“Then it seems you are to marry one, too.”
His eyes glimmered with mirth. “Are you saying that you are agreeable?”
“As you said, we have no choice.”
He grunted at what could have been taken as an insult, his smile fading. “I suppose I walked into that one,” he muttered, hoping for a response that might have fed his ego a little. “I was asking if there is anything about me that would make you even mildly agreeable to this marriage. My titles, mayhap? My wealth? My devilishly good looks?”
Elle fought off a grin and averted her gaze. “I think none of those would turn my head,” she said. “You are a Saesneg.”
“And if I were a Welshman?”
He caught her attention with that question, and she thought about it. If Curtis de Lohr had been a Welshman, she might verywell find him quite attractive. She wasn’t one to fawn over men in any case, but with him…
She might make an exception.
“If you were a Welshman,” she said, refusing to look at him, “I might find you… adequate.”
He burst into laughter, a great, booming sound that was almost instantly infectious. “Adequate, am I?” he said. “I’ll have you know I am the most handsome out of all of my brothers. I am the beauty of the family.”
“Then it must be an average family.”
He couldn’t stop laughing. He could see that she was smiling and trying very hard not to, which told him that she wasn’t serious. She was poking holes in his pride. It was at that moment he realized she had his interest, because any woman who wouldn’t feed him flattery was a woman of integrity, indeed.
Without question.
“I’ll pit my average brothers against average Welshmen any day,” he said, wiping his eyes of the hilarious tears. “But if you think me adequate, I will accept that. It is better than being inadequate, or worse.”
She was still biting her lip. “If you did not want to know my opinion, then you should not have asked.”
His eyes were still warm with humor. “I think that I shall always want to know your opinion because I suspect you will never lie to me,” he said. “Even if I do not want to hear the truth.”
Elle looked at him then. “Honesty is all I know,” she said. “I am a very bad liar. But I can be… without tact sometimes.”
“I hardly noticed.”
He was being sarcastic, and her grin broke through. “Since you asked me if I found anything agreeable in you, I shall ask you the same. Surely there cannot be anything agreeable about me that you’ve found.”
A smile played on his lips. “There is, as a matter of fact.”
“What is it?”
He was prevented from answering when Westley appeared in the tent opening. “Curtis,” the young man said, breathless from having run. “Papa wishes to see you now.”
Curtis looked at him. “Why?”
“I do not know,” Westley said. “He only told me to fetch you.”
Curtis nodded with resignation. “Very well,” he said. “Where is Lady Melusine, by the way?”
“I gave her over to Amaro.”
Curtis gave him a long look. “Nay,” he said quietly. “Go and find her. Give her over to Hugo or someone else, but not to Amaro.”
Westley looked stricken. “It was wrong?”
“It was wrong.”
Horrified that he’d done something his brother did not approve of, Westley took off running. Elle, who had heard the conversation, approached Curtis in concern.
