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“What can I expect from tonight?” she asks. “A load of posh people boasting about how amazing their life is?”
I chuckle. “Pretty much.”
I dash around the car quickly enough to ensure I can hold the door open for her. She may think chivalry is dead, but I want to prove her wrong.
“Do you often take a date to these things?” she asks as we pull away.
“Actually,” I admit, “you’re the first woman I’ve introduced to my family.”
She keeps her mouth shut. Maybe she sees that as a red flag. I wouldn’t blame her. We drive through the tight country lanes, and Rose keeps changing the radio, hopping from station to station.
“You’ve got nothing to be nervous about,” I reassure her. “I’ll be with you all night. We can just pretend that no one else is around.”
She smiles, but it doesn’t meet her eyes.
“We can turn around?” I offer. “We don’t have to go.”
“No,” she says quickly. “I want to.”
If we didn’t, my mum would think I made her up. It wouldn’t be the first time I fabricated a girlfriend to stop her from playing matchmaker. Introducing her to them is a big deal, but I can’t show my nerves to Rose. My family is hard to please. Scratch that, impossible to please. They’ll act polite on the surface, but bringing in a “commoner” won’t go down well.
The Collingsbrook’s country manor is situated among rolling hills over many acres. Over the summer, they open the grounds for exorbitantly priced public tours. There’s a grand waterfall, a hedge maze, and a stunning rose garden, but the effect is different on a bleak February evening. The foreboding gothic manor has ivy creeping up its crumbling walls, suffocating the old bricks and walls steeped in dark history.
We join a queue of cars at the gate, waiting for security to let us in. They have an entire team patrolling the perimeter because of the high-profile guests attending. Freddie worried about Rose being unsafe here, but I don’t know anywhere else she would be safer.
We reach the front, and a security guard shines a torch on my face. “Name?”
“Sebastian Montgomery,” I reply. “And Rose Hathaway.”
“We have to do a check of your plus one,” the man says gruffly. “Can you get out of the car, Miss?”
They waved everyone else straight through. This will be my mother’s doing, trying to make Rose feel like she doesn’t belong before she arrives. Rose tenses, and I place a reassuring hand over her knee. She’s not moving.
I wanted to give her a magical evening, not a strip search by a sixty-year-old guy who would use the opportunity to cop a feel. What does he think she’s hiding under her skirt? A bomb?
“That won’t be necessary,” I command. “If you have a problem, take it up with Margaret Montgomery.”
I wind up the window and speed forward. He doesn’t object or try to stop me. My expression was warning enough.
Rose gapes at the sheer size of the manor as we approach. “This place is…”
“A bastard to keep warm?” I joke.
Rose snorts and puts her mask on. It’s black with silver stitching around the edges and matches her dress perfectly. The gravel crunches under the wheels as we come to a stop. I fasten my mask—it’s simple, all black to match my tux with no frills.
I turn to Rose. “Are you ready?”
She nods.
I get out first and hold open her door. For once, she doesn’t object. I pass my car keys to a waiting staff member who will park it for us. Rose grabs her bag and takes my hand with the other. She’s wearing white satin gloves that come up to her elbows. Ugly sandstone gargoyles peer down at us from above as we walk into the courtyard. An illuminated fountain is positioned in front of the entrance, where people are circling.
I slide my fingers between hers and squeeze.
Let the games begin…
CHAPTER39
IVY
