“You don’t believe yourself to be the only man with blue eyes, surely.”
“Considering my... lack of carrying through on a promise, I’d have thought you’d have avoided them.”
“Have you avoided women with brown eyes?”
At first, he’d drowned himself in them, searching for the adoration, love, and admiration he’d seen in hers. Then he’d begun to eschew them like they carried the plague because they did nothing to diminish the memories of hers that haunted his dreams. “Who is her father, then?”
She shrugged. “Could be the Spanish matador, I suppose. Or the Italian sculptor. The Parisian artist. The German clockmaker.”
With each mention, his jaw had clenched tighter, and he had to force it to relax so he could speak, striving for a neutral tone so she wouldn’t realize her words had any effect on him, were in fact painful blows. “I’d heard the rumors that while you were in Europe you’d sampled as many men as you did the variations in cuisine.” Each tale had been a slice to his heart, and he’d believed with enough of them that he could eliminate his heart completely. Without it perhaps he’d at least find peace.
She gave him a smile, the sort a well-sated woman delivered in bed as her lover rolled off her. Triumphant and knowing. Fully aware, however, that in this case, he’d suffered. Greatly. And she was glad of it. Not that he blamed her. He deserved whatever punishment she meted out. “Why are you here, Knightly?”
“I know, without reservation or any doubt, you’re Anonymous.”
As soon as she’d seen at the Twin Dragons that he had acquired a copy of the tome, she’d known he’d deduce that she was the author. Her only surprise was that it had taken him a few days to arrive on her doorstep. She was also well aware he wouldn’t leave without having his say. Perhaps he’d come to blackmail her, although she couldn’t see him engaging in such a reprehensible act. She straightened her spine and angled her chin haughtily, giving the impression she was looking down on him when he stood several inches taller than she. “What of it?”
“You lied. You have read the book.”
“Actually, I didn’t lie. I’ve not read the book, onlythe manuscript.” Its contents and what she knew of them, yes, those she had lied about. But then he’d lied as well, claiming to love her when he hadn’t.
He laughed loudly, almost joyfully, a sound that had once sung to her soul. When the echo of it faded away, he remained smiling, a touch of affection in his eyes. “Only you would sparse words so carefully.”
Her heart ached with the reminder of how well he’d come to know her, how much they’d shared, how often he’d made her feel treasured. “What do you want, Knightly?”
“Does Chidding know about her?” He jerked his chin toward the doorway.
Other than the servants and her father, no one else yet knew about Arianna. However, only Regina and the ever-faithful Millie knew the lass had actually been born in March, nearly nine months to the day after Regina should have wed. They’d vowed to claim June as the girl’s birth month to eliminate any suspicion that Arianna was Knightly’s. Regina had made the decision as a means to protect her child from possible hurt and to prevent Knightly from learning the truth of her. He didn’t deserve her. In the end, he hadn’t wanted Regina. Why would she think he’d want his daughter?
Slowly she shook her head. “I’ve yet to determine if he can be trusted with the knowledge, how he might react to it. Once bitten, twice shy, or so they say. Will you tell him?”
“What do you think?”
“That I don’t know you. The man I thought youwere wouldn’t have cast me aside on the morning we were to wed. Why exactly did you?”
Turning his back on her, he walked to the fireplace, pressed his forearm against the mantel, and stared into the empty hearth. “To protect you.”
“By breaking my heart?”
He visibly stiffened, then sighed. “It seemed the lesser of two evils.” He faced her. “I assume he also doesn’t know you’re the author of that scandalousmemoir.”
“He does not, nor do I intend to ever tell him. I will deny being the author with my last breath.”
“Then why even write it?”
She’d decided that revenge was not best served cold, but rather hot—with heated words and searing passages designed to torment and tease the curious. With truth, conviction, and knowledge. When she’d submitted the manuscript to a publisher, she hadn’t even cared if all the world knew she was the author, but at the last minute, she’d made the decision to send it in anonymously through her trusted solicitor, who also collected her earnings. Now people debated whether it was truly a memoir or a novel. Surely it was fiction, the result of a wicked imagination. But if it was true, it had to be the product of a woman scorned. She’d been scorned.
“I grew up the object of unkind gossip and speculation. It turned savage when I was jilted. I was raked over the coals, my unworthiness proven when you announced I’d changed my mind.”
“I apologize for that miscalculation, Regina. Ithought it would go easier on you if people thought you’d found fault with me rather than my finding fault with you.”
“What fault did you find?”
“None. I told you that. My reasons had naught to do with you.”
Shaking her head, she scoffed. “It doesn’t matter. However, I wanted you to feel the pain of the bite that was inflicted upon me.” Although she hadn’t expected the tale to be labeled indecent. Granted, the writing might be provocative, might hint at fornication, but she hadn’t described the actual bedding in detail.Thatshe had kept to herself, unable to share the intimacy of it because it had encompassed the whole of her.
“Well, the bite has been sharp, and I can hardly go to my club without hearing the nattering going on behind my back, much less conduct business with the success I once enjoyed when entrepreneurs are presently more interested in discussing if I’m Lord K. The speculation is getting tedious. I want you, as Anonymous, to write a letter to theTimesdeclaring I am not Lord K.”
