“Is there a reason you are upset?” Bea asked.
“Or is there perhaps a gentleman in particular who has upset you?” Eugie prodded.
Her heart was broken. She had fallen in love with a man who would never love her back. She had engaged in acts with him that were too wicked to speak aloud. And then she had told him she could not bear to continue with their feigned betrothal, and he had not even bothered to stay her with a protest.
Likely, he had already found another feigned betrothed in the hours since she had last seen him. The arrogant, handsome devil would have no trouble, she was sure, finding her replacement.
Most hurtful of all was the realization that everything they had shared had been commonplace to him. No more special than a breath or a step he took. While for her, their every kiss, touch, interaction had beeneverything.
“Grace?” Pru asked, her tone gentling. “Are you well?”
She inhaled, trying to calm herself. Trying to stave off the rising tide of misery. But the hurt was too great. It was devastating. The grief threatened to consume her.
“I,” she began, only to falter as a sob stole the rest of her words.
Tears were running down her cheeks before she could stifle them.
At once, her sisters gathered around her, taking her in an embrace from all sides until she was in the middle, and their arms were banded in an unbreakable circle around her.
“Tell us, Grace,” said Bea.
“If Aylesford hurt you, I will break his arm,” Eugie vowed.
“I will punch him in the eye,” Christabella offered. “He will not look nearly so pretty with a bruise.”
“If he hurt you,wewill hurthim,” said Pru calmly. “You must tell us, Grace. What has you so upset?”
“I am in love with him,” she managed to admit, in spite of the sobs clogging her throat and in spite of her own embarrassment. “I am in love with a man who does not want to marry me, who is a rakish thief of hearts and books, who only wanted to pretend to be betrothed so he could gain an estate in Scotland. I am in love with a man who shall never love me back. Dear God, I am the greatest fool who ever lived.”
“Certainly not the greatest fool, darling,” said Pru, patting her back. “That title has been reserved for another far more deserving soul. Come, let us go for a walk, shall we?”
“A walk?” She frowned at her sisters. “Looking as I do? I cannot bear it.”
“You can and you shall,” Christabella told her softly. “Trust us, Grace.”
“You shan’t be sorry,” Bea added.
“You are in love with Lord Aylesford?” Eugie probed. “Truly?”
“Truly,” she said, her misery complete. “I know how foolish and ludicrous it sounds. That is why I have been hiding in my chamber. I have ended our feigned betrothal. I have yet to muster up the daring to tell Dev, because he caught us alone in the gardens the other night…”
“Come with us, if you please, Grace,” Pru insisted. “We have just the thing to lighten your mood.”
It was devilishlyclose to dinner by the time Rand had procured each of the necessary items the sisters had assured him would please Grace. The scratches on his cheek were still smarting. The cursed fat cat he had wrangled from the stables was stalking somewhere about the salon—likely lurking beneath a settee, plotting her next attack.
The pear tartlets were arranged nicely on a china plate. He also had, at the ready, a set of watercolors he had easily coaxed his sister into forfeiting—Lyd preferred science to art, always. He had managed to thieve some hibiscus blossoms from the orangery. And, he had written her a poem.
The poem was abysmal.
The angry, fat cat was old and disagreeable.
The pear tartlets were remnants from dinner the night before.
The watercolors had been used.
But he had done his best to acquire all the items the Winter sisters had assured him would please Grace and aid in his attempts to woo her. He had never even courted a lady since Georgina. There had been no need. And now that he wanted to do things the right way, the proper way, he found himself unaccountably nervous.
What if the sisters would not fetch Grace as they had promised they would?
