“Do you think it’s really going to continue getting hotter?” she asked, for the sake of conversation.
“Lord, I hope not.” He wiped his forehead on his shirt and grimaced. “I’m not built for the heat.”
“I enjoy the warmth, but there is such a thing as too much of it.”
“You could dip your hand in the water,” he suggested.
She leaned over the side of the boat to see how clear and deep the pond was, and the boat rocked to the side. Startled, she jolted upright. “Sorry! I didn’t realize it would do that.”
He grinned, but then it faded. “Lady Sophie, I’m sorry if asking this is overstepping, but have I done something to upset you?”
Oh no.
Sophie squirmed and looked anywhere other than at his open, friendly features. “Of course not. What would make you ask that?”
He sighed and stopped rowing, allowing them to drift on the water’s surface. “Sophie, you must know that I enjoy your company. You’re lively and interesting, and you gave me to understand that you might return my regard.”
“I….”
She didn’t know what to say.
He tried to meet her gaze.
She evaded him.
He sighed again and leaned forward as much as he could within the confines of the boat. “I understand that it could be construed as a move backward to shift from an earl’s household to a baron’s household, but my family is wealthy, and besides, you didn’t strike me as being the mercenary type.”
“I’m not!” she snapped, suddenly extremely aware of the sun beating down on her, the tightness in her chest, and the hardness of the wood under her bottom. “After a certain level, all wealth is more or less the same. All I want is a comfortable life.”
And love.
Not that she’d mention that.
He nodded, his jaw set. “So why are you avoiding me? All I can think of is that I must have said or done something untoward.”
He looked so torn that her heart ached. Drat. She was going to have to admit the truth.
“I’m sorry. You haven’t done or said anything wrong, and I did genuinely believe we’d make a good match.”
“But?”
She drew in a deep breath. “But my affections are engaged elsewhere.”
Comprehension dawned, and his mouth twisted unpleasantly. “Mr. Nicholas Blackwell?”
She didn’t answer his question with words, but she was sure that he could see the truth written on her face. She’d never been a very good liar.
He scoffed. “Then you’re foolish. However smitten he might act, Blackwell is not the marrying kind.”
Uncertainty lanced through her, but she forced herself not to react. It hurt to hear her own concerns echoed back at her with such vehemence, but she had to trust Nicholas.
She knew his reputation as a rogue, and she loved him anyway. She had to believe that his intentions were pure and that he’d marry her as he’d promised.
Remember the plan. Wait until the end of the house party. Elope. Retreat from society until next season.
She wasn’t living in a fantasy world. She and Nicholas had agreed to a course of action.
He wouldn’t let her down.
