He raised an imperious eyebrow. “And exactly who do you expect to believe that?”
She sighed. “Beau, I have spent my life on the fringes of everyone else’s families. Even my own. I think I have finally grown tired of it. Make your choice. I’ll know the answer if you show up tomorrow.”
“Listen, Brat,” he retorted, leaning over her. “You don’t know me well if you think I will back out now. I shall see you in the morning.”
She nodded and opened the door.
“And since I recovered your state secrets for you,” she added. “You can probably stop calling me Brat.”
She actually got a quick grin for that. “Not on your life.”
After checking the hall to find no one but Joyful waiting, she shooed him out and shooed her maid in. And then, knowing that she had settled exactly nothing with her fiancé, she let Joyful help her ready for her last night as a single woman.
She just wished she felt more hopeful about what was to come.
* * *
For a very long fewmoments Beau made it no farther than the hallway outside Pip’s door. First, by dint of the threat in her maid’s eyes.
“You don’t deserve my girl,” she said softly enough not to be overheard, her deep brown eyes somehow glacial. “You better know that.”
Actually, he did know that. It didn’t change anything though.
Still, he felt bad. Even after the maid swept through the door and closed it behind her, he just stood there, hands clenched, the words he should have said to Pip lodged in his throat.
He should have thanked her. He should have praised her. He should have told her never to do that again, since he still didn’t think she had any idea what she was up against. But this had been classic Pip, acting before she considered consequences.
He should have anticipated this, really. Pip had never been a slow child. And she had trailed Theo and him around like a faithful spaniel until the two of them went off to school. Then to put her in that school where every other student seemed to be a Rake sibling or daughter. It was inevitable she would suss out secrets.
After all, it had been her passion. She and Theo had played Round Table, except she had refused to be the helpless maiden. She was Gawain to Theo’s Galahad. Littlejohn to Theo’s Robin Hood. Restless, inquisitive, determined Pip, who had spent so much time as their shadow that Beau found himself looking for her in the sunlight.
And he was going to marry her. He still couldn’t comprehend the enormity of what was about to happen. He couldn’t come to grips with the upheaval he was about to suffer in his life. And not just by having a wife. Havingthatwife. Having Pip. He supposed she was right. He couldn’t very well call her Brat anymore.
And that wasn’t even the worst. How would he overcome his cataclysmic reaction to her? Catastrophic, more like. In a matter of hours, he’d gone from an effective, reasonable, unemotional investigator into a distracted, frustrated, confused, aroused—he tried, but there was simply no denying his physical reaction to his brother’s best friend—fool. Even after only a few minutes of talking to her, not even touching her, he was beset by a new and very unsettling arousal.
It was why he’d been so surly, he knew. He’d gone from all but taking Pip against a wall like a two-bit whore to being given the church’s official blessing to do just that. Which only made him harder.
He really should apologize to her for his behavior. He’d had an excuse, of course. After all, even though her intentions were good, she’d still backed him into a marriage he didn’t want. With a woman who affected him in ways he had never expected. Or needed. Certainly not wanted. Not from Pip.
Not from the girl Theo was supposed to marry.
He could still feel her soft skin in his hands, smell the clean lavender scent of her hair, hear the surprising little whimpers he seemed to have elicited. He was hard all over again just thinking about it.
And he couldn’t be. It would make him the worst kind of thief.
But Theo isn’t coming back,the devil on his shoulder whispered.Why is it so wrong to want a marriage with her, even a little?Because he could still see the love in Theo’s eyes when he’d waved her goodbye the last time. He could still hear his brother lament that he couldn’t take her along with him.
“She’d be the perfect person to follow the drum,” Theo had confided in him. “After all, she’s prepared her whole life for it.”
“You’ve prepared her,” Beau had corrected him. “You’ve so taken up her time with your horses and tactics and war games that if she hadn’t gone away to school, she wouldn’t even know how to curtsy.”
Theo, damnably optimistic Theo, who had been so unforgivably excited about going to war, had laughed. “Pip couldn’t care less about that nonsense.”
“She will when she goes to find a husband.”
Theo had laughed. “Tell you what,” he said with a clap on the back. “If nobody else has the sense to marry her, I’ll step up. Wouldn’t mind at all eating over her campfire. Or teaching her children how to ride and shoot half as well as she does.”
Well, Theo would never have the chance now. And as fate would have it, it would fall to Beau after all.
