“You cannot possibly think that I inventedeverythingI told you.”
“That’s why I’m here,” he said evenly. “To find out precisely how much you lied.”
“I only lied about my name and my previous experience as a governess.”
“Forgive me for saying so, but once someone has lied to me about one thing, everything else they’ve told me comes into question. Certainly you understand that my trust in you has been damaged.”
Those words wounded her more deeply than she wanted to let on. She blinked rapidly and tried to control her expression. Still, those watchful brown eyes of his saw what she tried to hide.
His expression softened along with his voice. “I don’t mean to hurt you by saying so, but if our situations were reversed, wouldn’t you be curious? Wouldn’t you want to know what was real and what was false?”
“But how am I to prove anything, if you won’t believe me?” Lily held her hand to the side as if to show she wasn’t hiding anything.
“I would like your word that you won’t lie to me, moving forward. If you give me your solemn vow only to tell me the truth, then I’ll believe you.”
Lily hesitated. It was a dangerous request, but a fair one. Didn’t she owe him that much, when he’d already assured her he wasn’t going to expose her lies or harm her sisters’ chances?
Yet a promise to only speak the truth wasn’t a small request. Not when he could very well ask heranything.
She braced herself and said, “Very well. You have my word. What do you want to know?”
Bradford frowned down at her; she studied his expression.
He finally said, “Do you really think that Daniel Defoe is the superior author over Jonathan Swift?”
She couldn’t help it; she barked a laugh. “Of all the questions, that is your first?”
He arched an eyebrow in challenge.
She shook her head. “None of the opinions I told you were false, including that of revival-age authors. I never could have kept everything straight if I’d made it all up—I’m not that good of a liar.”
“Forgive me if I disagree; you certainly had me fooled,” he said, not unkindly. He turned and they continued their slow walk down the path. “ThenMy Dearest Matildatruly is your favorite play?”
“It is.”
He grimaced. “I confess I’d rather hoped your poor taste in theater was part of your disguise.”
Lily huffed an incredulous laugh. “Pardon?”
“It’s sad you were being honest aboutthatopinion. It does little to help me trust you.” Perhaps his words might have injured her had they not been delivered in a teasing tone with a sparkle in his eye.
She shook her head and did her best not to reward his antics with a smile. “I’m not convinced you’ve actually ever seen the play with how you carry on.”
“I only wish that were the case. As it stands, I’ll have the memory of that poor sap crying ‘Matilda, my dearest dead Matilda!’ until the day I die.”
Lily laughed at his simpering rendition, even though he was mocking one of her favorite parts. “Or perhaps Northumberland theater is just far worse than that which we have in London.”
“Don’t blame it on Northumberland. I daresay the cast did the best possible job they could with the dreadful material they had to work with.”
“In any case, the play is so out of mode neither of us will ever have the chance to see it again. It’s best to let the subject lie—I shall keep my happy memories and you can keep your faulty remembrance of the event.”
“On the contrary. I find I must know if your poor taste was a folly of youth or a permanently embedded flaw in your character.”
Lily grinned at his purposefully pompous tone. If only Bradford had been this lively back when they shared a roof, all those dinners would have been far more enjoyable.
“It’s a matter of taste, which has nothing at all to do with character,” she said. “One cannot judge another too harshly for their preferences in such a trivial matter. It would be like judging someone’s morality based upon what kind of scones they prefer.”
“Lemon and poppyseed, as I well know. A virtuous choice, indeed.”
