“Mayhap,” Creston said. “It’s strange… Helen and I were much closer than Royston and I ever were. She was a troublemaker, however, and I was the one constantly getting her out of trouble.”
Cruz chuckled. “That does not sound like a de Royans,” he said. “You and your kind are not known to be trouble.”
Creston grinned. “Not according to my brother,” he said. “According to him, I just created a great deal of trouble for him with de Bulverton.”
Cruz grunted. “You do not become confrontational by nature,” he said. “You are a master interrogator, Cres. The earl must have said something you did not like.”
Creston thought back to the conversation, how he felt when he saw the earl grab Ophelia’s arm cruelly. “Hedidsomething I did not like,” he said. “Lady Ophelia weighs as much as my right leg, yet her grandfather did not seem to feel the need to becareful with her. He grabbed her by the arm and pulled her out of her chair, and the way he did it was… cruel.”
Ming Tang was listening to the conversation carefully. “Cres,” he said slowly, “did you agree to marry this woman so quickly because you feel a need to protect her? You are a defender by nature. Do you feel the need to defend her from her own grandfather?”
Creston looked at him a moment before averting his gaze as he thought on the question. His eyes, so very blue, took on a distant cast as he pondered many things—a frail lady, a cruel grandfather, and the situation that she’d found herself in. A terrible situation that he was about to become part of.Didhe feel the need to defend her?
Or was there more to it?
“Not defend,” he finally said, his voice quiet. “I’m not sure what I’m feeling, but it’s not a need to defend her. It’s something more.”
“How can you know after just having met her?”
Creston shook his head. “I am not certain,” he said. “But all I know is that she is a lady who seems to need… something. Mayhap she needs me.”
Ming Tang didn’t say anything more. As Creston stared off into the room, thinking about the situation, Ming Tang caught Cruz’s eye. They didn’t voice what they were thinking—that Creston, unable to get out of the betrothal, was now creating reasons to accept it. In the end, that would only do him, and the lady, harm when he realized he’d failed to accept the situation more than he was finding reasons that the marriage should happen.
She needed him.
She was abused.
It wasn’t simply that they were to marry and accepted the situation as it was.
It would have been better if Creston weren’t creating phantoms to fight in the lady’s name.
Finally, Ming Tang couldn’t remain silent.
“Creston,” he muttered, “mayhap I should not say this, but I am going to point out a very obvious possibility.”
Creston looked at him then. “What?”
“You do not know the lady or her grandfather,” he said. “You do not know their character. Is it possible that they staged that little display of cruelty simply so your chivalrous, knightly training would take precedence and you would feel the need to protect the lady? It would be rather coercive of them if they did. All I am saying is, do not think the lady too helpless. She may not be helpless at all.”
“Be on your guard, Cres,” Cruz said, his voice low. “That entire scene might have been for your benefit.”
Creston had to admit that what they were saying had not occurred to him. Was it possible that what he’d just seen was all for show? To make him feel protective toward her? If that were the case, there wasn’t much he could do about it except be on his guard.
And he would be if his friends were seeing something he wasn’t.
“Time will tell,” he said after a moment. “It always does.”
Talk of his betrothal was done for the night.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Later that night,Creston’s head had just hit his pillow when there was a knock at his cottage door. Wearily, he lifted himself out of bed, struck a taper, and trudged down the stairs, unbolting the door and yanking it open.
A gatehouse guard was standing in the darkness.
“I am sorry to trouble you, Sir Creston,” the man said, “but you have a visitor who was most desperate to see you. She would not leave until she did, so I hope we did right by admitting her.”
Creston was annoyed until the guard mentioned that the visitor was a female. Then he became curious.
