Eliza had no choice but to agree with him. “The wine is lovely,” she said reluctantly.
Just then, their food arrived, this time brought by a tall man who looked threateningly at Duncan.
Duncan smiled at him. “Thank you,” he said politely, nipping in the bud the aggressive remark the man had been about to voice.
The waiter turned and walked away, but not before giving Duncan a venomous glare.
Eliza looked down at the food on her plate. She had heard about the fare in coaching inns and was prepared for lumpy soup or a tasteless stew, but this was not at all what she had expected. There was a breast of chicken smothered in a fragrant gravy with cauliflower and other fresh garden vegetables. Slices of freshly baked bread slathered in butter sat on a platter in the middle of the table, and the whole meal looked and smelled delicious.
However, Eliza was determined not to eat. She watched as Duncan tucked into his food, then looked at her questioningly.
“Are you not hungry?” he asked.
“No,” she replied, taking a sip of wine.
Duncan gave her a half-smile and shrugged. “Have it your own way,” he said. “You are the only one who will suffer.”
Eliza took another sip of her wine and tried not to watch as Duncan ate his food enthusiastically, making appreciative “ums” and “aahs” as he bit into each mouthful.
She couldn’t believe that this man who had bought her like cattle was eating like it was any other day. She tried her hardest not to let her stomach rumble loudly.
The delicious aroma was almost unbearable, and Eliza lasted for three minutes before her stomach gave an almighty rumble. She gave up the fight and began to wolf the food down as if she were starving, while Duncan watched her out of the corner of his eyes, saying nothing and trying not to laugh.
Eventually, she cleared her plate and sat back, sated, but evidently, they had not finished, since a plate of scones and a pot of tea appeared. Duncan poured for both of them, and Eliza watched in surprise as his big hands handled the cups with great gentleness.
“Why did you buy me?” she asked abruptly. “What do you plan to do with me?”
“What does any man do with a woman?” Duncan asked mischievously, his golden eyes twinkling.
Eliza bristled with annoyance. Was he ever going to answer a simple question with a simple answer? “There are a hundred different answers to my question,” she pointed out, trying to keep calm. “Pick one.”
“You will have to give me some time to think about it,” Duncan answered, his voice irritatingly calm. He smiled at Eliza, and she responded to it with a deep frown of disgust.
She hated him. She knew it already.
Abruptly, Duncan yawned and stretched, showing off his impressive muscles, and Eliza tried not to look. However, the rest of the women in the room had no such inhibitions, and stared with open admiration at this tall, handsome red-haired stranger with the fascinating amber eyes.
“Time to go to bed,” Duncan announced.
“I’m not tired,” Eliza declared.
“You were not hungry either,” Duncan pointed out. “Look how quickly you changed your mind about that.”
Eliza said nothing, but pressed her lips together to stop herself from yawning too, unwilling to give him the satisfaction of seeing her give into fatigue.
But Duncan knew, and he gave her a sweet, but patently false grin before standing up to help her out of her chair. However, Eliza stood up before he could reach her and batted away his helping hand.
“I am quite capable of standing up myself,” she told him.
Duncan raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.
A moment later, another young waitress came to escort them to their rooms, and Eliza breathed a sigh of relief; she was almost fainting from exhaustion.
Duncan tried to take her arm, but again Eliza shook him off. “Do not touch me,” she snapped.
Again, Duncan kept quiet, but Eliza had the feeling that anger was building up inside him by the fact that his face wore no expression at all.
Perhaps I have gone too far,Eliza thought, Well, so be it. She reasoned that the best policy was silence from that moment on. She would only speak when she was spoken to.
