“Containing the damage is all we can do. What do you think your Aunt Ruth will do now?”
Amelia dropped her hands and shrugged. “Try to convince me to invite her to stay with me at the house or get me to leave and reside with her. But I won’t leave, and I can’t let her in. I’ll have to barricade the doors.”
“Maybe you should go to her house to avoid that. I can stay with Alston.”
Amelia snapped straighter. “No. I will not leave him.”
“Then how will you keep her away?”
“By being exactly as I am: a difficult, petulant, stubborn person.”
He snorted. “Is that really your plan?”
“I now also have a fiancé who is wildly possessive and prone to fits of jealousy,” she said, poking his chest. “I can’t reside in a house with Nelson. You won’t allow it.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Amelia could see it unfolding now. Of course, Aunt Ruth wouldn’t care what Amelia thought about where she should be allowed to stay, but Mr. Blakewood? As her future husband, no one would question him—which still galled her and only reaffirmed she never wanted to marry, however useful it was in this moment.
“Is there a reason I should be jealous of Nelson?” Blakewood asked, rolling his eyes.
“Certainly. He’s repulsive and predatory. Did you not see him sniff the handkerchief I used to wipe up the spilled punch on my chest? He once told me that there will come a day when I’ll be too desperate and lonely to refuse his advances.”
Blakewood grew stony again. “He what?”
Amelia nodded. “He’d probably steal my undergarments if I had to share a roof with him.”
He pivoted and strode away.
“Where are you going?”
“To murder him.”
“Wait!” She grabbed his arm and tugged him to a stop. “I’m not serious. Well, maybe a little.”
His breathing had quickened. “I will rip his—” He stopped, a flush creeping up his neck.
Amelia raised a brow. She’d never seen him like this—protective of her, with a common enemy—and damn it all, she found herself liking it rather too much. “His what?” she encouraged.
“This is serious, Lady Amelia.”
He stepped closer to her, and Amelia’s laugh caught in her throat. She backed up into the shrubbery, but he didn’t stop until the buttons of his coat brushed her bodice. He put a knuckle under her chin and lifted it until she held his severe, heated stare. Her stomach swarmed with butterflies, but her eyes narrowed.
“Do I have cause to think Nelson would make unwanted advances if given the chance?”
“He’s made advances toward me since I was fifteen, and they have all been unwanted. Don’t all men behave that way?”
His jaw flexed. “No.”
She raised a brow and shifted her eyes to look down at the negligible space between them. “Are you certain?”
“I’m your fiancé; I don’t count.”
She huffed a shaky laugh, trying to hide how his nearness made her heart race, as if there might be a chance he’d hear it.
“It’s not real. We’re going to pretend to be engaged.”
“You just announced our engagement to half thetonat a garden party. That’s as real as it gets. We should have discussed this earlier.”
