“Well, perhaps that scandal will trump yours,” Gray offered.
“No, it will be bound to mine,” Lucien said, his voice faraway. “Even though I want nothing to do with her, people will whisper aboutusandourscandals, as if we were still linked.” He shook his head. “But that leads me to my next question. How long have you and Rosalinde Wilde been…attached?”
Gray flinched at his term. “Attached?”
“You want me to be more direct?” Lucien asked, his voice elevating. “How long have you been bedding her? I assume from your behavior today that is what you’ve done.”
Gray lifted his chin as anger pulsed through him. “Careful now. That is a lady.”
“Have you treated her as such?” his brother countered.
“She is a magnet to me,” Gray explained softly. “I am drawn to her without trying to be, sometimes without wanting to be. And I have failed in my behavior, I realize. But I intend to fix that now.”
Lucien’s anger faded from his face. “Fix it? How?”
“She and Celia need a savior. They obviously can never return to Fitzgilbert—he is too volatile. I’m going to ask Rosalinde to marry me. Celia can stay with us. My money and influence should ensure Fitzgilbert won’t be able to say much about it.”
“You’re going to ask her to marry you?” Lucien was staring at Gray as if he had suggested he was going to breed poodles and start traveling in the circus with them.
“People marry, Lucien. You needn’t look so surprised.”
“You have always behaved as if you never would,” his brother retorted. “So you must forgive my surprise.”
“It is the right thing to do,” he said.
“Right. Is that the only reason?”
Gray let his thoughts turn to Rosalinde. To all she had become to him, to all he wanted her to be. But to say those things out loud felt very dangerous, even to a person he trusted with his life.
“It will help you out of a mess,” he suggested, changing the subject. “We can tell the world that Rosalinde and I fell in love, but that her grandfather refused to allow the marriage because he wanted his two granddaughters to give him connection to more than one family. That will explain my untoward behavior this afternoon.”
“You snapped when he refused to let you have your bride,” Lucien said. “So driven by your passions were you.”
Gray nodded. “And you and Celia, with your arranged marriage, could see that your siblings would not be happy without each other. So you nobly stepped aside to allow us to wed in your place, freeing Celia to marry into another important family to appease her grandfather.”
Lucien considered the story. “If told correctly, it might just make thetonsupport what was done, rather than shun Celia and despise me.” Lucien sighed. “Of course, this assumes Rosalinde will accept your proposal.”
Gray took a deep breath. “Yes, there is that. But I am off to have that discussion with her right now. I didn’t want to bring it up in front of everyone because the pressure might have been too much after what she went through today.”
Lucien observed him for what felt like a very long time. Long enough that Gray shifted beneath his focused regard. Then his brother waved his hand.
“Off with you then. And I hope she says yes to your offer.”
Gray smiled. “As do I.”
“I also hope at some point you tear down that wall around yourself and actually let the girl love you as she obviously does,” Lucien added as he turned his back and began to stack the papers on his desk.
Gray stared at Stenfax’s back, but he had nothing to say to that statement.
“Yes, well, I’ll let you know her answer once I have it,” he said, and left the room. But as he strode up the stairs to the woman he hoped would be his bride, Lucien’s words rang in his head.
And made him think of things he didn’t want to think of. And want things he wasn’t sure he was ready to accept.
Chapter Twenty-One
Rosalinde sat at the small table in the chamber she shared with Celia, staring at the plates before them. Neither of them had eaten since the food was delivered. They had hardly spoken either, as the gravity of all that had happened that day sank in bit by bit.
“Do you think he’ll come back?” Celia asked.
