“He had it tucked into his journal, and when he showed me…” She shook her head and rubbed her chest a little frantically.
If he were another man and she another woman, he would have stilled her hand by clasping it in his own.
Hell, he would have taken her into his arms.
But he was who he was, and he had a faint sense that if he made one move toward her to acknowledge the slipping of her mask, she’d retaliate. Violently.
“What did your mother write?” he asked gently.
“That she was ill, and she was afraid she wouldn’t survive much longer. She wanted to ensure that her family was taken care of, and she had a vision of her daughter having a place beside him and his family one day.”
She took a small sip of her drink. “It was haunting, seeing those words in her handwriting. To be honest, I was stunned.”
He would have been. “She’d never spoken of such a thing before, to you?”
“Never. Her departure from us was…abrupt. When I said nothing in reaction to the letter, your father took my hand. He said he’d watched me with his family over the years and he knew my mother was right.”
She drew a breath. “‘Promise me, lass,’ he said. ‘Promise me you’ll honor our wishes.Marry my son.’”
Ian knew that part was true because he and Mrs. Turner were in the hall, approaching his father’s room. They’d heard his father’s request, and Diana’s soft reply of acceptance.
He’d been so angry about the impending loss of his father. And his own dreams. There was so little in his control, he’d seized on the pledge he’d made to defend the emeralds and protect his family and he’d made it his calling. His father hadn’t minced words about what would happen if he failed. Ian knew the man wouldn’t have wanted Diana mixed up in any of it.
And he'd swindled her into believing that the promise she made was about Jared, because he’d convinced himself it was.
“I couldn’t refuse your father,” Diana said. “I was reeling from hearing my mother’s wish, from beyond the grave. With all of that spinning through my head, I wasn’t thinking clearly when you walked me home that night. If I had, I would have noticed the men in the shadows.”
“I should have seen them. And I don’t regret what either of us did to defend ourselves.”
“Neither do I. But I am sorry about the way we parted, and what happened after.”
Diana took a step closer. A faint flush rose over her cheeks.
“I never intended to marry Jared. I planned to call off the engagement, but when someone leaked it to the papers, a miraculous thing happened. Men stopped hunting me.” She gave a short laugh. “It was the first taste of freedom I had since my debut, and it was glorious.”
He couldn’t find relief in her confession because her proximity and the whisky were making his blood heat.
“My father might have been happier than me.” She laughed again, this time with affection, as she brushed her eyes. “He wanted Jared nowhere near Rives Shipping. It was his idea to keep up the charade of the engagement until I was ready to call it off. The ruse gave me the chance to learn his business. It allowed me to step in when his own health began to falter.”
She’d had years with her father, which Ian envied. “Still, after he died, you had the entire mourning period to end the engagement. There was no need for such a dramatic exit from your betrothal.”
Her small sigh carried an edge of exasperation. “I’m not as Machiavellian as you think. I expected Jared to overindulge the night before the wedding, and I’d planned to confront him about Polly this morning. But he went missing, and I needed to know what happened. You did too.”
He didn’t want to believe her explanation. It made it too easy for him to surrender to his desires, and he couldn’t betray his duty to his father.
“Where do we go from here?” he asked.
“I need some time to think through what happens next. Away from London,” she replied. “Will you help me with the final stage of my escape?”
She sounded tentative.
He hated that their constant jockeying with each other made her believe he’d willfully refuse her anything. “Tell me where you wish to go, and I shall escort you safely there.”
The smile she rewarded him with was so bright and so quick, it momentarily blinded him. “I must visit my man of business at the shipping office.”
“I’ll have Hepburn hail a cab on the high street, while you gather your things.”
Hepburn also produced an overcoat and hat for Diana. As she pulled the coat around her, she squirmed. “I must have missed a button.”
