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Chapter 12
Richard Lewis, Viscount Gage, was livid with anger and barely holding on to his temper, so much so that Sam thought he was going to burst.
“I can’t leave you alone for one damn second! What were you thinking?” He stalked the length of the drawing room like a caged beast.
After being caught with John by Lady Montbrook, Sam was quickly bundled up in a carriage and Isabel took her home. Gage had still been dealing with St. Clare at the time and didn’t know what had happened. What a surprise it was to him when the whole ballroom was abuzz with a second scandal on the same night. A scandal featuring his dear sister.
“Haven’t we hammered into your head the importance of propriety and not stepping out anywhere alone with a gentleman?”
“Richard, that’s enough. Can’t you see she’s upset?” Isabel sat next to a defeated Sam, holding her hand.
“Oh, she is upset, is she? Well, she should have thought before acting so foolishly!” Richard let out a growl. “I’m going to kill Ashbury!”
“No!” Sam lifted her eyes to her brother’s for the first time that night. “Please don’t do anything to him.”
“What the devil are you talking about, sister? He’s ruined you! If I don’t restore your honor, how will I be able to look upon my face in the looking glass?”
“My honor?”
“You are not talking of a duel, are you?” Isabel asked. “Not after spending half the night talking Stanhope out of it.”
“Stanhope?” Sam turned to look at her sister.
“St. Clare’s other paramour.” Isabel grimaced.
“The woman who was fighting with Lady Wakefield was Stanhope’s wife?”
Isabel nodded. Sam was shocked, but Isabel seemed unperturbed. Of course, she’d witnessed the whole event and had had plenty of time to compose herself. Still, having the wife of her ex-fiancé make a spectacle of herself over another man must have provoked some emotion out of her. Sam decided she’d ask her later. After Gage was done scolding her.
“It is different,” Gage said irritably. “Those women know what they are getting themselves into when they agree to a tryst with St. Clare. You were tricked!”
“I wasn’t tricked,” Sam protested.
“He seduced you, there’s no other explanation.”
“Richard!” Sam let out an exhausted sigh. She knew he was trying to protect her, or perhaps cast Ashbury as a villain, but his logic was faulty at best.
Isabel put a staying hand on Sam’s arm. “Promise me, Richard, you won’t do anything rash. Not when you’re in a temper.”
“I am not in a temper!” he yelled.
Isabel raised her brow.
“Fine! I shan’t do anything rash. But don’t you think I am letting Ashbury get away with this. He’s either going to marry you or die.”
Sam’s jaw went slack.
“Besides, I don’t think the duchess is going to marry him after that,” he added quietly.
Sam lowered her gaze, her stomach tied in a knot. She felt like she was going to cast up her accounts. How could she have done this to Evie? Tears started falling from her eyes and onto her skirts.
“It’s all Adam and Ben’s fault,” Gage muttered under his breath. “I’ve tried to discipline you the best I could, but they spoiled you and allowed you everything you wanted. They still took you out to the lake with them, taught you to swim, and even climb the trees!”
“What does this have to do—”
“Don’t interrupt me!”
Sam and Isabel exchanged amused looks. Gage always tended to go off-topic with his tirades.
