“I had no part in arranging this. I promise you.”
His jaw was still tight and she found herself wondering if he believed her. Wanting him to believe her. Why, she couldn’t really say. They hadn’t been friends. More like enemies even at the beginning, and then they’d come to tolerate each other, kissing aside. And yet she didn’t want him to tar her with the same brush her parents so richly deserved.
“I didn’t want this, my lord.” She drew a breath. “Roderick.”
His cheek twitched when she used his given name. Somehow it felt right on her tongue, even though she had resisted its use. “No,” he said at last. “Before we kissed, you were even telling me you didn’t truly want a loveless marriage. It’s almost funny.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “If it weren’t so bloody awful.”
“You could refuse,” she suggested. “You could walk away.”
“If I tried, do you think your parents would then cover up what they saw? That they would pay off the vicar so he wouldn’t spread the story and let you go on as before?”
Protect her, he meant. And she knew the answer to that. So did he, judging from his expression. She bent her head. “Well,Iwould make it clear you weren’t in the wrong.”
“And destroy yourself in the process?” He shook his head. “I’m a rake, not a villain. Or at least I do my best not to be so. And even if I were, I couldn’t save myself now.”
She blinked. It seemed he was more cognizant of protecting her than her own parents. That he worried about both their well-beings, not just his own. Even after she had judged him ill-mannered. “But?—”
“The vicar saw us kissing. Your parents have made it in his best interest to be part of this, evidently. It was a moment we both surrendered to. We kissed. Ithinkwe both wished to kiss.”
She swallowed as heat filled her cheeks. She’d been trying to forget the feel of the kiss. To forget what welled up in her when his mouth was on hers.
“Yes,” she admitted. “I don’t know what came over me, but when you kissed me, it was what I wanted.”
Something flickered in his stare. The same heat that had been there before his mouth found hers a short time before. That heat called to some wanton part of herself that she hadn’t fully killed with propriety. One she needed to kill, judging from the trouble she had found through it.
“Most of the time these little lapses don’t have repercussions,” he said. “We might have found our senses. One of us would have stepped back. We each would have apologized for losing control. And then we could have walked away with a good memory.”
She touched her lips despite herself and his nostrils flared.
“But for—” he said, and cut himself off.
“But for their machinations,” she said with a sigh.
He nodded. “You don’t believe they’d quiet this and based on their uncouth behavior, I agree. So we must marry.”
It felt like everything was collapsing. “I want to say no.”
“But you realize you can’t.” His tone was gentle now and he reached out to take her hand.
She stared at his thick fingers encasing hers, thought of how warm he’d been when he held her, how firm his lips had been. Her heart throbbed faster, betraying her in this moment when she should feel nothing but torment. Especially when there was so much regret and even loss in his stare. Loss. Which made her wonder what his hopes had been before he had the misfortune to be dragged to her parents’ estate.
“Right now we’re both shaken,” he said. “This is a shock. But soon we will sit down and we’ll discuss the marriage. I think we’ll want to make clear what we both want and expect from each other.”
That idea was so shocking she rocked back a little. “Oh. I hadn’t thought of that.”
He nodded. “We may not have had many choices in how this came to be, Clarissa. But we’ll have all the choices in how we live it out. Now, let’s join them in the hallway.”
He released her hand and motioned to the door, but as he reached to let them out, she said, “Roderick?”
He turned back. “Yes?”
“You are being very kind about his. Very gentlemanly whether I deserve that consideration or not. I appreciate it.”
He smiled slightly. “I hope I’ll eventually live down whatever your first impressions were. And that we’ll come to some balance that doesn’t include actively despising each other.”
Then he opened the door and revealed that her family was in the hallway with the vicar still at their side. Only now they had seemed to call out for others. There was a small crowd gathering. Clarissa’s heart sank as she stared at the curious and somewhat judgmental faces.
“And there is the happy couple,” her mother cried out.
