Chapter Two
Glynnis couldn’t seemto stop herself from digging her hole a little deeper.
“My fiancé will soon be joining me.”
Say you were only teasing,she ordered herself, but she said nothing of the sort.
Besides, if she were believed to be engaged, not only by Hargrove but by all the eligible bucks, she wouldn’t appear so desperate. The well-heeled gentlemen around her would relax, safely misinformed that she was soon to be yoked and then someone else’s baggage.
Glynnis was forming a plan. Being engaged would give her almost as much freedom and desirability as being a tempting widow. Any number of men might try to compromise her merely for sport, knowing her fiancé would be the one to deal with the repercussions after the marital knot was tied.
And she intended to let herself be thoroughly compromised if there was any chance of being discovered while doing so — a shocking, humiliating, ruinous discovery and then a demand for honor to be satisfied.
She could see no other way to obtain the coveted marriage proposal. And as she used to hope for love and then lowered her expectations to someone she didn’t despise, now she wished only for any wealthy man to marry her even if she had to cut a desperate sham.
Elsewise the future showed only bleakness, a return to Llandeilo in Wales with nothing to look forward to but the St. Teilo's Fair and a life of spinsterhood, slipping irrevocably into poverty because of her brother’s carelessness and her parents doting leniency toward him.
Thus, she looked Hargrove directly in his dark eyes and lied again.
“My fiancé and I knew it would be easier to meet here than in London. With the Prince Regent will come an atmosphere oflaissez-faire, or so I’ve heard.”
“With the prince comes also thebon vivants, to be sure, and with them a goodly number of unsavory people.”
She hoped Hargrove didn’t count her in such a group. When the Prince Regent traveled, thedemi-reputableswent along, hanging on the outskirts, ready when needed.
“What’s his name, this lucky fiancé?” came his lordship’s quick question.
Glynnis froze, then coughed, then sipped her now-cold tea, and then it came to her.
“Lord Aberavon. I doubt you’ve heard of him. The baron favors his Welsh home on the Swansea Bay. For me, however, he said he would travel all the way down here to Brighton.” That was perfect. Aberavon was merely a man her father had invited to dinner once or thrice. She would recognize him if she saw the man, but they had barely spoken two words. And by the time the baron ought to arrive, she would have put the parson’s noose around some other suitable nob.
Or she would have run out of money and departed on the coach that brought her there.
“I confess, I had heard nothing of this,” Hargrove said.
“Our engagement was very recent,” she said. “I’m sure the banns have been read in Swansea and Llandeilo. But why would you, in London, know anything about it?”
“I suppose you’re right.” He fixed her with a lengthy stare. “I look forward to meeting the lucky man.”
“Me, too,” she murmured, staring at her now-empty plate. Then she coughed. “I mean, I look forward to introducing you should we run into each other again.”
Lord Hargrove stood. “I must be off. It was a pleasure. I thank you for inviting me to join you.”
With a polite nod, he departed, leaving her with her mouth open. He hadn’t paid. The blasted bolter had left her with the bill. But also with the last small sandwich. Wrapping this in her napkin, she put the nuncheon on her hotel account and left. At this rate, she would need a husband even sooner.
