“Does it matter?” he asked.
He could not forget the feel of her soft skin beneath his hand. The delicacy of her. The vulnerable femininity. Her eyes were large, their light fierce. Her body was the very paragon of womanhood, curving and sumptuous. Curves that cried out to be touched. Tristan clenched his hands behind his back.
“I thank you for your consideration and for your help. But I think that I must now find a way to prove that I have not been closeted alone with you. To avoid scandal,” Christine said.
She stepped away from him, clasping her hands together, creating a shield against him.
This is my opportunity. To gain my revenge on her damnable brother for his crimes against my family. I will not let it pass by.
“There is only one way to avoid such a scandal. I thought of it the moment I heard your name. If we are believed to have been matched, if we were betrothed, there would be no scandal.”
Christine gaped at him. Then she laughed.
“I came here to try and repair a courtship that had been sabotaged without my knowledge. And now a complete stranger proposes? And one with such a reputation!”
“We are all strangers here, and yet we are expected to pair off. Hundreds of strangers marry in England every day. The aristocracy is practically founded on arranged marriages.”
“But all with more than a few minutes’ notice!” Christine cried, “Why do you wish to offer me this?”
“I wish to find your brother. He did considerable harm to my family.”
“You want to be revenged upon him? I do not know where he is or even if he is still alive.”
“Not revenge, justice. I don’t believe he is dead. Merely hiding. Our being publicly linked might draw him out.”
Christine paced the room, hugging herself tightly.
“I…I don’t know. I can’t just leap into such a decision.”
“Nor would I expect you to. So, take the time you need. We are supposed to be here for a week, are we not?”
She stopped pacing. Looked at him. It was a look that had nothing of vulnerability or weakness. There was a fierceness there that stirred something in Tristan.
“A week then. At the end of the Hunt, I will give you my answer.”
Five
“There you are, my dear. I hope the wardrobe I furnished your room with was suitable?” the Dowager Duchess asked.
“To describe the wardrobe as suitable is to do your generosity a great injustice, Your Grace,” Christine replied.
After being escorted to her room by a servant, Christine had, at first, thought herself in the wrong place. A large oak wardrobe housed a dozen gowns, which rustled and glittered as she ran her hands over their sumptuous fabric. She wore one of them now.
“I am pleased that I remembered your dimensions as well as I did. It was based purely on memory, from my grandson’s wedding to your sister, Selina,” the Dowager Duchess said, casting a critical eye over Christine’s dress. “In fact, if anything, I should say that the gown is slightly on the large side. It could benefit from being taken in, though it was already intended to be something of a slim fit.”
And I cannot tell you how that has come about. The days in which I was denied food or held to a starvation ration for some perceived slight against Lady Gillray.
Christine colored, but the Dowager Duchess was not one for noticing subtleties unless they related to match-making. She had already moved on in the conversation.
“Now then, I understand that Lord Bingley was not the man for you. I do not take such things personally, no, not at all. Though it was here that the two of you were matched, under my roof and by my judgement. Yes, indeed.”
“No reflection on you at all, Your Grace,” Christine assured her.
“On me?” the Dowager Duchess said with surprise, “Well, of course not. The very idea. You came through the games together, the perfect match. If Lady Martha is truthful…well, that is neither here nor there. I have such an event planned for this evening. Come, everyone should be gathered on the lawn by now.”
While Christine had been changing her clothes and cleaning herself up, night had fallen. She was hungry and had quite forgotten the scheduled entertainment to celebrate the beginning of the Duke Hunt. At the same time, she was nervous about potentially running into Lady Martha again, given her apparent enmity towards Christine.
Is Lady Martha truthful? What has she been saying about me?
