Page 36 of The Gentleman’s Leading Lady

He kept his voice indifferent on purpose. If he did reveal the slightest interest in Cerys, Bathsheba would pounce and shred her. She would not tolerate a rival, even an imagined one. Even if she didn’t want Dante for herself.

Cerys was using him too, he reminded himself. Her little whimsy about protecting him from Bathsheba was a bargain because she wanted to put him in her debt. He was a stepping stone for both women, and he would be wise to remember that.

“Really, Dante. Do be sensible. For as long as I’ve known you, your one longing in life was to be recognized as a gentleman.”

Dante concentrated on the cornice for his loggia. Vaguely pointed arches, Moorish style, to offset the austere symmetry of the classical design. Bathsheba was only partially right. His longing in life was to establish himself in a career, provide for his family better than his father had, and attain the status of gentleman. The third made the other two possible, a means to a larger end.

He paused his crayon. Was that true, or was that simply what he had told himself, justification for craving admiration and the kind of respect that had never been afforded his father?

Was he, in the end, no better than Bathsheba, trying to advance himself simply so he might position himself above others, and applaud himself for his own worth?

Thompson and Dorsey had joined Cerys now, all four of them regarding the wooden building of the spa as they fell into an animated discussion. Dante burned to be part of that conversation. Clearly they were discussing ideas, designs, something pertinent to this theater he was supposed to be building. But he had isolated himself, standing apart to sketch, and now Bathsheba had him in her clutches.

“She can’t raise you,” Bathsheba said softly. “She can’t help you. Look at her…she’s barely civilized. She mimics well, I’ll give you that, but look who she associates with. She’s not a woman a gentleman could have at his side.”

She paused. “Could you imagine her in the parlor of your home, welcoming your guests? Serving them tea? What would she talk about during calls? Nothing but theater performances and the gossip of her low friends. And at dinner—only imagine how she would entertain your guests. As poorly as her showing last night. She’s a girl who knows nothing of the world, or of people.”

Bathsheba knew of the house he’d longed to build. She’d heard him talk at length about the kind of home he wanted, the layout, the feel. In the last six years he’d made progress toward building the house, the designs he’d imagined coming to life brick by brick and stone by stone, all the elegance and airy ease and comfort he could design. Did Bathsheba know him still? Was he still the same person?

No. No, he was not.

And Cerys’s performance last night had been utterly entrancing, her voice sweet and pure, her pitch perfect. She was the picture of genteel entertainment, seated at the pianoforte in her flowing gown, and Bathsheba had seen it as well as Dante could.

As if she sensed his burning stare, Cerys glanced his way again. He tried to communicate his plea with his eyes. Involve me in your discussion. Deliver me from Bathsheba.

She raised a slender brow, looked from him to Bathsheba, back to him. Smirked.

And turned back to Pearson Thompson, who was determined to engage her attention by any clumsy stratagem possible.

Devil blast it, Dante wanted her attention. All her talk of rescuing him from Bathsheba, and she was just going to leave him with the woman?

Because he’d told her not to meddle. He’d told her he didn’t want the protection of a false alliance.

He’d told her he didn’t want her, and she was honoring his wishes.

The minx.

“Do you ever think about it, Dante?” Bathsheba whispered in his ear.

His crayon veered, leaving a long, dark streak across the paper. Blast it. Paper was expensive; he would simply have to work around the smudge. “Think about what?” he asked through gritted teeth.

“Us, of course.”

He let a pause elapse, cruel, cold. “No. Hardly ever. Never,” he corrected himself.

“A shame.” She leaned close. Her curves had deepened since he’d known her, growing from lush abundance to a sign of self-satisfaction. “I have tried to put you from my mind. Tried to be happy in my marriage. But I find I have not succeeded.”

“How strange,” Dante said. “I thought you put me from your mind quite easily the moment Baeccon started paying you his addresses.”

“Oh, my dear man.” She chuckled. “If you think you are easy for a woman to forget, you severely underestimate yourself.”

Against his will, the crayon paused in midair.

How many times had he imagined this? Bathsheba returning to him, repentant, sorrowful. Swearing she had loved him only and regretting that she had chosen ambition over love. Vowing to him that she could not rest with the knowledge of what she had done to his heart. Eager to make things right.

He’d imagined a dozen different endings to the scenario, too. Him cruel and hard-hearted, showing her what she had made of him. Others that ended with her back in his bed.

Brazenly, she trailed a finger over his upper arm. The wool was thick and barely registered the pressure of her hand.