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Three-one thousand.
Four-one thousand.
For as long as he’d known her, five seconds was the longest stretch of silence Minerva would allow. He stared into her pretty hazel eyes. “I should have known better than to involve Kent. I presume it was your brother who has alerted you that I’m about to depart shortly.”
Brow creased, Minerva asked, “Why didn’t you tell me yourself?”
His hands flew out wide. “How was I supposed to do that when you’ve been avoiding me!” He glared down at her.
Her cheeks pinkened, but her gaze remained trained on him. He searched her features, features that he could draw blindfolded. Guilt. She was guilty as a fox. The minx was a master chess player and had outmaneuvered him for the past three months. But here she was. In his bedroom questioning him. He should be the one demanding answers for her behavior, not the other way round.
“I’ve not risked my reputation this eve to enter into an unwanted argument with you,” she said.
“Then please share…why are you here?”
Minerva took a half step closer. “Is it your wish to leave your home? Your friends?”
“You know it’s not.”
“Then why not appease the Head of the Foreign Office and challenge me to a game of chess? After all, it’s highly unlikely that you shall win.”
Minerva’s brazen declaration stabbed him in the chest. It was his own bloody fault for letting her believe a lie. A lie that had been festering under his skin for years. “And what if I did win?”
“You won’t.” Minerva stepped around him and peered out the window, her breath fogging up the glass.
“Minerva?”
She didn’t turn to face him. She was avoiding him, which meant there was a possibility she wasn’t as confident at a victory despite her boastful claims.
One-one thousand.
Two-one thousand.
Three-one thousand.
Four-one thousand.
Five-one thousand.
On cue, Minerva said, “I defeated you soundly once before, and I shall easily trounce you again.”
The woman was hitting a nerve. He had forfeited the damn game. Not that he’d ever let her know that. But if he were to play her again, wanting her, desiring her, he might not have the willpower to let her win once more. And if he were honest, her winning would be the only satisfactory outcome, for he couldn’t marry her.
“You didn’t answer my question,” he said. “What if I were to win?”
“I would agree to you marry you, of course. After all, that is what I declared, remember?”
Oh, he remembered. In a moment of pure panic and jealousy during her debut Season, he had subtly goaded her into making the absurd challenge to marry the man who could best her in a game of chess. At the time, he hadn’t realized how torturous it would be for him to watch her play gentleman after gentleman, willing her to win every match. Nor had he anticipated the toll it would take on Minerva. If he could travel back in time, he would have ignored Kent’s concerns over Minerva’s prospects during her debut Season, and for certain would never have shared with Kent the idiotic idea of a challenge.
Minerva turned around but did not meet his gaze and added, “You need not worry. I have no intention of losing. I have my own plans…for my future, and they do not include wedlock.”
“I heard you intend to journey to America for a spell.”
“My brother really needs to learn to keep family matters a secret, especially since Isadora will be marrying an agent for the Foreign Office.”
“Humor me. Suppose I challenge you and, due to a stroke of good luck, I am able to defeat you. Would you marry me of your own free will, and not because you declared you would to all and sundry?”
Minerva’s hands fisted at her hips. “I professed I’d willingly marry the man who defeated me. What more do you want from me?”
