“I am.”
“Why the haste?”
“I do not wish to wait,” he said, flushing.
His mother eyed him thoughtfully. “You do realize that such unseemly haste will cause gossip, don’t you?”
“Yes, but we can weather that.”
“Very well, I shall make it happen, somehow.” She patted his arm again. “I am pleased you have at last found the woman you’ve been looking for, my dear. I had almost given up.”
“So had I, Mama,” he said awkwardly. He cleared his throat and went on, “You will be patient with her, won’t you? Remember, she is not accustomed to the kind of pomp and ceremony we take for granted. And she has no worldly ambition—she didn’t set her cap for me. In fact, she was deuced hard to convince,” he admitted.
“I knew that first evening that I liked her. And if you love her, my dearest, I will learn to love her, too.”
Robert flushed again and squeezed her hand. “Thank you, Mama.”
Mama was a gem to accede to his desire to push forward with the wedding so rapidly, for it would mean a great deal of work for her and would be a distraction from Ava’s season though Ava was far too fond of him to object to the interruption. It seemed he had fooled his family into thinking he had formed a strong attachment to Sarah, for which he was grateful. The truth was not so sanguine.
His fury over being entrapped by Lady Holbrook, was nothing to Sarah’s. He’d had no moment alone with her to discuss it, but the daggers she threw at him and her cold manner told him that she believed him to have been complicit with Lady Holbrook in the affair.
The fact of the matter was he’d had no choice but to make their betrothal a reality upon being discovered in such a compromising position with Sarah. His reputation, as well as hers, was at stake. The last thing he wanted was a scandal, particularly in the middle of Ava’s come out season, nothing could be more ruinous to her chances than to have her brother embroiled in a scandal. They had managed to avoid one at Vauxhall, though he was still not quite sure why or how. The fact that the alliance suited him was almost irrelevant.
*
Sarah was livid.Sarah wasn’t sure who she was more angry with, Daphne or the duke. That they had conspired to entrap her she had no doubt.
Being perfectly aware of the terms of her great-aunt’s will, she knew the benefit that would accrue to Daphne in orchestrating Sarah’s marriage to a duke. It was a significant jointure that would see her comfortable for the rest of her days.And Daphne’s refusal to apologize was even more galling. She stuck to it hammer and tong that she had acted in Sarah’s best interests, and she would thank her for it one day.
Sarah was so flabbergasted by this she just stared at her duenna. “You cannot be serious!”
Daphne dabbed at her eyes and sniffed. “I am perfectly serious. The duke is an absolute gentleman, and he most sincerely esteems you—anyone with eyes can see that. He will make you a splendid husband, you just haven’t the sense to see it yet, but you will!”
Sarah turned and left the room, unable to support a moment longer with the woman she had once thought her friend.
And as for the duke, she was so angry with him she refused to receive him. She kept to her room entirely for the first day after the announcement of the engagement, only emerging the next morning to resume her early morning walks.
She felt his betrayal, if anything more keenly, because it cut to the quick of her burgeoning affections toward him. She had assumed, wrongly, that he was a man of integrity. She now felt that she didn’t know him at all and that every construction she had put on his behavior was false. He cared only for money and consequence.
Her thoughts thus were quite dark as she entered the gates of Hyde Park trailed by Esme and the faithful James. It was a gloomy day, which suited her mood, and she hunched into her pelisse against the cool breeze, her eyes on her feet.
“Good day, Miss Watson.” The familiar voice brought her head up with a start and her steps to a halt. It was the Earl of Lannister again. But this time he did not appear to be the worse for drink. He was impeccably dressed in a jacket, breeches, and top boots under a caped greatcoat, shaven and quite bright-eyed.
He bowed. “I understand congratulations are in order,” he said with a quizzical smile.
Feeling entirely unequal to dealing with the earl’s double meanings and bantering manner, she tried to assume the demeanor of a just-engaged lady who was happy about it. Acknowledging his bow with a curtsy and a nod of her head, she said, “Thank you, my lord.”
“Will you let me take a turn about the park with you?” he said, taking her hand before she could protest and slipping it into the crook of his arm. Esme and James had fallen back a bit, although they were still in sight, as the earl tugged her gently along the path. There were few people out this early, and the air was still misty with dew upon the grass.
“What are you doing here, my lord?”
“Waiting for you. I waited yesterday, too, but you didn’t show.”
“I-I had the headache yesterday,” she said, flustered.
“Did you?” He looked down at her. “Forgive me, Miss Watson, but you look like you still have the headache.”
“What do you want, my lord?”
