“No, Mrs. Colthrust, I am most certainly not interested in Mr. Hopscotch.”
“Well, I might be,” she said, watching him walk away. “He’s not so dashing as some gentlemen, but he doesn’t have a bad look about him either. Did he happen to say whether or not he was married?”
“Of course not, and that was the furthest thing from my mind while we were talking,” Louisa said.
“Well, doesn’t matter right now anyway. I see he is already leaving. I’ll have to meet him another time, but I will make some inquiries about him. I’ve been looking for Gwen. Have you seen her recently?”
Louisa started scanning the ballroom. “No. The last time I saw her, she was dancing with Mr. Standish. That was several minutes ago.”
“Maybe she’s in the retiring room. I’ll check there and you look on the other side of the dance floor. Perhaps she’s standing in a corner by a large urn like you are.”
“Could we meet at the front door? I think I’m ready to go home.”
“I suppose we have been here long enough, but I don’t know how you and Gwen will ever find a husband if we continue to leave early each evening. Go, go. I’ll meet you at the front door.”
As soon as Louisa located Gwen, she was going to find Bray and let him know she now knew the truth of why he’d finally decided to comfort her.
A movement out of the corner of her eye caught her attention. It was the door to the courtyard opening. Gwen walked inside. Louisa expected to see Mr. Standish come in right behind her, but Louisa’s feet halted and her stomach felt as if it fell to the floor. It was Bray who walked in after Gwen.
A soul-shattering pain ripped through Louisa.
Bray had been in the courtyard with her sister? A feeling of betrayal washed over her. Her hands curled into fists. Gwen turned back to Bray, and they spoke quietly before she hurried away. Louisa didn’t know which emotion she felt strongest—anger, jealousy, or hurt that Bray would dare try to woo her sister. She could forgive him for ignoring her for two years, for having no patience with the girls, even for keeping the Prince’s intentions from her, but she would not forgive him for pursuing her sister.
With single-minded purpose, she strode over to him, pinioned him with a glare, and in a frosty tone said, “How dare you take my sister out to the courtyard for a romantic interlude!”
Bray’s eyes narrowed and he folded his arms across his chest. “I thought we had established long ago that I will dare anything, Louisa.”
“But my sister!” she whispered earnestly. “I knew you were a scoundrel of the highest order, and you keep proving it to me day after day. I can understand you seducing me, thinking you would then be able to force me to marry you so you can do the Prince’s bidding. I was a more-than-willing victim, but seducing my sister is unforgivable.”
The courtyard door opened again, and they had to move out of the way to let the couple come inside.
“What did you say about the Prince?” he asked.
She knew they were attracting attention and noticed a couple of ladies were looking at them, but at this point she didn’t care who knew she was angry with the duke.
Keeping her voice low, she said, “Yes, I know there is a dirty little secret between you and the Prince. Mr. Hopscotch told me that you are trying to force me to marry you in order to save the Prince, or England, or both from some kind of scandal. I don’t care if Napoléon miraculously raises another army and threatens England once again. I will not marry you.”
“Good.”
She blinked. “Good?”
“Very good. Did he tell you why he is desperate for us to marry?”
“Only that it would cause a huge scandal for the Prince and England if we didn’t.”
“It will. Our Prince has wagered the Elgin Marbles.”
“What?”
“Yes, the dirty little secret is that the Prince wagered the Elgin Marbles to the Austrian archduke that we would marry by June one. Mr. Hopscotch came to see me within a week of you coming to London, Louisa. He has been to see me several times, always impressing upon me the need for us to marry.”
“I didn’t know what it was. He didn’t tell me.”
“Oh, that’s right, the Prince’s minion told me not to tell, but when have I ever done what I was told to do? When I suggested that you should ask me to marry you that night in your house, the Prince’s wager and what he’d asked me to do never crossed my mind! A man pays his own gambling debts. I have told this to Hopscotch repeatedly. As far as I am concerned, those damned stones will be just as well taken care of in a museum in Austria as in England. If the Prince loses them, maybe that will teach our glutton of a prince a lesson that he shouldn’t raid England’s treasury and antiquities on foolish wagers.”
Louisa was trying to make sense of his words about the Elgin Marbles, but Bray didn’t give her time to think. He kept talking.
“And as far as Gwen, Louisa, do you really think I would try to seduce your sister after I have made love to you?”
