Page 19 of The Viscount and the Vicar’s Daughter

Her fingers curled around it. “Why must you be this way?”

St. Ashton made no pretense of misunderstanding her question. “A fatal flaw in my character.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“Don’t you? After I’ve tormented you and bullied you and made you cry?”

She flashed him a reproving glance. “You have not succeeded in making me cry, sir.”

His mouth lifted briefly in a solemn smile. “I’m glad of it.”

Valentine looked at him again. “What is wrong with you? Is it… Is it something to do with your father?”

After another long pause, during which it seemed he wouldn’t answer her, he motioned to an ornate iron bench near the window. She hesitated a moment before moving to sit down. St. Ashton followed, seating himself very close beside her.

“I’ve been cut off,” he told her. “Cut off and exiled to Northumberland. I have a property there. It’s isolated. Remote. I’m to live there. I daresay my father hopes I might die there.”

“That can’t be true.”

“You think not? I’ve been a disappointment to him. I haven’t measured up to the Sinclair standard. Indeed, according to my father, I’ve squandered everything that’s ever been given me, including my good name. He hasn’t got the facts entirely accurate. Not that that’s ever been a barrier to his casting me as a black-hearted villain. But even if only half of what he believes were true… I won’t deceive you, Miss March. I’ve made the devil of a mess of my life.”

Valentine considered this. “The drinking and the…?”

“The gambling. The brawling. The women. Not but that I haven’t given it all up these past years. God’s truth, I’ve been living like a monk. I haven’t been gaming. And I certainly haven’t been brawling. I rarely even visit my club anymore. And do you know how long it’s been since I’ve had a woman? Ah, but we mustn’t discuss that topic, I see. I believe I’ve made you blush.”

“I believe you were trying to make me blush,” she said with a touch of asperity.

“You blush very prettily.”

“What does that say to anything?”

“You need more color in your cheeks. You were too pale at dinner. Indeed, there was a moment or two I feared you’d been turned into a marble statue.” He paused. “What was my father saying to you?”

Valentine flinched. “Nothing.”

“Ah. Now you intrigue me. He was clearly not saying nothing.” St. Ashton turned in his seat. “Was it about me? Was he warning you?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Was he telling you that you must stay away from me?”

There was a peculiar edge to his voice. It was all of a piece with his strange demeanor this evening. Was it the drink? A reaction to the altercation with his father? She had no way of knowing for certain, but Valentine sensed that beneath St. Ashton’s veneer of mocking, dry humor lay anger and bitterness and bone deep hurt. She felt a flicker of pity for him. “What an absurd idea, my lord. He didn’t mention you at all.”

St. Ashton raised his brows. “Not even once?”

“No, sir.”

“Then what in the hell was he saying to you?”

Valentine’s lips thinned into a disapproving little line. “Is it a sport for you, my lord?”

“Is what a sport?”

“To repeatedly put me out of countenance? I confess that I don’t find it amusing. And if you persist, then I shall take my leave of you—”

He caught her arm. “Forgive me. It’s not sport. If it were, trust that I wouldn’t speak to you so plainly. Nor so inelegantly. That I do so is only… Good God, Miss March, can’t you see that if I act the brute around you it’s only the unhappy result of your putting me out of countenance.”

She looked up at him, bewildered. “I?”