“The two of you know each other?” he asked warmly, as if this were an entirely ordinary tête-à-tête.
As if it were a normal occurrence for him to bring a drunken, unwed lady home, declare he was going to marry her, and then leave her to the mercy of his brother’s embittered wife. If Izzy did not know better, she would have suspected she was dreaming this entire ignoble affair.
“We were not previously acquainted,” the countess said with a tone of undisguised distaste, as if she had sampled something disgusting at the table.
At the thought, Izzy’s rebellious stomach gave another lurch.
“You will be seeing each other quite often in the near future,” he said brightly, directing his attention toward Lady Anglesey.
No longer being the focus of his magnetism allowed Izzy to breathe easier. Nothing could have prepared her for the situation in which she had suddenly found herself hopelessly mired.
“I look forward to it, my lord,” the countess said with such a frigid lack of enthusiasm that there was no question as to the lack of veracity in her words.
“Excellent.” His gaze returned to Izzy. “I shall escort you to the waiting carriage, my dear.”
Thank heavens.
She had to get out of this Bedlam. She needed sleep. And to never again drink a drop of champagne.
She inclined her head. “Thank you, my lord. Good day, Lady Anglesey.”
The countess issued a tight-lipped, grudginggood dayin return, and then Izzy took the earl’s proffered arm. They passed a maid who averted her eyes and an openly curious footman.
“Does your brother’s widow live here?” she could not resist asking.
“For the moment,” he said cryptically.
She could not be certain if his response indicated the countess was planning to leave in the future or he was planning to remove her. There was much she needed to learn about the man at her side if she was to become his wife.
Indeed, there was everything to learn.
CHAPTER5
“What the Christ were the two of you thinking?”
If any other man had spoken to him thus, Zachary’s response would have been a swift fist to the nose, followed by the requisite spilling of blood. But since the question had come from his trusted chum, Hudson Stone, the Duke of Wycombe, and since his friend’s query was more than valid, Zachary restrained the impulse.
“I was thinking I would be meeting Letitia for a tryst, if you must know,” he answered honestly. “I did not expect Lady Isolde to join me in the blue salon. Nor did I anticipate anything that happened thereafter.”
He was seated in the drawing room at Wycombe’s town house, a very civilized spread of tea and scones laid before them on elegant porcelain. Lady Isolde was present, still looking rather like she might retch at any moment. Although, to be fair, perhaps it was the prospect of their looming nuptials which had that effect on her.
“Anything that happened thereafter,” the Duchess of Wycombe repeated, her tone suggesting she was quite a bit less than pleased with him. “You are referring to the part of this drama where you spirited my sister from Greymoor’s town house and took her to yours.”
A shame, all that ire directed at him. He and the duchess had been friends until this bloody contretemps.
“Ellie, we have been over this,” Lady Isolde interrupted before he could form a response. “None of what happened is the fault of Lord Anglesey. It is all mine.”
“He kidnapped you from a ball,” the duchess drawled. “Or have you forgotten?”
“She was snoring,” he said in his own defense. “When I tried to wake her, she swatted me as if I were a fly and wished me to the devil. I had to remove her from the situation somehow.”
This, also, was true.
Apparently, Lady Isolde grew quite vexed when woken from sleep. This morning’s response had been little better.
“So you claimed last night,” the duchess said. “I am disinclined to believe you save for the last bit. Izzy has always been appallingly grumpy when she wakes.”
Izzy, was it?
