“Try telling that to my father. Which is an impossible task for more than one reason,” Mr. Forester said. “Given that he’s dead.”
“Oh, I’m terribly sorry.”
“I’m not. He never approved of a thing I said or did my entire life.”
“I know exactly how you feel.” Sarah sighed. “It’s the same with me and my mother.”
“But the difference is you seem to put a great deal of stock into what your mother says about you,” Mr. Forester added. “You’ve mentioned her more than once.”
“Did I?” Did she? “I can well imagine what she’s saying about me now.”
“If she had any heart, she would be wondering why her beloved child has fled and is worried sick that you’re missing.”
“I can assure you, neither of those things is likely.”
“Why not?”
“‘Do as you’re told, Sarah,’” she mimicked in a stern, matronly voice. “That is my mother’s very favorite thing to say to me. I was supposed to be at half a dozen parties since I’ve been gone. No doubt Mother is lamenting the fact that I’ve been unavailable to Lord Branford and am ruining my reputation and putting my highly sought-after engagement at risk.”
He glanced down at Sarah briefly. “That’s why you feel guilty for running away? Because for the first time in your life, you didn’t do as you were told?”
She nodded. “I don’t know what came over me.”
“You said your parents don’t know that you don’t love Branford?”
She snorted at that. Her hands nearly fell from the cravat. “Of course they know. I think they’d be surprised if I did.”
Mr. Forester’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
She concentrated on the knot, weaving the stiff fabric through itself and pulling tight. “My parents have raised me like a prize heifer since the day I was born. Status, power, position at court, reputation. Those are the things that matter to them most.”
“And not their daughter’s happiness?”
She tugged a bit too hard on the cravat. “It’s not—it’s more complicated than that.”
“Is it? You’re not a piece of chattel to me and I’ve only known you two days.”
She tugged hard again, trying to ignore those words. “I’ve always known what was expected of me. It’s my duty to make a good match.”
“But can’t you make a good match and one you actually might enjoy at the same time?”
“There is no better match than Lord Branford.”
“That’s your parents’ opinion, not yours.”
“‘Do as you’re told, Sarah,’” she whispered. She gave him a smile that didn’t reach her eyes, then tugged the cravat one last time. Mr. Forester was pulled off balance. He grabbed her shoulders to steady himself. His large hands cupped her shoulders and Sarah closed her eyes.
He righted himself and pulled his hands away.
“I obviously don’t know my own strength.” She laughed and reached up again to pat the cravat. “There, a mathematical knot.”
Mr. Forester’s jaw was rock hard and he was staring above her head. “I heard those are quite fashionable.”
“You heard right.”
She moved away from him and walked over to stoke the fire with the poker. She tried to banish the memory of his bare chest from her mind, the smell of him, like soap and firewood, and the look in his eye when he’d told her she wasn’t a piece of chattel to him. Then the feeling of his hands on her shoulders… Dear God. For the first time in her life, she’d wanted a man to kiss her.
She quickly shook her head, clearing it of such unhelpful thoughts. “‘Do as you’re told, Sarah,’” she murmured. She wrapped her arms around her middle. She was engaged to another man, for heaven’s sake. “I hope the weather turns soon. I must leave as soon as possible. I need to get home.”
