Joyful had not sought her bed. Worse, neither had Beau.
“There you are,” he greeted her from where he waited in her own armchair he’d dragged by her fire, his legs crossed, his countenance fierce. “Do I need to call some gentleman out even before the wedding?”
3
Pip couldn’t help it. She barely got her door closed before she took one considered look at the fury on Beau’s continence and the outrage on Joyful’s and burst out laughing. Of all the accusations Beau could have made, it had to be that one.
Beau seemed not to be amused. “It is the night before your wedding,” he snapped, getting to his feet. “Where the hell have you been? And I will tell you right now, Brat, that this kind of behavior will not be tolerated. Do you hear me?”
She laughed even harder. It seemed she couldn’t stop. Waving ineffectually at Beau, she dropped onto her dressing table stool, removed her glasses to wipe her eyes, and set off again. She wasn’t quite sure she wasn’t becoming hysterical.
“Hush, Missy,” Joyful admonished. “Everybody will hear.”
Pip waved her off as well. If someone wanted to drop in on her hours before her wedding to find her fiancé glowering at her in her own room chaperoned by her maid, let them. How could that possibly make the situation more ludicrous?
“I would love to know what you find so funny,” Beau growled.
She waved at him again. “You.”
Joyful silently passed over a lace-edged handkerchief, and Pip mopped at her eyes.
“Oh, Beau,” she mourned, shaking her head. “You do know how to put a coda on the most absurd four hours I have ever spent.”
For a moment she seemed to have successfully confused him. But never let it be said that her Beau lost his purpose for long. Theo used to say that his big brother would manage to do his estate books in a bordello.
Oh, Theo.
“Well?” Beau demanded, straightening to what Pip had always called his ‘head lad’ position. “Where have you been? There can be no answer that is acceptable at this time of night. I’d better not hear you were in another guest’s bedroom. If you were, I’m warning you. I shall walk off and humiliate you.”
That made her laugh all over again. “But I was,” she gasped, almost sobbing with the absurdity of this conversation. It was better than howling with outrage at the unfairness of it. “Under Perfect Pamela’s bed, as a matter of fact.”
Joyful gasped.
Beau snarled.“That is not funny.”
“No,” Pip agreed, giving her eyes a final wipe and reclaiming her glasses so to be able to see Beau clearly. “You are correct. It was not funny at all. Well, except for what she eats when she’s alone. I swear I think her maid dragged in an entire steer.”
He looked ready to bite. “Pip…”
“It must take so much effort to maintain that ‘eats like a bird’ myth, don’t you think? Fortunately for me, no one expects delicacy from me.”
He truly looked angry now, which forced her back to the point. She took in a calming breath.
“Yes, yes. The point is that I had snuck in earlier since I knew she wouldn’t be around, and didn’t get out in time, leaving me under her bed during what I must tell you is a most protracted skin care regimen. And the steer, of course.”
That brought him to his feet. “You invaded a guest’s room while she wasn’t there? What made you think she wasn’t there?”
She lost her smile. “Oh, Beau, you always do get snarly when you’ve been caught.”
Getting back to her feet, she met his gaze unflinching, even though she stood chin-to-chest. “I knew she wouldn’t be in her room because I was atyourroom just before that.”
He went rigid. “You weren’t….”
Her smile this time was cold as truth. “But I was. I wasn’t going to say anything. After all, isn’t that what girls are taught? That they have no right to be...entertaining...someone not her fiancé the night before her wedding, but that she also has no right to expect the same of her fiancé? But,” she said with a shrug, “I find I do not like such hypocrisy. Neither of us may want this marriage, but lying under that bed for the last three hours, I came to the conclusion that we will approach it honestly or you may indeed walk out and humiliate us both. I find I just don’t care.”
She did, desperately. But he didn’t need to know that. At least she had silenced him. He just stood there frozen in place, his features pale and stark-looking. Probably with rage. Pip would deal with that when she had to. Right now, she needed to finish the night’s task before she collapsed in a heap.
“Joyful,” she said, turning to her maid. “If you wouldn’t mind. I need to speak with Lord Drummond alone for a moment.”
