It was a quick ride home. Alec spurred Ceres to ungodly speeds, riding as if the hounds of hell chased him. Delia didn’t mind. She loved the way the wind whipped her hair and coaxed color into her cheeks. Athena surged beneath her, and she could almost imagine she’d sprouted wings as the horse’s long, smooth strides sent her soaring across the grounds. Alec rode just ahead of her, expertly controlling the gigantic black horse with his powerful thighs, his back straight, with the wind tossing his wavy dark hair.

It had been a glorious ride. A glorious morning.

She looked up when they reached Bellwood, surprised at how short the ride home had seemed. Rylands, with the uncanny prescience of all perfectly trained butlers, had already opened the door and stood stoically waiting for them.

“Hello, Rylands.” She waved gaily.

Rylands bowed. “Miss Somerset. Lord Carlisle. Luncheon will be served at noon.”

Alec drew Ceres to an abrupt halt. “Has my mother come down yet this morning, Rylands? The other guests?”

Rylands shook his head. “It’s been a quiet morning, my lord. Lady Carlisle took her breakfast in her room.” The butler hesitated, then added blandly, his face impassive, “As did Lady Cecil and her daughter.”

Alec merely nodded, but his body relaxed and the tightness in his jaw eased. “Very good.” He turned to Delia. “Thank you for your company this morning, Miss Somerset.”

Delia supposed this was her cue to dismount. She did so reluctantly, taking a moment to stroke Athena’s neck and murmur to her. She glanced shyly up at Alec, about to thank him for the wonderful ride, but before she could say a word, he gathered Athena’s reins, gave her a cursory nod, and trotted off to the stables.

Delia watched him go. She felt vaguely dissatisfied, though she couldn’t have said why.

She hurried up the stairs to her bedchamber to dress, and found Lily sitting in front of the mirror, puzzling over which ribbon best matched her gown. Delia gazed at her sister’s reflection and smiled. Lily’s cheeks were pink and the dark circles under her eyes had faded.

“The white one.” Delia hurried into the room and discarded her hat on the bed.

“Goodness, Delia. Where have you been? Off on a ride? You’d best hurry; it’s nearly time for luncheon.” Lily turned away from the mirror and eyed Delia with curiosity.

“Blast! I left my hat ribbons in Thomas’s saddlebag.”

The wind had loosened the silk ribbons on her riding hat. Fortunately she’d noticed it and she’d given the ribbons to Thomas, who’d tucked them into his saddlebag for safekeeping.

“You look as if you rode home without a hat altogether. It would explain your hair.” Lily turned back to the glass and gave her own perfectly arranged hair a complacent pat.

Delia reached up to touch her hair and groaned. She didn’t need to look in the glass to know it was a mass of tangles. “It’ll take me ages to brush it out. Do you suppose I could retrieve the ribbons after luncheon?” Her stomach gave a hopeful growl.

“If you forget and the ribbons are lost, Hyacinth and Violet will go mad.” Lily turned away from the mirror and eyed Delia sternly. “I wouldn’t blame them, for you’ll never match the color, and the hat is the best part of the costume.”

“Blast,” Delia repeated, this time with resignation. “I’m going.” She was already halfway out the door.

“If you hurry back, I’ll help you with your hair!” Lily called out, just as Delia closed the door behind her.

“Help me indeed,” she muttered, taking the stairs at a near run. “If you really wanted to help, you’d go down to the stables with your perfect hair and fetch the ribbons for me.”

Rylands saw her bolting down the stairs and opened the front door. “Luncheon is served at noon,” he repeated as Delia flew out the door and ran in the direction of the stables.

“I know, Rylands. I know!” she called over her shoulder. She couldn’t be sure, but she thought she heard the butler sigh heavily.

She arrived at the stable doors and was about to hurry in when she heard raised male voices coming from inside. She paused, not sure what to do. She didn’t want to interrupt, but—

“… don’t know what the hell you think you’re doing, Alec, sneaking around last night and then disappearing for the entire morning today!”

It was Robyn Sutherland’s voice, and he sounded furious. Delia let out a long, quiet breath. The ribbons would have to wait. She couldn’t barge into the stables in the middle of an argument.

“You don’t need to know, Robyn.” Alec’s voice was cold. “It’s only necessary I do. And I hardly disappeared with Miss Somerset.”

Delia froze. Were they arguing about her? She instinctively drew closer to the stables, into the deeper shadows at the side of the building.

“Oh, I’m sure you do know just what you’re doing, Alec—you always do. But I find myself wondering what you could have to gain by spending the morning alone with her, without a chaperone.”

“Thomas was with us the entire time.” Alec’s voice sounded strained.

“A servant! Not quite the same as a proper escort, is it, Alec? Rather like Major Lytton at dinner last night. You were careful to make sure no one overheard that conversation.”

“Have you taken your eyes off her even once since she arrived, Robyn? You seem to be watching her very closely.”

“Not as closely as you are,” Robyn snapped. “And now everyone else is watching her, too, brother, since you’ve exposed her to their notice with your pointed attentions.”

“If she didn’t want to be noticed, she should have stayed in Surrey. Would to God she had,” Alec added in a dark voice, as if to himself.

Delia wrapped her arms around herself and squeezed. The wind had picked up, hadn’t it? She shivered and pressed her back against the stable wall. If she pressed hard enough, maybe she’d disappear.

Robyn gave an angry snort. “What are you talking about? Why shouldn’t she be here?”

“She doesn’t belong here. You know it’s true, Robyn. Even Miss Somerset knows it, naïve as she is.”

Delia’s throat went tight when she thought of the rush of pleasure she’d felt just this morning when Alec said she was as accomplished as any young lady of the ton. He hadn’t meant it, then. Her heart throbbed with misery. God, she was such a fool to believe she could ever belong here.

Robyn’s voice had gone very low. Delia didn’t want to hear anymore, but still she found herself straining to make out his words.

“I see.” But Robyn sounded as if he didn’t see. Not at all. “Perhaps we should clarify your objection, Alec. Is it her behavior you find offensive? Her manners? Her conversation? In what way does she fall short of your lofty expectations?”

“There’s nothing wrong with the girl’s behavior.”

Delia had never heard the word girl sound like such an insult before. Alec’s tone was utterly dismissive.

Robyn must have thought so, too, for his voice had gone as cold as the wind that clamped its icy hand on Delia’s neck. “What’s this all about, Alec? You can’t mean you object to her simply because of her birth?”

There was a pause. Delia clenched her hands so tightly her nails dug into her palms, but she didn’t notice the sting. Her whole body had gone numb.

“Simple? If only it were.” It sounded as if Alec’s calm demeanor was crumbling. “But it goes way beyond that. Delia Somerset’s father was a nobody, and her mother was at the center of a scandal that humiliated our family. Their own grandmother, Lady Chase, doesn’t even acknowledge them. Do you think the ton will welcome her into society when her own grandmother has rejected her?”

“I didn’t think of the ton at all when I urged Charlotte and Eleanor to invite her here,” Robyn said. “I thought only that she’s charming, and our sisters’ friend. I didn’t realize you expect me to take the ton’s opinion into consideration every time I issue an invitation.”

“I don’t expect anything of you anymore, Robyn. So it falls to me to point out the ton will be tittering over the Sutherland name in every drawing room in London if the scandal is revived. Do you wish to see our mother and sisters exposed to society’s derision again? Have you no family loyalty, Robyn?”

“Family loyalty?” Robyn echoed faintly, as if he couldn’t believe what he’d heard. “That scandal is decades old, Alec! You can’t seriously accuse me of lacking family loyalty on the grounds of a house party invitation.”

“Christ, Robyn!” Alec’s voice cracked off the high rafters and echoed through the stables. “Do you really expect me to believe that’s all it is? Anyone can see you’re besotted with her! You can’t take your eyes off her. You can’t stop thinking—”

Alec broke off abruptly and there was a moment of tense, stunned silence, like the hush after a gun discharges unexpectedly. When he spoke again, his voice was tight. “I accuse you on the grounds you’re seriously pursuing her when a match between you is impossible. It’s out of the question, Robyn.”

“It seems to me as though you’re pursuing her,” Robyn shot back. “I’ve hardly seen her since her arrival because you’re always alone in some dark corner of the garden with her, or off on some mysterious ride.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Alec replied very quickly. “I’ve been trying to keep her out of your way!”

The sound of the flies buzzing around the stable door was deafening. Delia waited, motionless, nausea roiling in her stomach. Alec hadn’t been trying to seduce her, then. She knew she should be relieved. Thankful, even. So why did it hurt her so much? Because he’d gone to such great lengths to keep her out of his family?

It must have been so odious to him to pretend interest in a nobody like her. But like the rest of the ton, he was a skilled dissembler. She’d actually believed he enjoyed spending time with her. What had he felt when he’d kissed her? Touched her? Tears stung the corners of her eyes. Had he imagined he was kissing and touching Lady Lisette instead?

Finally Robyn spoke. “What if I said I was in love with her, Alec? What then? Would you encourage my suit? Or would the potential scandal be more important to you than my happiness?”

There was a long silence. Alec’s voice when it came was flat, toneless. “Are you trying to tell me you’re in love with her, Robyn?”

“I’m asking you if it would make any difference to you if I was. What if my happiness depended on her?”

“There are other ways to get what you want. Perhaps if you took her as your mistress …”

Delia pressed her hand to her stomach, directly over the chasm that opened there at Alec’s words. Oh God, she was going to be sick. She’d be sick and they would find her here, and they would know she’d overheard every awful, painful word …

There was a furious snarl and then she heard what sounded like an angry scuffle. One of the horses whinnied nervously, but it ended almost as quickly as it had begun.

“God damn you, Alec.” Robyn’s voice shook, and he’d abandoned any pretense at restraint. “Do you think Delia Somerset would consent to be any man’s mistress? Or that I would ruin a gently bred young lady?” Robyn was nearly spitting with rage. “You don’t know her at all, Alec. What’s worse, you don’t know me.”

The nervous horse stirred for a few moments, then settled down into the stall with a snort. Delia watched the dust motes dance in the one remaining shaft of weak sunlight. Alec was silent.

At last Robyn took a deep breath. “I wish I could say I don’t recognize you anymore, Alec, but I do. You’re just like Father. Just as cold and manipulative. Oh, you’re far more charming than Father was. You put a better face on it. But no matter how polished the surface, it’s still the same underneath.” His voice was quiet and final. “If carrying the title means being like Father, then I’m damned thankful I’m not the Earl of Carlisle.”

Delia heard footsteps and shrank back against the wall, in a near frenzy at the thought of being discovered. When no one appeared, she realized Robyn must have exited from the opposite side of the stables. At least she thought it was Robyn. It had sounded as if he had nothing else to say.

She needed to get away from there as quickly and as quietly as possible, but she was trembling from head to toe and she didn’t trust herself to move. It would be a disaster if Alec found her there—

She went still as a realization swept through her. It would be a disaster for him to find out she’d overheard his hateful words, but it wasn’t one for her. She’d done nothing wrong, except to choose a deucedly bad time to search for her ribbons.

A pure, cleansing anger took hold of her at that moment, a glittering, frozen anger unlike any she’d ever felt before. She’d be damned if she’d skulk away like a common criminal. Before she could talk herself out of it, Delia stepped away from the side of the building and through the stable door.

As soon as she saw Alec’s face, she almost regretted her bravery. His sensuous mouth was a thin, grim line. His fists were clenched so tightly on his riding crop, his knuckles had gone white, and he was deathly pale under his sun-bronzed skin.

When he looked up and saw her, his face went even paler. For one fleeting moment her heart seized with pain for him. But then she remembered.

Her own grandmother rejected her … Her father was a nobody … She doesn’t belong here … Perhaps if you took her as your mistress.

Delia wanted to put her hands over her ears to shut out the words, but she knew it would do no good. Those hateful words would echo in her head for as long as she lived.

Good. They would remind her never to be so foolish again.

“All this time I’ve wondered why an insignificant, naïve girl like me should be fortunate enough to enjoy the attentions of the great Lord Carlisle,” she said in a dead voice. “At one point I even believed you were trying to seduce me.” She laughed a little, but the sound was hard and cold. “You’re certainly determined to keep my family’s disgraceful scandal from polluting the pure Sutherland name, aren’t you, Alec? How ironic,” she added with another near-hysterical laugh, “since I never remotely considered Robyn a marriage prospect.”

She was furious to hear her voice quaver at the end of her little speech. Alec took a step toward her. “Delia, don’t—”

She held up a shaking hand. “No.” A thread of panic entered her voice. “Don’t come near me. I don’t want you near me, and I don’t want to hear any explanations.”

He came to a halt, his eyes searching hers. “I won’t come near you. I only want to say I regret you overheard such an ugly argument.”

“Do you regret you said those things, or that I overheard them?”

She already knew the answer.

He took one step closer, despite his promise. “I regret you overheard them, but I meant it when I said there will never be anything between you and Robyn.” His voice was low and fierce, and his black eyes glinted dangerously.

To Delia’s fury, his words cut through her like a thousand shards of glass. “Yes, I deduced that, my lord.” She caught her breath painfully. “Of course, there is one consolation. It seems I would make an admirable mistress, so perhaps the journey to Kent wasn’t wasted after all.”

She tried to keep the misery out of her voice, but as soon as the words fell into the heavy, dusty air of the stables, she knew she’d failed. The words hung there, a noose choking the life out of their fragile intimacy of that morning.

Alec flinched when she said “mistress,” but otherwise he was silent. He simply watched her, an odd expression in his eyes. Was it regret? Or, so help her God, was it pity? Suddenly Delia’s every limb was trembling again. Her throat closed. Tears of rage and humiliation pressed behind her eyes. He dared to pity her?

“As I said, my lord, I didn’t come here to trap Robyn into marriage. It never even occurred to me.” Delia wanted to stop talking, but the words tumbled from her lips. “But it has now.”

Before she could move, Alec leapt toward her, closing the distance between them. He grabbed her upper arms. “What do you mean by that, Delia?” His voice was a whisper, lethal and dark.

Delia shivered but didn’t answer. His hands tightened on her shoulders and he pulled her toward him until their bodies were touching. His heat overwhelmed her, and she found herself swaying into him. “What did you mean, Delia?”

She didn’t know what she’d meant. She’d said it to wipe the pity from his eyes. To make him angry. To hurt him. She hadn’t thought beyond that.

His breath was fast and harsh, and his dark eyes had gone black. He towered over her, his lean, hard-muscled body far too close to hers, seething with fury and frustration and, she knew instinctively, passion and desire. As if this experience hadn’t been humiliating enough, she realized every cell in her body ached in response to his nearness.

“Let go of me, my lord.” She twisted in an attempt to free her shoulders from his grip. His hands tightened for a moment and his eyes dropped to her lips, but then he released her so suddenly she stumbled backward.

He took a step forward again as if to help steady her, but froze when she backed away from him. “I should thank you for your honesty, my lord—your honesty to your brother, that is, as opposed to the lies you told me during our ride today. I would much rather know the truth, even if it’s spoken behind my back.”

“I don’t know what the truth is, damn it. All of it is true. Or none of it. Since you came here, I can’t tell the difference anymore.”

His voice throbbed with some emotion Delia couldn’t name, but she was past caring. “I have a very hard time believing that, Lord Carlisle.” She turned her back on him and walked toward the stable doors.

“This isn’t a game anymore, Delia.” His voice was soft, deadly. “You’ll never belong to Robyn. Stay away from him. Don’t do anything unworthy of you.”

Delia kept her back to him so he couldn’t see the tears wetting her cheeks. “From what I overheard today, my lord, I think there is very little you’d consider unworthy of me.”

She paused, but he didn’t correct her or deny her words. Delia’s back stiffened. “I may not be a suitable match for Robyn, but he is an excellent match for me. Do you imagine I’ll overlook my own best interests?” She tried to laugh, but the sound that emerged sounded more like a sob. “You expect a great deal from a social outcast with a nobody for a father.”

After that, there seemed to be nothing left for either of them to say, so she walked away.