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Pia knew Belinda’s harsh judgment was made simply in hopes of jolting her from a bad decision. “I know it may be hard for you to understand.”
“Try impossible.”
“Belinda means well,” Tamara said, jumping in.
“On second thought,” Belinda continued, “maybe you have the right idea, Pia. You can always walk away from an affair.”
Pia understood what Belinda meant. Ironically, Belinda couldn’t manage to get unmarried, while she herself, the romantic, couldn’t find a ticket for a trip down the aisle…
“I knew it,” Belinda mused, resting one silk-sweater-clad arm on the table as they waited for their meal to be cleared. “I knew the minute that you said you were wavering in your negative opinion of Hawk that there was reason to worry. What has he done to you?”
He’s turned me inside out. He makes me want to be with him no matter what.
“It makes me happy to be with him,” she said simply.
Belinda rolled her eyes, and Tamara touched her arm as if to restrain her.
“That’s how it starts,” Belinda argued, her brows drawing together. “One minute you’re having a good time, the next you’re in bed thinking you’re ready to gift him your body forever more…”
“Are we talking about Pia here?” Tamara asked as she and Pia stared at Belinda.
Belinda pressed her lips together. “Sorry, yes.”
Tamara pulled a worried frown of her own and searched Pia’s face. “Have you really considered what this would mean?”
Pia hesitated, and then nodded. She could tell, however, that Tamara had picked up on her short pause before answering.
Tamara sighed. “I wish I’d been able to warn you about Michelene. After you left Gantswood Hall, I questioned Sawyer about what he knew. It seems he had his suspicions but felt he’d received enough assurance on the matter.” She pursed her lips and shook her head. “I just wish Sawyer had bothered to tell me!”
“It’s okay, Tamara,” Pia responded. “It’s not your fault.”
Belinda shook her head, her expression perplexed and disbelieving. “Have you thought this through, Pia? Because, you know, he’s a duke with an obligation to produce a legitimate heir sooner rather than later. This would give you only a little more time with him. And he’s misled you now twice.”
Pia had followed the same train of thought a dozen times already, tormenting herself. She was hoping it would be a long while before Hawk was officially engaged. He’d asserted during their argument that he hadn’t planned a proposal or bought a ring. Did she dare believe him?
She’d managed to leave Silderly Park with a shred of dignity and self-respect, but only by the barest of margins. Was she willing to throw her self-respect out the window now by going back to Hawk’s bed with no strings attached after all that had happened?
“Perhaps Tamara and I aren’t the ones to be talking to you about this,” Belinda joked with dark humor. “We’re the first wives club, after all.”
“The first and only,” Tamara modified.
“For you, I hope,” Belinda said. “For me, I wouldn’t mind if Colin found another wife.” A look of pain flashed across her friend’s face in contradiction of her belligerent tone. “But even if Tamara and I can’t fully relate to the situation, we still know you. Do you really think you could do this—hold on to Hawk for now and then let
him go?”
“It’s fine for you and Tamara to be married to aristocrats,” Pia replied. “But unlike the both of you, I wasn’t born into a world of titles and money. I don’t know much about—”
“Oh, Pia, that’s nonsense!” Tamara broke in. “If I had a dollar for every bonhomie aristocrat who married in questionable taste, I wouldn’t have needed Sawyer to bail out Pink Teddy Designs.”
Despite herself, Pia smiled.
“Not that a marriage to you would be in questionable taste, of course,” Tamara hastened to add.
“Of course not,” Belinda joined in.
“Look at me, for example,” Tamara went on as a waiter cleared their plates. “I always considered myself poor countess material.”
Pia smiled uncertainly. It was true that, until a few months ago, Tamara had been a bohemian New York jewelry designer. But she was also the daughter of a British viscount. And she was now, in the space of a few short months, adapting well to straddling the line of what was expected of her as the Earl of Melton’s wife and as a New York-based designer.
