The duchess gave her a hug and Robert mouthedthank youover her head. The duchess shook her head at him and smiled. She then swept Ava off for more ball preparations, and his brothers sloped off to the billiard room, leaving him alone with Sarah. His family could always be relied upon.
“Thank you for agreeing to stay,” he said, drawing her back down onto the couch.
“I hardly had the opportunity to refuse.”
“Mama is somewhat of a force of nature,” he said. “She knew I wanted you to stay.”
“To continue our quarrel?”
“To resolve it, I hope. Will you accept my apology, Sarah?”
She looked down and then up, swallowing visibly. “Yes,” she smiled tentatively, and he was tempted to kiss her, but there was one other matter he needed to address with her. It was burning a hole in his breast.
“I also wanted you to know that I have taken steps to ensure that you will no longer be bothered by the Earl of Lannister. If he should approach you again, I want you to advise me at once.”
Her cheeks flamed, and she jerked her hands from his grasp.
“What do you mean?”
“I am aware that he importuned you in the park two days ago. I regret that you were put to such distress and that I was not able to prevent it.”
“So, you’re spying on me as well?” Her eyes flashed, and his heart sank. She was angry with him again, but this time he felt as if he was on firmer ground.
“No, servants’ gossip. I was informed, that is all.”
She rose and walked to the window, so he perforce rose also and followed her. She was clearly agitated.
“I’m sorry to upset you,” he said again. “But it is my duty and privilege to protect you from such blackguards as Lannister. He is not a proper person for you to know. It upset me greatly that he had the audacity to offer for—” he broke off as she turned to face him.
“How do you know what he said to me if you were not spying on me?”
“He told me himself when I confronted him.”
“He made the offer out of kindness, nothing else. He could see I was unhappy.”
“My dear, you are surely not that naïve? If you think me a fortune hunter, Lannister is far worse. And his reputation is shocking, his morals no better.”
“Yet I believe he was more sincere in his offer than you, Your Grace.”
Her words were a kick to the gut. Struggling to maintain control of his temper, he said in shaking accents, “In what way?”
“He was motivated by care for me, which you were not!”
“I was motivated by the need to save your reputation, and”—his innate honesty forced him to add—“in some small measure my own. The last thing Ava needs right now is for her brother to be embroiled in a scandal. But that aside, I had already offered for you before being discovered at the ball and renewing that offer. It was you who turned me down!”
He recalled the reason she had given him for her refusal in the first place and a sick feeling of dread entered his stomach.
“Am I to understand that the person who had engaged your affections was Lannister?”
“That is a moot point now,” she said, her back still toward him.
“Yes, because once the announcement of our engagement was made, it would cause a monumental scandal if you threw me over for Lannister, wouldn’t it? And that would as surely ruin your sisters’ chances as any scandal I could have caused. Worse in fact.”
“Exactly.”
He found he was shaking now with something other than anger, and there was an ache in the region of his heart the like of which he had never felt before. “Damn it, Sarah! You can’t love him. He is the worst kind of man, a liar and a cheat, a libertine. I tell you he has no moral compass whatever.”
“You cannot tell me who to love and who not to love, Your Grace. Although it is just like you to try. You are so accustomed to having everyone do your bidding, you cannot fathom why it is you cannot control me!” Her voice cracked on a sob and something inside him cracked with it.
