“Because itishideous.” Grace’s tone was sharp—she had never been one to mince words or spare feelings. “If I did not know you as I do, I would suspect you guilty of all the abominable things that pompous bag of wind accused.”
“You know just as well as I that I only ever kissed Lord Cunningham once,” she felt compelled to defend, hating how one man’s prevarication could follow her for so long. Could ruin her in the eyes of others for a lifetime.
How quick society was to believe a lie as long as it whetted their collective appetite for a good scandal.
“Of course I know that, dearest,” Grace reassured her, patting her arm in a rare show of consolation. “But perhaps Lord Hertford does not.”
Though her sister’s tone was gentle, the implication was clear.
All the warmth burning through her went cold. “You mean to suggest the earl believes the scurrilous rumors Cunningham spread about me?”
Grace’s countenance softened with undeniable sympathy. “He has kissed you twice in two days. He has also managed to get you into this room so he could ravish you. Perhaps you ought not to be worried about our sisters, Eugie. Mayhap you should be concerned for yourself.”
Dear Lord.Why had she not seen it for herself? Why had she not realized sooner?I should not wish to cause further damage to your reputation, he had said in the garden. Which meant not only did the Earl of Hertford know about the gossip surrounding her, he was only kissing her because he believed she would allow him liberties.
He thought she was a trollop.
And she had certainly behaved as one.
“Oh, Grace,” she whispered, dread settling over her shoulders like a mantle. “What shall I do?”
“If I were you, I would punch him in the eye,” Grace drawled. “But you are too softhearted for violence.”
“I think I shall settle for a sound harangue instead.”
“Wise choice.” Her sister gave her a quelling look. “But no more splinters, real or imagined, or I will be forced to tell Dev after all.”
“No more kisses with the earl,” she promised Grace.
Why did the thought fill her with disappointment?
What had hebeen thinking?
Cam stalked from the writing room, castigating himself with each step that took him farther away from his folly. He needed to find a brandy. Or claret. Or anything.
No, he did not. He needed a head-clearing walk in the frigid December air.
He made his way toward the gardens, surprised when Aylesford ambled into view around a bend in the hall, looking as if he had just woken up although it was the midst of the afternoon. Now that he thought upon it, he had not seen his friend at breakfast this morning.
“Aylesford,” he greeted him grimly, offering nothing more than a curt smile that was more grimace.
He had every intention of continuing on, moving past the dissolute viscount so he could make sense of his own stupidity.
But Aylesford was otherwise inclined. “Just the man I was looking for this morning.”
“It is well past noon,” he offered acidly, “and I am not in the mood for a dialogue at the moment.”
“Damn me, I slept longer than I had supposed,” Aylesford grumbled, passing a hand along his jaw, which was neatly shaven. “Why did Carruthers not tell me it was afternoon? You have not seen my sister or my mother, have you?”
“I have not seen Her Grace or Lady Lydia,” he said, thinking the duchess would not be impressed by the viscount’s bleary-eyed state. “You had a late night, I take it? One of the matrons or bored wives present warmed your bed all evening, I gather.”
“Yes.” Aylesford coughed, the blades of his cheekbones darkening. “Something rather like that.”
Despite his own state of distraction, Cam noted the lack of sincerity in his friend’s tone. Along with the way he suddenly averted his gaze. “Never say it was your feigned betrothed who kept you awake.”
Miss Grace Winter seemed a cool sort from his few interactions with her and the dialogue he had overheard in the library, but perhaps there was another side to her. Leave it to a rakehell like Aylesford to draw it forth.
The color in the viscount’s cheeks deepened. “Lower your tone, man, lest someone hear you. No one knows she is my betrothed just yet.”
