“Excellent. I’m glad that’s settled,” Lord Jamieson said, clapping his friend on the shoulder.
“Perhaps she is not comfortable competing against men?”
Lord Hamilton had given her a way out and may not have intentionally meant the words as a challenge, but Evie took them that way.
“I will compete,” she heard herself saying seconds later.
“Evie is extremely competitive,” Prue said. “I’m sorry to say I am not.”
Evie followed the men back to where Lord Corbyn now stood, watching everything unfold. His smirk matched Lord Jamieson’s.
“Well, give her a bloody bow then,” Lord Hamilton snapped.
“Tsk tsk,” Lord Jamieson said, a look passing between him and Lord Corbyn that she had no idea how to interpret. “There is no need for bad manners, Anthony.”
“Indeed,” Evie added, because she knew it would annoy Lord Hamilton, and they disliked each other already, so why not annoy him more.
He closed his eyes briefly, and when he opened them he was smiling. It was forced and would terrify small children.
“One hopes your prowess is not exaggerated, Miss Spencer. I would not want you to leave here weeping piteously after losing to me.”
Bastard.
Chapter Nine
“I’m not surewhy you are needling me, both of you,” Anthony said to Jamie and Toby when Miss Spencer went to inspect the bows. “But desist, or I shall make you pay.”
“He is excellent at revenge,” Toby said. “Do you remember that time he—”
“God’s blood, you two are trying,” Anthony snapped.
“Come now, she is three times Chipping Nodbury champion. Surely you can allow her to compete with us?”
Jamie’s face was all innocence, but when you knew someone as well as you knew yourself, you understood when you were being played.
“She’s a lovely woman and would make you an—”
The words finished on a wheezing sound as Anthony elbowed Toby hard in the stomach.
“Right, then,” Jamie said, grinning because he hadn’t received the jab. “Have you selected a bow that would suit you, Miss Spencer?”
When Anthony had turned to find Miss Spencer standing there with her sister, he’d thought seriously about leaving. Just picking up his bow and disappearing into the trees. But as his aunts were due to arrive, he couldn’t.
The woman made him feel like he had an itch he couldn’t quite reach, and then there was the fact that she was on the list his aunts had written, about which he seriously regretted tellinghis friends, even if he’d crossed her name off. Plus, now he knew the plans Cavendish had in place for her, and that unsettled him.
Miss Evangeline Spencer got under his skin, and no one did that. He couldn’t understand why her, of all women?
It certainly wasn’t her fashion sense. Today’s bonnet had a wide brim that looked like it was more poor design than deliberate, and under her chin was a fat blue silk bow. The long ends trailed down her chest to a simple white dress with no lace or frills. At least the hem reached her footwear this time.
“I will use this one if I may,” she said, holding up a bow for them to see. It was the one Anthony always brought in case his aunts wanted to participate.
“Off you go then, or we will be here all day.”
She glared at him.
“Take a step forward, Miss Spencer, as women’s targets are usually a great deal closer.”
She looked at him, her brown eyes narrowed, suggesting she would like to tell him exactly what to do with his words.
