“It had to be set,” the Duchess of Raven stated.
Lady Levermarch made a gesture dismissing her words with a hand. “Continue, Miss Carlow. I find your voice comfortable, unlike some of the others.”
“I hope you’re not counting me in that?” Zach said.
“No.” She shot Lord Plunge a look, but as he was brushing some invisible speck of lint from his waistcoat he did not notice.
“I would rather cut off my arm then drop you, my dear sweet one true Dorothea,” Beth continued, and the women and Plunge sighed.
“Not one word, Plunge. She simply inserted that name,” the duke said. “Continue, Miss Carlow.”
She changed her voice for each character, and Nathan had to say she was good. Better than good. Her voice was lovely like the rest of her.
Bloody bothering hell.
“Then pull me up, Captain Broadbent, and let us once again be on our way.”
“Just a moment,” the Duke of Raven said. “Surely with a fall that far she has to have broken something?”
“Ssssh,” his wife said.
“‘Hold tight,’ Captain Broadbent called. It took him several minutes, but eventually he once again held his love in his arms. ‘I fear my ankle is damaged.’ Lady Nauticus wept into his chest.”
“And my point is made.” The duke looked pleased with himself.
Beth read, everyone hung on her words, and when she had finished, there was a round of applause.
“I think that is enough for today. Miss Carlow, you are hereby invited to all my impromptu literary salons,” the Duchess of Yardly stated. “The voice of an angel and not completely witless. You will do.”
“High praise indeed,” Alexander Hetherington said.
“You’ll pardon my ignorance, but how will she know to attend them if they are impromptu?” Plunge said. “And for that matter, how will I?”
“If you are meant to be there, you will be,” the duchess dismissed his words, thereby breaking the man’s heart.
Walter, clearly having had enough of the inaction and Romulus, leapt over Alexander Hetherington, taking his hat with him, and loped away to freedom.
“Blast,” Miss Saint-Bonnard said.
“I’ll get him,” Lady Levermarch declared, giving chase.
“Come, Beth, we must leave.” Mary Blake signaled to her friend.
“Good day to you,” Beth said softly. Nathan nodded, then watched her ride away from him. Were her shoulders slumped slightly?
Not that I care.
“Nathan, is everything all right?”
“Yes, Gabe.”
“That look would suggest otherwise.”
They turned and rode in the opposite direction from that which Beth had taken, and he took perhaps his first full lungful of air since she’d pulled her horse in beside him. Correction, Michael had.
“What are you about?”
“In what way?” Michael asked, his face innocent. Nathan thought about leaning out of his saddle and pushing him off.
