Page 57 of The Lady’s Sweet Revenge

He stalked to the plate that had been served the moment he walked into the room and snatched up the bacon before whipping out of the room toward the beach.

Belle whined at the top of the steps and looked back toward the house.

“Aye, lass. I will miss her this morning as well.” He tucked his hat firmly on his head before descending. His dog—likely torn between duties to him and Harlow—paused twice on the way down. Both times looking back as if expecting Harlow to be there. He knew she wasn’t because both times Belle stopped to look, he did as well.

“Come!” he ordered and the dog followed along. On the beach, all duty was forgotten as the dog darted up the beach sniffing around each boulder. She stopped and barked incessantly.

“Please don’t let it be another woman. I’m up to my ears in them already,” he muttered more to himself as he hurried to catch up with the dog who had cornered a small crab that seemed set on defending itself and its place on the beach.

“Leave it,” Reese said, and then repeated when the dog hesitated and barked at the poor crustacean snapping its claws at Belle. Eventually Belle gave up to run away again, finding another creature to explore. Each time Reese called her away before she did something regrettable.

He and the dog were both soaked to the bone when they returned to the castle. Mrs. Garrison saw to sending Belle out to the stables until she was dried while Rupert had a warm bath and dry clothes waiting for him.

“Where is Lady Harlow?” he asked his valet as he slid into the warm water.

“Shall I ask Finch?”

“Aye.” Reese hoped she was in a room of the house without his mother so he might go speak with her, but when the valet returned with a wince, Reese knew it wasn’t to be.

“The ladies are set up in the drawing room with their needlepoint, my lord.”

He’d not join them there.

As he took his seat in his study to focus on his ledgers, he considered the situation and thought perhaps it was better this way. His mother would force him to keep his distance from both ladies, and it would give him time alone to think about something other than Harlow. But an hour later he realized he hadn’t done much besides think of her.

*

After spending every minute of the day with Lady Breckenridge, Harlow had been looking forward to seeing Reese at dinner that evening. When the meal was served before he arrived, she realized he was still hiding.

What she wasn’t sure of was if the man was avoiding her or his mother.

Perhaps he regretted what they’d done together the night before and was using his mother as an excuse to evade Harlow and any messiness he perceived between them.

Or, he really was that put out with his mother’s meddling. Harlow wished she could tell the woman that her mention of them being a good match did little to help her. In fact, Harlow wondered if the man wouldn’t be all the more obstinate about marriage after his mother pointed out how well they suited.

Perhaps Harlow should get the woman to protest against a match between them and that might make him want to marry. But again, Harlow didn’t wish for a match in that way. She didn’t want to look back and know that her husband had only chosen her because she’d schemed and tricked him into it.

If she couldn’t have a husband who chose her for herself rather than her fortune, at least she could refrain from deception.

After dinner, Harlow played for the countess and received a nod of approval. Harlow thought that might be the most that could be expected of the woman and tried not to be deterred by the woman’s lack of enthusiasm.

“Does he often take his meals in his room?” the countess asked.

Harlow opened her mouth to assure the woman he didn’t, but then realized how that might sound. While it didn’t prove anything, it heartened Harlow to know that he hadn’t taken to his rooms until after his mother arrived.

It was coincidence that it was the same time they’d spent the night together. Still, Harlow chose to pretend it was the countess rather than her. It made her feel better.

Instead of spending the rest of the evening cozied up on the settee in the library listening to Reese read from the Stonecliff novel, she was trapped in the drawing room with the countess who had taken up her needlepoint again.

Harlow rubbed her sore finger. If she was forced to stitch anything again this evening she might run out in the rainy evening screaming.

There was a saying her father used often when he lectured her and her brothers after they’d done something ill-advised. “Be careful what you wish for.” It would have suited now for instead of needlepoint, the woman had poured them each a glass of madeira and begun recounting all the suitors Harlow had rejected.

Surely she couldn’t remember them all, for Harlow herself did not.

“What fault did you find in Lord Wilder?”

“Lord Wilder?” Harlow attempted to swallow. Despite the wine her throat seemed so dry. She didn’t recall Lord Wilder.