“We’ve spoken,” she tossed over her shoulder without breaking stride. “We’re speaking now.”
“You’re being childish.”
She let her forward-marching feet be her answer.
Discontent tipped over into bloody irritation. “Do we need to talk about it?”
He detected a hiccough in her step, even as she asked, “Talk about what?”
“The night,” he said. “Or shall I explain in minute detail which night?”
She whirled around, eyes brimming with fear and fire in equal parts. “Don’t you dare.”
He had her—and it felt good to provoke her into genuine emotion beyond studied indifference. “Then I suggest you start talking about something else.”
Gray eyes sparked with annoyance. At last, she said, “How did you acquire Primrose Park?” She began striding through the woods again, him at her back. “The same way you acquired Little Wicked? In a card game?”
Again, irritation snapped through him. “I’m not an actual scoundrel, you know,” he fired back. “Everything I’ve acquired has been done so honestly.” Well… “More or less.”
She shot him a sheepish glance over her shoulder. “That was rather low of me. I apologize.”
He nodded his acceptance, even if he didn’t quite believe her. “Primrose Park was unentailed, and the lord who owned it deeply in debt.”
“A common enough story.”
“Indeed.”
“You’re good at it, you know.”
“Good at what?” He was good at many things—a few of them she’d experienced intimately.
“At playing the aristocrat.”
He snorted.
“Better than most aristocrats.”
“All it takes is a mountain of money and a willingness to spend it on expensive things, like racehorses and country estates.”
A laugh drifted over her shoulder. “That reminds me. I suppose I must thank you.”
“Beatrix,” he said. “May I walk beside you?”
Her hesitation was borne out by the dozen or so yards that passed beneath their feet. “If you must.”
A few strides later, he was by her side. “Now, you may thank me.”
Her mouth twitched, but she managed to hold a smile in check. “I must thank you for sending your parents on holiday.”
“Oh? I was under the impression you liked them.”
“I do,” she said. “Very much, in fact, but I don’t relish the idea of playing pretend as your fiancée beneath their observant eyes.”
Playing pretend.
He didn’t know why the phrase rubbed him the wrong way, except it did.
A thought for another time, perhaps.
