Rudeness is the ultimate test of perfection.
The delicate lady holds her tongue.
—A Treatise on the Most Exquisite of Ladies
The most exciting finds at the modiste are not wisps of silk, but whispers of scandal . . .
—The Scandal Sheet, October 1823
“Englishwomen spend more time buying clothes than anyone in all of Europe.”
Juliana leaned back on the divan in the dressmaker’s fitting room. She had spent more hours than she would care to admit on that particular piece of furniture, upholstered in a fine, scarlet brocade that was just expensive enough and just bold enough to echo the proprietress of the shop.
“You must never have seen the French shop,” Madame Hebert said drily as she artfully pinned the waist of the lovely cranberry twill she was fitting to Callie.
Mariana laughed as she inspected an evergreen velvet. “Well, we cannot allow the French to best us at such an important activity, can we?” Hebert replied with a pointed grunt, and Mariana hastened to reassure her. “After all, we have already won their very best seamstress to our side of the Channel.”
Juliana grinned as her friend narrowly avoided a diplomatic disaster.
“And besides,” Mariana continued, “Callie spent far too long in horrible clothing. She has much to make up for. We just come along for the excitement . . .” She paused. “And perhaps a winter cloak in this green?”
“Your Grace would look beautiful in the velvet.” Hebert did not look up from her work. “May I suggest a new gown in the dupioni to match? It will make you the belle of a winter ball.”
Mariana’s eyes lit up as Valerie spread out the stunning green silk—heavier than most with a dozen different greens shimmering through it. “Oh, yes . . .” she whispered. “You may certainly make such a suggestion.”
Juliana laughed at the reverence in her friend’s tone. “And with that, we are here for another hour,” she announced, as Mariana headed behind a nearby screen to be measured, poked, and pinned.
“Not too tight,” Callie said quietly to the dressmaker before smiling at Juliana. “If autumn remains as social as it has been, I cannot imagine what will come of winter. You’re going to need new dresses as well, you know. In fact, we have not discussed what you shall wear to your dinner.”
“Not my dinner.” Juliana laughed. “And I am sure I have something suitable.”
“Callie’s selected an excellent crop of London’s lords, Juliana,” Mariana sang from behind the screen. “Each one more eligible than the last.”
“So I have heard.”
Callie inspected the waist of her gown in the mirror. “And all but Leighton have accepted.” She met Juliana’s eyes in the mirror. “Including Benedick.”
Juliana ignored the reference to the Earl of Allendale, knowing she should not press Callie further on the event. Nevertheless, “Leighton is not coming?”
Callie shook her head. “It is unclear. He simply has not responded.” Juliana held her tongue, knowing that she should not press the issue any more. If he did not wish to attend the dinner, what business was it of hers? “I am trying to find the good in him . . . but it is not easy. Ah, well. We shall have a lovely time without him.”
“Would you like me to have Valerie show you some fabrics, Mademoiselle Fiori?” Hebert interjected, as excellent a businesswoman as she was a dressmaker.
“No.” Juliana shook her head. “I have plenty of dresses. My brother need not be bankrupted today.”
Callie met Juliana’s gaze in a large looking glass. “Don’t think I don’t know about your little secret gifts with Gabriel. You know he loves to buy you clothes and whatever else you want. And I know where all his new books and pieces of music come from.”
Juliana smiled. When she had first come to England, feeling entirely disconnected from this new world and her new family, she had been convinced that her daunting half brothers would hate her because of who she represented—the mother who had deserted them without looking back when they were boys. It did not matter that that same mother deserted Juliana, as well.
Except it had mattered. Gabriel and Nick had accepted her. Without question. And while their relationship as siblings continued to evolve, Juliana was learning—later than most—what it was to be a sister. And as part of that immensely pleasurable lesson, she and her eldest brother had begun a game of sorts, exchanging gifts often.
She smiled at her sister-in-law, who had been so instrumental in building the relationship between her brother and her, and said, “No gifts today. I am still reserving hope that the season will come to an end before I require a formal winter wardrobe.”
“Don’t say such things!” called Mariana from behind her screen. “I want a reason to wear this gown!”
They all laughed, and Juliana watched as Madame Hebert artfully draped the fabric of Callie’s gown over her midsection. Callie considered the folds of fabric in the mirror before saying, “It’s perfect.”
And it was. Callie looked lovely. Gabriel would not be able to keep his eyes off her, Juliana thought wryly.
“Not too tight,” Callie said.
It was the second time she had whispered the words.
Their meaning dawned.
“Callie?” Juliana said, meeting her sister-in-law’s guilty gaze in the mirror. Juliana tilted her head in a silent question, and Callie’s wide, lovely grin was all the answer that she needed.
Callie was with child.
Juliana leapt from her seat, joy bursting through her. “Maraviglioso!” She approached the other woman and pulled her into an enormous embrace. “No wonder we are shopping for more gowns!”
Their shared laughter attracted Mariana’s attention from behind the dressing screen. “What is maraviglioso?” She poked her blond head around the edge of the divider. “Why are you laughing?” She narrowed her gaze on Juliana. “Why are you crying?” She disappeared for a heartbeat, then hobbled out, clutching a length of half-pinned green satin to her, poor Valerie following behind. “What did I miss?” She pouted. “I always miss everything!”
Callie and Juliana laughed again at Mariana’s pique, then Juliana said, “Well, you’ll have to tell her.”
“Tell me what?”
Callie’s cheeks were on fire, and she was certainly wishing that they weren’t all in the middle of a fitting room with one of London’s best dressmakers standing a foot away.
Juliana could not stop herself. “It appears my brother has done his duty.”
“Juliana!” Callie whispered, scandalized.
“What? It is true!” Juliana said simply, with a little shrug.
Callie grinned. “You are just like him, you know.”
There were worse insults coming from a woman who madly loved the him in question.
Mariana was still catching up. “Done his—Oh! Oh, my! Oh, Callie!” She began to hop with excitement, and the long-suffering Valerie had to run for a handkerchief to protect the silk from Mariana’s tears.
Hebert quit the room—either to escape smothering in a wayward embrace or being caught in the emotional fray as the two sisters clutched each other and laughed and cried and laughed and chattered and cried and laughed.
Juliana smiled at the picture the Hartwell sisters made—now each so happily married and still so deeply connected to each other—even as she realized that there was no place for her in this moment of celebration. She did not begrudge them their happiness or their connection.
She simply wished that she, too, had such an unbridled, uncontested sense of belonging.
She slipped from the fitting room to the front room of the shop, where Madame Hebert had escaped moments earlier. The Frenchwoman was standing at the entrance to a small antechamber, blocking the view to another customer. Juliana headed for a wall of accents—buttons and ribbons, frills and laces. She ran her fingers along the haberdashery, brushing a smooth gold button here, a scalloped lace there, consumed with Callie’s news.
There would be two new additions to the family in the spring—Nick’s wife, Isabel, was also with child.
Her brothers had overcome their pasts and their fears of repeating the sins of their father, and they had taken that unfathomable leap—marrying for love. And now they had families. Mothers and fathers and children who would grow old in a happy, caring fold.
You’ve never in your life considered the future, have you? You’ve never imagined what came next?
Leighton’s words from the theatre echoed through her mind.
Juliana swallowed around a strange lump in her throat. She no longer had the luxury of thinking of her future. Her father had died, and she had been upended, shipped to England and delivered into a strange family and a stranger culture that would never accept her. There was no future for her in England. And it was easier—less painful—not to fool herself into imagining one.
But when she saw Callie and Mariana looking happily toward their idyllic futures, filled with love and children and family and friends, it was impossible not to envy them.
They had what she could never have. What she would never be offered.
Because they belonged here, in this aristocratic world where money and title and history and breeding all mattered more than anything else.
She lifted a long feather from a bowl, one that must have been dyed; she’d never seen such inky blackness in a plume so large. She could not imagine the bird that would produce such a thing. But as she ran her fingers through its softness, the feather caught the sunlight streaming into the shop, and she knew immediately that it was natural. It was stunning. In the bright afternoon light, the feather was not black at all. It was a shimmering mass of blues and purples and reds so dark that it merely gave the illusion of blackness. It was alive with color.
“Aigrette.”
The dressmaker’s word brought Juliana out of her reverie. “I beg your pardon?”
Madame Hebert raised a black brow. “So polite and British,” she said, continuing when Juliana gave her a half smile. “The feather you hold. It is from the egret.”
Juliana shook her head. “Egrets are white, I thought.”
“Not the black ones.”
Juliana looked down at the feather. “The colors are stunning.”
“The rarest of things are usually that way,” the dressmaker replied, lifting a large wooden frame filled with lace. “Excuse me. I have a duchess who requires an inspection of my lace.” The distaste in her tone surprised Juliana. Surely the Frenchwoman would not speak ill of Mariana in front of her . . .
“Perhaps if the French had moved more quickly, Napoleon would have won the war.” Disdain oozed across the shop, and Juliana turned quickly toward the voice.
The Duchess of Leighton stood not ten feet from her.
It was hard to believe that this woman, petite and pale, had spawned the enormous, golden Leighton. Juliana struggled to find something of him in his mother. It was neither in her pallid coloring nor in her parchment skin, so thin as to be nearly translucent, nor was it in the eyes, the color of a winter sea.
But those eyes, they seemed to see everything. Juliana held her breath as the duchess’s cool gaze tracked her from head to toe. She resisted the urge to fidget under the silent examination, refused to allow the woman’s obvious judgment to rattle her.
Of course, it did rattle her.
And suddenly, she saw the similarities in crystal clarity. The stiff chin, the haughty posture, the cold perusal, the ability to shake a person to her core.
She was his mother—him in all the very worst of ways.
But she did not have his heat.
There was nothing in her but an unwavering stoicism that spoke of a lifetime of entitlement and lack of emotion.
What turned a woman to stone?
No wonder he did not believe in passion.
The duchess was waiting for Juliana to look away. Just like her son, she wanted to prove that her ancient name and her straight nose made her better than all others. Certainly, her unwavering gaze seemed to say, it made her better than Juliana.
Ignoring her rioting nerves, Juliana remained steadfast.
“Your Grace,” Madame Hebert said, unaware of the battle of wills taking place in her front parlor, “my apologies for the delay. Would you care to look at the lace now?”
The duchess did not look away from Juliana. “We have not been introduced,” she said, the words sharp and designed to startle. They were a cut direct, aimed to remind Juliana of her impertinence. Of her place.
Juliana did not respond. Did not move. Refused to look away.
“Your Grace?” Madame Hebert looked from Juliana to the duchess and back again. When she continued, there was uncertainty in her tone. “May I introduce Miss Fiori?”
There was a long pause, which might have been seconds or hours, then the duchess spoke. “You may not.” The air seemed to go out of the room with the imperious statement. She continued, without releasing Juliana’s gaze. “I admit to a modicum of surprise, Hebert. There was a time when you serviced a far less . . . common . . . clientele.”
Common.
If the rushing in her ears had not been so loud, Juliana would have admired the older woman’s calculation. She had chosen the perfect word—the one that would provide the quickest and most violent set down.
Common.
The very worst of insults from someone who lived life up on high.
The word echoed in her head, but in the repetition, Juliana did not hear the Duchess of Leighton.
She heard her son.
And she could not help but reply.
“And I had always thought she serviced a far more civilized one.” The words were out before she could stop them, and she resisted the impulse to clap one hand over her mouth to keep from saying anything more.
If it were possible, the duchess’s spine grew even straighter, her nose tipped even higher. When she spoke, the words dripped with boredom, as though Juliana were too far below her notice to merit a response. “So, it is true what they say. Blood will out.”
The Duchess of Leighton exited the shop, taking the air with her as the door closed, its little bell sounding happily in ironic punctuation.
“That woman is a shrew.”
Juliana looked up to see Mariana heading toward her, concern and anger on her face. She shook her head. “It seems that duchesses can behave as they please.”
“I don’t care if she’s the Queen. She has no right to speak to you in such a way.”
“If she were queen, then she really could speak to me however she liked,” Juliana said, ignoring the shaking in her voice.
What had she been thinking, goading the duchess on?
That was the problem, of course. She hadn’t been thinking of the duchess at all.
She’d been thinking of flashing amber eyes and a halo of golden locks and a square jaw and an immovable countenance that she desperately wanted to move.
And she’d said the first thing that came to her mind.
“I should not have spoken to her in such a manner. If it gets out . . . it will be a scandal.” Mariana shook her head and opened her mouth to reply, almost certainly with reassuring words, but Juliana continued with a small smile. “Is it wrong that I cannot help but feel that she deserved it?”
Mariana grinned. “Not at all! She did deserve it! And much more! I loathe that woman. No wonder Leighton is so stiff. Imagine being raised by her.”
It would have been horrible.
Instead of feeling set down, Juliana was reinvigorated. The Duchess of Leighton might think herself above Juliana and the rest of the known world, but she was not. And while Juliana had little interest in proving such to the hateful woman, she found herself recommitted to showing the duke precisely what he was missing in his life of cold disdain.
“Juliana?” Mariana interrupted her thoughts. “Are you all right?”
She would be.
Juliana pushed the thought away, turning to the normally unflappable modiste, who had watched the scene unfold with shock and likely horror, and offered an apology. “I am sorry, Madame Hebert. I seem to have lost you an important customer.”
It was honest. Juliana knew that Hebert would have no choice but to attempt to win back the favor of the Duchess of Leighton. One did not simply stand aside as one of the most powerful women in London took her business elsewhere. The repercussions of such an altercation could end the dressmaker if not handled properly.
“Perhaps Her Grace,” she indicated Mariana, “and the marchioness,” she waved one hand in the direction of the fitting room and Callie, “can help to repair the damage I have done.”
“Ha!” Mariana was still irate. “As though I would stoop to conversing with that—” She paused, rediscovering her manners. “But, of course, Madame, I will happily help.”
The dressmaker spoke. “There is nothing in need of repair. I’ve plenty of work, and I do not require the Duchess of Leighton to suffer my clientele.” Juliana blinked, and the modiste continued. “I’ve got the Duchess of Rivington in my shop, as well as the wife and sister of the Marquess of Ralston. I can do without the old lady.” She lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “She shall die soon enough. What are a handful of years without her business?”
The pronouncement was so brash, so matter-of-fact, that it took a moment for the meaning to settle. Mariana smiled broadly, and Juliana gave a bark of disbelieving laughter. “Have I mentioned how very much I love the French?”
The modiste winked. “We foreigners must stay together, non?”
Juliana smiled. “Oui.”
“Bon.” Hebert nodded once. “And what of the duke?”
Juliana pretended not to understand. “The duke?”
Mariana gave her a long-suffering look. “Oh, please. You are terrible at playing coy.”
“The one who saved your life, mademoiselle,” the dressmaker said, a teasing lilt in her voice. “He is a challenge, non?”
Juliana turned the egret feather in her hand, watching as the brilliant, hidden colors revealed themselves before meeting the dressmaker’s gaze. “Oui. But not in the way you think. I am not after him. I simply want to . . .”
To shake him to his core.
Well, she certainly couldn’t say that.
Madame Hebert removed the plume from Juliana’s hand. She moved to the wall of fabric on one side of the shop and leaned down to remove a bolt of fabric. Turning out several yards of the extravagant cloth, she looked up at Juliana. “I think you should allow your brother to buy you a new gown.”
The modiste set the feather down on the glorious satin. It was scandalous and passionate and . . .
Mariana laughed at her shoulder, low and wicked. “Oh, it’s perfect.”
Juliana met the dressmaker’s gaze.
It would bring him to his knees.
“How quickly can I have it?”
The modiste looked to her, intrigued. “How quickly do you need it?”
“He is coming to dinner two evenings from now.”
Mariana snapped to attention, shaking her head. “But Callie said he has not accepted the invitation.”
Juliana met her sister-in-law’s eyes, more certain of her path than ever before. “He shall.”
“It is not that I do not wish our military to be well funded, Leighton, I’m simply saying that this debate could have waited for the next session. I’ve a harvest to oversee.”
Simon threw a card down and turned a lazy glance on his opponent, who was worrying a cheroot between his teeth in the telling gesture of a soon-to-be loser. “I imagine it’s less the harvesting and more the foxhunting that you are so loath to miss, Fallon.”
“That, as well, I won’t deny. I’ve better things to do than spend all of autumn in London.” The Earl of Fallon discarded in irritated punctuation. “You can’t want to stay, either.”
“What I want is not at issue,” Simon said. It was a lie. What he wanted was entirely at issue. He would endorse a special session of Parliament to discuss the laws governing cartography if it kept visitors from turning up on the doorstep of his country manor and discovering his secrets.
He set his cards down, faceup. “It seems you should spend more time on your cards than on searching for ways to shirk your duties as a peer.”
Simon collected his winnings, stood from the table, and ignored the earl’s curse as he left the small room into the corridor beyond.
The evening stretched before him, along with invitations to the theatre and half a dozen balls, and he knew that he should return to his town house, bathe and dress and head out—every night he was seen as the portrait of propriety and gentility was a night that would help to secure the Leighton name.
It did not matter that he was coming to find the rituals of society tiresome.
This was how it was done.
“Leighton.”
The Marquess of Needham and Dolby was huffing up the wide staircase from the ground floor of the club, barely able to catch his breath as he reached the top step. He stopped, one hand on the rich oak banister, and leaned his head back, pushing out his ample torso to heave a great breath. The buttons on the marquess’s yellow waistcoat strained under the burden of his girth, and Simon wondered if the older man would require a physician.
“Just the man I was hoping to see!” the marquess announced once he had recovered. “Tell me, when are you going to speak to my daughter?”
Simon stilled, considering their surroundings. It was an entirely inappropriate location for a conversation that he would like to keep private. “Perhaps you’d like to join me in a sitting room, Needham?”
The marquess did not take the hint. “Nonsense. There’s no need to keep the match quiet!”
“I am afraid I disagree,” Simon said, willing the muscles in his jaw to relax. “Until the lady agrees—”
“Nonsense!” the marquess fairly bellowed again.
“I assure you, Needham, there are not many who consider my thoughts nonsense. I should like the match kept quiet until I have had a chance to speak directly to Lady Penelope.”
Needham’s already beady gaze narrowed. “Then you’d best get it done, Leighton.” Simon’s teeth clenched at the words. He did not like being ordered about. Particularly by an idiotic marquess who was a poor shot.
And yet, it seemed he had little choice. He gave a curt nod. “Presently.”
“Good man. Good man. Fallon!” the marquess called as the door to the card room opened and Simon’s opponent stepped into the hallway. “You’re not going anywhere, boy! I plan to lighten your pockets!”
The door closed behind the portly marquess, and Simon gave a silent prayer that he was as bad at cards as he was at shooting. There was no reason for Needham to have a good afternoon after so thoroughly ruining Simon’s.
The enormous bay window that marked the center staircase of White’s overlooked the street, and Simon paused in the afternoon light to watch the carriages pass on the cobblestones below and consider his next move.
He should head straight to Dolby House and speak to Lady Penelope.
Each day that passed simply prolonged the inevitable.
It was not as though he had not eventually planned to marry; it was the natural course of events. A means to an end. He needed heirs. And a hostess.
But he resented having to marry now.
He resented the reason.
A flash of color caught his eye on the opposite side of the street, a bright scarlet peeking through the mass of muted colors that cloaked the other pedestrians on St. James’s Street. It was so out of place, Simon moved closer to the window to confirm that he had seen it—a bright scarlet cloak and matching bonnet, a lady in a man’s world. On a man’s street.
On his street. Across from his club.
What woman would wear scarlet in broad daylight on St. James’s?
The answer flashed the instant before the crowd cleared, and he saw her face.
And when she looked up toward the window—she couldn’t see him, couldn’t know he was there—he was unbalanced by the wave of disbelief that coursed through him.
Had he not—the evening before, for God’s sake—warned her off such bold, reckless behavior? Had he not given her a lesson in childishness? In consequences?
He had. Just before he had told her to do her best to win their wager.
This was her next move.
He could not believe it.
The woman deserved to be turned over someone’s knee and given a sound thrashing. And he was just the man to do it.
He was instantly in motion, hurrying down the stairs and ignoring the greetings of the other members of the club, barely forcing himself to wait for his cloak, hat, and gloves before heading out the door to catch her as she left the scene of her assault on his reputation.
Except she was not on the run.
She was waiting, quite patiently, across the street, in conversation with her little Italian maid—whom Simon vowed to see on the next ship back to Italy—as though the whole situation were perfectly normal. As though she were not breaking eleven different rules of etiquette by doing so.
He headed straight for her, not at all certain what he would do when he reached her.
She turned just as he reached them. “You really should be more careful crossing the street, Your Grace. Carriage accidents are not unheard of.”
The words were calm and genial, spoken as though they were in a drawing room rather than on the London street that boasted all the best men’s clubs. “What are you doing here?”
He expected her to lie. To say she had been shopping and taken a wrong turn, or that she had wanted to see St. James’s Palace and was simply passing by, or to say that she was searching for a hackney.
“Waiting for you, of course.”
The truth set him back on his heels. “For me.”
She smiled, and he wondered if someone in the club had drugged him. Surely this was not happening. “Precisely.”
“Do you have any idea how improper it is for you to be here? Waiting for me? On the street?” He could not keep the incredulity from his tone. Hated that she had shaken emotion from him.
She tilted her head, and he saw the wicked gleam in her eye. “Would it be more or less improper for me to have knocked on the door of the club and requested an audience?”
She was teasing him. She had to be. And yet, he felt he should answer her question. In case. “More. Of course.”
Her smile became a grin. “Ah, so then you prefer this.”
“I prefer neither!” He exploded. Then realizing that they remained on the street across from his club, he took her elbow and turned her toward her brother’s home. “Walk.”
“Why?”
“Because we cannot remain standing here. It is not done.”
She shook her head. “Leave it to the English to outlaw standing.” She began to walk, her maid trailing behind.
He resisted the urge to throttle her, taking a deep breath. “How did you even know that I was here?”
She raised a brow. “It is not as though aristocrats have much to do, Your Grace. I have something to discuss with you.”
“You cannot just decide to discuss something with me and seek me out.” Perhaps if he spoke to her as though she were a simpleton, it would settle his ire.
“Whyever not?”
Perhaps not.
“Because it is not done!”
She gave him a small smile. “I thought we had decided that I care little for what is done.” He did not respond. Did not trust himself to do so. “Besides, if you decide you want to speak to me, you are welcome to seek me out.”
“Of course I am welcome to seek you out.”
“Because you are a duke?”
“No. Because I am a man.”
“Ah,” she said, “a much better reason.”
Was that sarcasm in her tone?
He did not care.
He just wanted to get her home.
“Well, you were not planning to come to me.”
Damned right. “No. I was not.”
“And so I had to take matters into my own hand.”
He would not be amused by her charming failures in language. She was a walking scandal. And somehow, he had come to be her escort. He did not need this. “Hands,” he corrected.
“Precisely.”
He helped her cross the street to Park Lane and Ralston House before asking, quick and irritated, “I have better things to do today than to play nanny to you, Juliana. What is it you want?”
She stopped, the sound of her given name hanging between them.
“Miss Fiori.” He corrected himself too late.
She smiled then. Her blue eyes lit with more knowledge than a woman of twenty years should have. “No, Your Grace. You cannot take it back.”
Her voice was low and lilting and barely there before it was whisked away on the wind, but he heard it, and the promise it carried—a promise she could not possibly know how to deliver. The words went straight to his core, and desire shot through him, quick and intense. He lowered the brim of his hat and turned away, heading into the wind, wishing that the autumn leaves whipping around them could blow away the moment.
“What do you want?”
“What things do you have to do?”
Nothing I want to do.
He swallowed back the thought.
“It is not your concern.”
“No, but I am curious. What could an aristocrat possibly have to do that is so pressing that you cannot escort me home?”
He did not like the implication that he lived a life of idleness. “We have purpose, you know.”
“Truly?”
He cut her a look. She was grinning at him. “You are goading me.”
“Perhaps.”
She was beautiful.
Infuriating, but beautiful.
“So? What is it that you have to do today?”
Something in him resisted telling her that he had planned to visit Lady Penelope. Planned to propose. Instead, he offered her a wry look. “Nothing important.”
She laughed, the sound warm and welcome.
He was not going to see Lady Penelope today.
They walked in silence for a few long moments before they arrived at her brother’s home, and he turned to face her finally, taking her in. She was vibrant and beautiful, all rose-cheeked and bright-eyed, her scarlet cloak and bonnet turning her into the very opposite of a good English lady. She’d been outside, boldly marching through the crisp autumn air instead of inside warming herself by a fire with needlepoint and tea.
As Penelope was likely doing at that very moment.
But Juliana was different from everything he had ever known. Everything he had ever wanted. Everything he had ever been.
She was a danger to herself . . . but most of all, she was a danger to him. A beautiful, tempting danger he was coming to find increasingly irresistible.
“What do you want?” he asked, the words coming out softer than he would have liked.
“I want to win our wager,” she said, simply.
The one thing he would not give her. Could not afford to give her.
“It will not happen.”
She lifted one shoulder in a little shrug. “Perhaps not. Especially not if we do not see each other.”
“I told you I would not make it easy for you.”
“Difficult is one thing, Your Grace. But I would not have expected you to hide from me.”
His eyes widened at her bold words. “Hide from you?”
“You have been invited to dinner. And you are the only person who has not yet responded. Why not?”
“Certainly not because I am hiding from you.”
“Then why not reply?”
Because I cannot risk it. “Do you have any idea how many invitations I receive? I cannot accept them all.”
She smiled again, and he did not like the knowledge in the curve of her lips. “Then you decline?”
No.
“I have not decided.”
“It is the day after tomorrow,” she said, as though he were a small child. “I would not have thought you to be so callous with your correspondence, considering your obsession with reputation. Are you sure you are not hiding from me?”
He narrowed his gaze. “I am not hiding from you.”
“You do not fear that I might win our wager after all?”
“Not in the least.”
“Then you will come?”
“Of course.”
No!
She grinned. “Excellent. I shall tell Lady Ralston to expect you.” She started up the steps to the house, leaving him there, in the waning light.
He watched her go, standing on the street until the door closed firmly behind her, and he was consumed with the knowledge that he had been bested by an irritating Italian siren.