brothers, I believe?'
The cold silver eyes regarded her in silence.
'Well.' She dabbed at her eyes once more. 'I considered it my duty to warn you, your grace, that your sister may be in danger of having her heart broken. Joshua is such a handsome boy and such a heartless rogue. I do not know why I love him, but I do. Lady Freyja is such a sweet lady. I would hate to see her hurt.'
His grace was fingering the handle of his quizzing glass again and regarding her with haughtily raised eyebrows and arctic eyes.
'Oh.' She smiled brightly and waved to someone across the room. 'If you will excuse me, your grace. I see that I am wanted.'
The duke bowed slightly to her, and she hurried away.
What is it, sweetheart?' Joshua asked. 'Can't keep your hands off me, can you?'
He was lighting a single branch of candles on the mantelpiece in the small downstairs room his grandmother used as her office and writing room. There were a desk and chair in there, as well as a few bookcases and two matching armchairs with gilded arms and legs.
'Ha!' she said with haughty disdain.
He turned his head to grin at her. She had told him that she needed to have a private word with him, and he had brought her in here. She was wearing a transparent silver tunic over a low-cut pale blue gown with a great deal of silver thread and embroidery and was looking quite dazzlingly handsome. Her hair was threaded with silver too.
'I may well not be able to keep my hands off you,' he told her, perching on the edge of the desk with one foot braced on the floor and the other leg swinging free. 'I believe your modiste must have run short of fabric when she reached your bodice. With magnificent results, I might add.'
'Such lascivious talk does you no credit,' she said severely. 'I would wager you would not dare talk thus to any other lady.'
'Good Lord, no,' he agreed. 'I never enjoy having my face slapped. You will note that I set half a room between us before talking thus to you. I like my nose the shape it is.'
'We have got ourselves into a dreadful coil,' she said.
'We have,' he agreed. 'Somehow I suppose I imagined that Mr. King would announce our betrothal, everyone would smile and nod and assure us and one another that that was very pleasant news, and then we would all go about our business more or less as usual until you and I could decently go our separate ways again. I did not envisage this party-or the extravagance of my grandmother's delight.'
'And I did not foresee Wulf's coming to Bath,' she said, frowning. 'It has made the whole thing horribly and embarrassingly complicated.'
'Has he tried to persuade you to end the betrothal?' he asked. 'I have been under the distinct impression that he is less than delighted with me.' He wondered if her brother had shown her his aunt's letter or told her any of the damning things she appeared to have included in that letter.
She shook her head. 'Wulf would not do that,' she said. 'He does not give orders. Not to his brothers and sisters anyway. Though I have often thought that he is quite expert at maneuvering us into doing what he wants us to do, apparently of our own free will.'
'Perhaps, then,' he said, smiling at her, 'you can allow him to maneuver you into giving me my marching orders. It would be the perfect answer to our dilemma, would it not? Just give me enough warning, though, if it happens before my aunt leaves Bath so that I can flee before I find myself betrothed to someone else instead.'
'I assured him,' she said, 'that I adore you and that you adore me. I have promised him that we will be happy.'
Despite himself he threw back his head and laughed.
'You might try frowning less ferociously,' he said. 'I might almost believe that you do not mean a word of it.'
'Is everything a joke to you?' she asked, coming closer to him. 'I have never lied to Wulf before. I have always scorned lies.'
He reached out and took one of her hands in his and shifted his weight so that he was sitting fully on the desk.
'At the moment,' he said, 'I am feeling something akin to adoration.'
'He expects you to accompany us back to Lindsey Hall within the next few days,' she said, 'so that you can be presented to the rest of my family and our neighbors. So that our betrothal can be celebrated there. So that our wedding can be planned.'
'Ah,' he said, possessing himself of her other hand too. 'We find ourselves in a coil indeed.'
'You are not to agree to it,' she said, glaring at him haughtily along the length of her nose. 'You are not to come. You are to make some excuse about another commitment, and then after you have gone I will break the truth to Wulf.'
'Ah, sweetheart,' he said, 'I have made life difficult for you.'
'You have indeed,' she said. 'But I agreed to your mad scheme and on the whole I am not sorry. This past week has been far less tedious than it would have been if we had not been betrothed. Indeed, it has been downright enjoyable.'
'For me too.' He grinned at her.
She opened her mouth and drew breath to say something else, did not say it, but locked glances with him instead. It was an awkward, unexpectedly silent moment in which it seemed they both simultaneously realized that they were alone together in a small, private room lit only by the flickering light of three candles.
