It was an attack, and Charlotte regretted it immediately. The trick to confronting an angry man was to remain calm. The calmer the better, with perhaps a concerned furrow of the brow thrown in, as if one was trying very hard to be helpful. Charlotte had flummoxed any number of lords, leaders of industry, politicians, and even members of the royal family in just this way, but with Warrick she lost all finesse.
“I’m not your brother,” said Warrick. “I’ve no obligation to lecture you, but I do have an obligation to say—”
“You’ve no obligations whatsoever.” Charlotte crossed her arms and huffed away a powdered curl that had worked loose and fallen in front of her eye. “I deeply regret any inconvenience Julian caused by involving you in my affairs, and I release you entirely.”
“Ramsay caused me no inconvenience. He’s your brother, and it’s only fitting that he should see to your care.”
“Oh?” A thought occurred to Charlotte, and much to her horror, her eyes went hot. “Don’t tell me you’re planning to stand in my own drawing room with that awful look on your face and tell me you think me ruined.”
“No! Christ, I wouldn’t.”
In the pale morning light, his inky blue gaze was filled with a bewildering mix of anger, irritation, and—Charlotte swallowed because her throat felt suddenly tight. Oh God, was that sympathy?
Warrick stepped closer. “Any look you see on my face is fury that I could not squash Dumbarton like the bug he is, for fear of greater scandal. Do you see my dilemma? I was a soldier, you remember. My first thought when I see a problem is how much gunpowder I will need.”
Oh.
Heat rushed through Charlotte.
Oh!
“I see.” Her eyebrows came together. “No, I don’t see a thing. I’ve never understood! Are you quite—”
“I brought you here to apologize, Lady Charlotte. I promised your brother to protect you and I failed. I will not fail you again.”
Warrick bowed low over her hand and turned on his heel, leaving Charlotte to stare at his broad back as he strode out of the room.
CHAPTER 6
Charlotte managed to get afew scant hours of sleep, but all too soon it was time to wake up, take three deep breaths, and jump out of bed to select her armor for the day. What to wear when the world was falling apart? Head-to-toe black suited her mood, but it seemed a bit much even for her. Besides, everyone would think she was in mourning for her reputation, and that she couldn’t allow. The previous night had been thick with shame, but it belonged to Major Dumbarton.Shewasn’t about to pick it up and carry it.
So Charlotte reached for a morning gown delivered only yesterday from Josephine’s, sewn from airy cotton in pale peach, with a slim skirt and row after row of creamy flounces at the hem, which made her look as if she were strolling on top of a cloud.
I Don’t Give a Damn in dress form—thatfelt right.
Charlotte dashed downstairs, intending to be first in the morning room, but her grandmother, the Dowager Countess Lady Alice, was already there and halfway through a pot of chocolate.
“There you are, darling!” Gran lifted piercing blue eyes to her granddaughter. “Levy tells me there was trouble last night?”
Charlotte kissed her grandmother on the cheek, called for a pot of coffee, and plopped into her chair, pouring the whole story onto the table.
“And you broke the rotter’s toe? Well done,” said Gran, when she’d heard everything. “His father, Colonel Dumbarton, was just the same in my day, and I wish I’d done him an injury. Still, it’s going to be a dreadful scandal.”
“I’ll simply have to brazen it out. The sticklers will amuse themselves by snubbing me, I’ll amuse myself by how magnificently I won’t care, and both sides will be perfectly happy. It’s Mother’s debt that concerns me.”
The dowager stared. “Darling, I think you have it backward. Your mother’s more than capable of—”
“She’s not capable of finding fifteen thousand pounds! I know how little you care for her, but—”
Gran tossed her napkin on the table. “I certainlydocare for Margot. She’s my daughter-in-law and your mother, and, of course, I—”
“Then you see why we can’t abandon her.”
Lady Alice went quiet. She held herself straight as a pin, but her hair was snow-white and her skin thin as parchment, and Charlotte was conscious that her grandmother ought to be off pottering in her orangerie instead of having worries piled high on her breakfast plate. Especially Lady Margot–shaped worries, which were notoriously intractable.
Was it Lady Margot’s awful marriage that had left her prone to moods, flinging from high to low, or had she always been that way? Charlotte wasn’t sure. She’d been so little when her father died that she didn’t remember, and then there were the years spent veering back and forth between her mother’s household and Gran’s. All she knew was that her mother was more difficult all the time, pushing everyone else away even as she clung harder to her daughter.
Still, Charlotte loved her mother, even if that love felt heavy sometimes.
