause is sound, you can meet me on the floor of the House of Lords."

Stanwood turned red as he fidgeted with the watch fob at his waist. "What if I agreed? I don't say that I shall, but suppose I did-when exactly would I expect to receive this fifty thousand quid?"

Julian had won the first stage of the battle.

Twenty-Five.

T HE NEXT TWO days were a living hell for Julian in which old feelings of helplessness and grief were roused along with disturbing and emotional images of others lost to him. This was different, of course. Sophie was far from dead-she was merely going to France. Indefinitely. For the rest of her life, perhaps.

It felt like death, and Julian grieved for her loss of innocence, despairing of the road ahead for her. He moved through the long hours with a dozen distasteful tasks, from discussing Sophie's marriage in detail with his solicitors, to overseeing the packing of her things, to soothing his sisters' fears that the evolving scandal would potentially touch their own children.

He did not allow himself to think of anything but the task at hand, certainly not the many ways he might have spared Stanwood's fist on her, although that crept into his conscience more often than not.

And certainly not the extraordinary little house on Upper Moreland Street.

But he could not stop thoughts of Claudia invading him like an army, attacking every part of his mind and his heart. He forced those thoughts from his mind, smothered them under so much garbage in him, refused to acknowledge them or give them the light of the least bit of deliberation. How could he? He would crumble if he allowed himself to think, and he had to see to Sophie, to all of his sisters-everyone but himself.

On the morning Eugenie and Louis bundled their daughters in warm coats and waited patiently on St. Katherine's dock, Julian fetched Sophie from Upper Moreland Street. After a lengthy goodbye to all the women in residence there, including a teary farewell to Stella, who had opted to stay at the little town house, and Janet, who had no choice but to stay, Sophie stepped into the coach with a calmness that baffled Julian. Her newfound confidence had grown even more in the few days since he had last seen her, and as if to prove it, she assured him with a smile that she was quite all right and actually looking forward to her journey.

As the coach rolled away from Upper Moreland Street, Sophie asked, "Is Claudia with Eugenie? I want to thank her before I go."

Julian dragged his gaze away from the window. "Claudia has gone home to her father," he said simply.

The smile disappeared from Sophie's face; he could see the thoughts tumbling in her head. After a long moment she asked him why.

"Because, love, there was too much distrust between us."

"It's because of me, isn't it? Oh, Julian, don't be angry with her-she saved my life!"

As if he needed to be reminded of that.

"We can't lose Claudia! Whatever trouble there is between you, you can fix it, can't you?" she asked anxiously.

"I don't know," he answered honestly, and refrained from prolonging the conversation, unable to discuss what had happened-as if he really knew what had happened between them. It was struggle enough to keep his overwhelming dismay pushed down and buried in the darkest corner of his soul.

At the docks, his entire family was waiting. When he and Sophie walked down the boardwalk toward them, Ann and Eugenie broke away from the others, racing to their sister. The three of them held each other tightly with their arms around their shoulders, their faces pressed together as they whispered to one another. Watching them, Julian could remember how, as girls, they would hold one another just like that . . . except that there had been five of them then.

The rumbling disquiet in the pit of his belly almost doubled him over.

They milled around as they waited to board the ship that would take them to France, no one quite sure what to say, everyone stealing glimpses of Sophie, looking for more bruises, for some sign that she was broken. But her countenance was serene; she showed no signs of despair, nothing to suggest that the journey she was about to begin frightened her. When the ship's steward gave the signal to board, the girls hugged and kissed one another, promising to write often.

Julian exchanged a few final words with Louis before he lifted each niece to kiss their chubby cheeks. He held Eugenie in his arms and kissed the top of her head, extracting a promise that she would write at least weekly so he would know how Sophie fared. He then turned to Sophie, absolutely horrified that his eyes had started to water. She flung her arms around his neck, kissed his cheek. "I'll never forgive myself for all that I've put you through, Julian. I shall be quite all right, I swear it, and you must promise not to worry so."

He smiled into her hair. "I'll try, love, but I can't promise you that."

She pulled back, smiling up at him. "You will give my love to Claudia, won't you? You really must thank her for helping me. I am forever in her debt."

So were they all. With a nod, he kissed her forehead. And then Sophie was suddenly gone.

Julian was alone.

He did not return home immediately, but ordered the driver to take a turn around Hyde Park. And then another. He dreaded going back to that dark, empty house and its deathly quiet. There was no light or laughter there, no sound of children playing, or women gaily arguing, or target practice on the lawn.

Christ, he missed her.

Unthinking, he pressed his fists against his eyes. She was lost to him. In the end, he had lived up to his worst nightmare and failed her, too, just as badly as he had failed the others. The discomfort in him had grown to a raging fire since she had left, consuming his very spirit-at least he understood now from where the discomfort came.

It had taken Sophie's disaster to finally make him understand the ache that had plagued him since Valerie's death. It had dawned on him, crystal in its clarity, when he had returned from Upper Moreland Street to find Stanwood in his house. After the bastard had gone, Julian had sat with his head between his hands, aching until he thought he would go mad with it . . . because he needed her.

He had needed her then and there, to put her arms around him, to whisper something soothing in his ear. He needed to share his burden, to feel her comfort him. He needed her silly little violets on his desk, target practice on the lawn, teas with slightly deranged ladies. He needed her laughter, her dozen smiles, the warmth of her body at night. At last, a ray of light had finally shone on his battered heart, and he had understood the words of the vicar at Phillip's funeral, "know ye in this death the light of our Lord, the quality of love . . ."

He almost laughed aloud at his own stupidity as the coach creaked around a turn in the road. All this time he thought he knew the quality of love, that his was to lose those for whom he cared. Now he understood that the quality of love he yearned for, ached for, was with Claudia, a love without beginning or end, timeless, never ending, strong and pure in the face of the worst adversity. That was what he had so desperately wanted without even knowing it, perhaps since the time of his father's death. And it was a quality of love he had been unwilling to give himself, so foolishly convinced that he would harm her with it.

He had harmed her, all right-he had shut her out, pushed her away when he needed her most. She could have turned her back on him, could have walked away from further scandal. But she hadn't-she had tried her best to hold on. And how goddamned ironic that was- when Phillip died, he had taken Julian to the edge of the abyss with him. He had clung to Claudia then, first the ideal, then the person. Whether she knew it or not, Claudia had pulled him back from the brink and kept him from falling.

He wanted nothing more than to bury the demons that plagued him and simply love her, believe in her, revel in her, help her. More than that, he desperately wanted her to love him. Yet that opportunity was perhaps lost to him forever.

Perhaps he would remain in that abyss after all.

The Danes were not the only family in Mayfair to have suffered the last few days. The Whitney household was in like turmoil over Sophie's tragedy, albeit from a very different perspective.

That perspective had to do with Earl Redbourne's steadfast belief that Claudia belonged to Kettering, and was, therefore, his problem. The moment the earl had given her to Kettering in marriage, her unorthodox behavior became his to discipline, her wild thinking his cross to bear, her extravagant allowance his expense. These opinions were rather loudly voiced to Claudia, along with a strongly worded admonishment that she could not simply walk out if the arrangements did not suit her. Especially not after another Dane woman had up and run from her lawful husband.

Claudia had argued fiercely with him, then cajoled him, then flatly begged him not to send her back. But the earl was insufferably determined in this-he would not allow her to leave her husband like some baseborn wench. However, if Kettering decided she was no longer wanted, then he would have no option but to send her to Redbourne Abbey until such time her husband could see his way clear to put her away at Kettering Hall. One way or another, he shouted, she would be dealt with. As if she was some distasteful object to be placed out of sight.

Claudia's degradation, then, was complete on the afternoon she was delivered to the Kettering House on St. James Square like a piece of old furniture that did not belong in her father's house. And while the earl thought it necessary to assure himself she actually boarded the coach as he had decreed, he did not think it necessary to actually deliver her to Kettering House, and therefore sent her on alone, in the company of a footman.

She arrived like a pauper, with nothing but the small bag she had left with. Much to her great relief, Tinley did not seem surprised to see her, and taking advantage of his faulty memory, she escaped to her rooms where she paced like a caged animal. Never in her life had she felt so insignificant, so contemptibly useless.

And never had she felt more alone.

Disheartened, Claudia was not as presumptuous as her father-she had no hope that Julian would allow her to stay. Even if he were feeling particularly generous, he would undoubtedly send her off somewhere so that he would not have to look at her. He would, at last, banish her from his sight.

Had he found Sophie? Where would he take her?

Her rooms were dark and cold, but Claudia made no move to call for a servant. She had no energy, no will. She collapsed into an overstuffed chair, tightened her cloak about her, and curled her feet under her gown for warmth. It occurred to her as she lay there in that enormous chair that she had lit a hearth fire only once in all her life. There had always been someone to do that for her, someone to tend to her every need. Someone to make her and keep her completely useless to the world. She could not even light a fire.

She dropped her forehead to her palm and closed her eyes, but there were no tears-the well was bone dry, used up. It didn't matter. She was far past tears-just . . . desolate. For the first time in her life, she had no idea which way to turn, no notion of how to cope, what to do. Helpless, vulnerable, and wretched, she had come to the realization that, in spite of all her efforts to improve her lot, it had all come down to the mercy of a man in the end, a man she loved with all her heart. A man who abhorred her.

The sound of someone entering the little vestibule of her suite filtered into her room and Claudia sighed wearily, trying to summon her strength for Brenda or Tinley-whoever had come to see after her. She listened to the muted footfall, felt it tread upon her heart. The bright flare of the match startled her, and she abruptly looked up, blinking.

"Claudia."

Oh, God. Julian.

Ashamed, she turned away and unsteadily brushed the back of her hand across her cheek, unable to look at him. "Tinley said you were here." He walked into the room, and Claudia glanced at him from the corner of her eye. His was an intimidating figure; he stared at her, his expression inscrutable. It was like a knife to her heart, shredding the last bit of her hope, and she was suddenly desperate to at least have her dignity.

"I'm sorry," she murmured, choking back dry tears. "Papa . . . he brought me back. H-he believes my place is here until you say otherwise. I'm really very sorry, Julian-I tried my best to dissuade him-"

"You must be freezing," he said softly.

Freezing. Not the response she had expected. She shook her head and slowly rose to her feet. "I'm not cold," she said dispassionately. "I can't really feel myself anymore."

"I am very sorry to hear that."

So was she. Looking at him now, at the sharp angles of his jaw, the thick hair that was still too long, black eyes boring into her, she was struck by just how sorry she was that she could not feel him any longer. There was a time she could feel his eyes on her from across a crowded room or his breath on the back of her neck when he wasn't even nearby. And now . . . now she couldn't feel a bloody thing. She was numb, deadened, her soul extinguished. God, how she regretted it all!

"Everything-this is all my fault, and I'm so very sorry," she suddenly blurted, and covered her face with her hands, mortified that he should see her like this, like a beggar. "I was so stupid about so many things! From the beginning, even, and you are quite right, you know, for I've known you near forever . . . but I. . . I just loved you so desperately that I wasn't thinking clearly all that time, and when the ladies would remark on your hands and your lips, and your beauty, I hated you for wanting them and not me-"

"Ah, Claudia," he murmured, and took a cautious step toward her.

She was aware that she was on the verge of blathering hysterically, but she couldn't stop herself, compelled by an unseen force to let the words tumble from her heart and into the open. She plunged on. "And then . . . then you were always with Phillip, always cavorting about, and it was no secret what the Rogues did, especially Phillip, and the night of Harrison Green's there was Lady Prather, you know. So when I came here, and you and Arthur went out, I assumed it was all the same again, and I should never have listened to Tinley, but women are supposed to accept it, and I wasn't supposed to mind terribly-but oh, God, I did!" she cried, covering her eyes with her hands again.

"Claudia-"

"I loved you so much that I couldn't bear for you to touch me, because when you touched me, I felt as if I was the only woman in the world to you, but I wasn't! There was always another whom you touched in the very same way-"

"I never touched another woman, Claudia-don't say more!" he begged her, taking another step toward her.

But she stumbled backward, out of his reach, unable to stop now until every last dark secret was out. "And I lied to you! Not just about Sophie, not only that, but about Phillip, too," she sobbed, lifting her head to look at him. "I lied to myself. I never loved Phillip, not like I have loved you, not like I love you now, and I am quite thankful I did not marry him, because I know what my life would have been, and it wouldn't have been this," she said, gesturing wildly about her. "It wouldn't have been you, and I would have been so sorry, so very sorry all my life! Yet I lied because I was hurt. I thought. . . I thought you didn't like me very much, that you thought something was infinitely wrong with me, and that you wished you had never known me, and perhaps you do, and I surely would understand if you were to go to my father right away and demand that he take me back-"

"I will never let you go again," he said hoarsely, moving forward until he was within arm's reach of her.

His nearness made her panic, as if she was standing too close to the edge-if he touched her, she would fall. She jerked her arm up, holding it straight in front of her. "This is . . . so humiliating," she muttered miserably. "To be sent back to someone who doesn't want you-"

"I want you-"

"Forced to grovel at your feet like some beggar-"

"It is I who am at your feet." He carefully reached for her , his fingers fluttering to her hand and closing around it.

With a violent shake of her head, Claudia said, "I can't bear this-I've ruined your life, I know it-"

"You have enriched it beyond measure-"

"I committed a crime when I took Sophie, with no thought to the consequence, and therefore, my crime is your crime-"

Julian suddenly jerked her toward him, grabbing her arms. "Claudia, listen to me," he said roughly, stooping down so that they were at eye level. "I love you! I have loved you hopelessly for far too long. There is not a single hour of the day that goes by that I do not think of you, not a moment I don't look for you or strain to hear your voice! All I want-" He stooped lower, forcing her to look at him. "All I want on this earth is for you to love me in return, if even just a little."

Her heart caught, suspended somewhere between heaven and earth. "Oh, no," she moaned, and her legs buckled under the weight of those words. She went down on her knees, Julian with her, still holding her in a fierce grip. "I love you," he said again, his fingers curling deeper into her arms.

Inconceivable. After what she had done? "Don't say that," she begged him, squeezing her eyes shut against the poignant look in his eye. "Don't say it to me because I will fall to pieces-"

"No you won't," he said, shaking her once. "You will love me in return. You will love me as you tried to love me when I wouldn't let you. You will show me how to live, Claudia; you will show me how to give myself to everyone around me, never fearing the propriety or the consequences. You will show me how to care so deeply for others less fortunate than myself. You will show me how to love you, because God knows I haven't done it very well-"

"No.'" she cried. "I'm afraid, Julian! You can't know how very much it hurts-"

"The hell I don't," he muttered angrily. "Don't give up on me, Claudia! It feels as if I have waited my whole life for you! I need you-can't you see just how desperately I do? I can't live without you. I can't breathe without you! I ache when you are away, I ache when you are near, I am consumed with longing for you! Lord God, I am sorry; from the depths of my pathetic soul, I am sorry that I didn't understand it all sooner. But I do now, and I swear to you, I swear I will do better, I will do whatever it takes . . . just love me."