Clearly, she was stalling from discussing anything important, either still embarrassed or perhaps worried for what came next.
“You are as good as any player in a—” he stopped himself. He nearly mentioned the only place he had heard a piano for the past few years, a bordello, both in London and in Paris.
“In an orchestra,” he finished.
She frowned. “Highly unlikely. Remember we talked about flattery before.”
“Of course.” He ran a hand through his hair. “We ought to discuss our future.”
Surprisingly, she gave a single harsh laugh.
“Is something funny?”
“Don’t you think so?” she asked. “Maybe ironic is a better term. I always intended to marry a devoted, loyal gentleman, someone like my father.”
“I see.” He was about to be insulted.
“I never truly sawyouas a potential suitor. I believe I told you that from the beginning. You and your ilk—”
“My ilk?” he repeated.
“There you go, interrupting again like you did before I started trying to civilize you. I guess I failed dreadfully.” She shook her head. “Your ilk — the rakish swells of London’s noblemen. You are the opposite to anyone who would attract me.”
“I think you’re lying,” he said, feeling defensive. “You and I have an attraction as powerful as any I’ve ever felt.”
She waved it away with a gesture of her hand.
“I wanted a husband such as my sister married. Staid, mannered, calm. A rum duke of a man in manner as well as in appearances.”
“And I am none of those things?” He couldn’t deny he was hurt by her low opinion. But he waited for her answer.
Chapter Sixteen
“Well?” Purity asked, staring at the piano keys and not at him. “Are you?”
Matthew hated this conversation and her disappointed, saddened tone.
“I can be loyal and well-mannered,” he insisted.
“You have had many associations with other women, have you not?”
Matthew had a flash of dozens of mouths and naked bodies, but they were all as one and the same — inconsequential and unimportant.
“I don’t like to speak about other women with you,” he said, “but I have, yes. What import to that?”
“You didn’t offer for any one of them. Were you never caught before?”
Purity ought not to compare herself to any of the females with whom he’d ever been associated. How could he make her understand the chasm of difference between all those women and her? And how could he make her believe him?
“They were not the type of women expecting an offer of marriage.” Apart from the angry one who was now Varley’s wife. She had wanted too much from Matthew. With Purity, however, it didn’t seem too much at all.
As if reading his mind, she asked, “What about Lady Varley, before she was married?”
The devil take him if Purity wasn’t the most perceptive lady he’d ever met.
“How did you know?” he asked.
“I didn’t,” she said softly. “Now, I do.”
