“If you did, Lord Huntington, you would have kissed me in the garden that day, without ever considering whether it was proper or not.”
His gaze drifted over her face, narrowing on the telltale flush on her cheekbones. He wanted to tell her the truth about why he hadn’t kissed her that day, but what if it became garbled somewhere between his brain and his mouth, and he said it wrong? What if he tried to describe the panic he’d felt when he’d found her in the garden in her torn gown, with Wrexley looming over her, and made a mess of it?
But he looked into her face, at the proud jut of her chin, and the next thing he knew, he was speaking. “Propriety had nothing to do with it.” He traced a finger over her jaw, his voice soft. “I didn’t kiss you because I knew Lady Beaumont was there, just on the other side of the hedge, listening, and I…I couldn’t let her hear that.”
Surprise flitted over her features, and then, for the first time since he’d entered her bedchamber, her face softened.
“If I had kissed you that day, would we still be betrothed? Would you really jilt a marquess over a single kiss? Because even if I kept dozens of mistresses and wagered on every lady in London, not a single one of them would jilt me for it.”
She shrugged, but her throat moved in a nervous swallow. “Any one of those things is sufficient reason to jilt someone, isn’t it?”
As far as society was concerned, wagering and debauchery didn’t disqualify a man either as a gentleman or a husband, especially if that man also happened to be a marquess. “I don’t care if it’s a sufficient reason. I only care if it’syourreason.”
Her eyes searched his, making his breath stop in his chest, but then she pulled back. Not far, but far enough to let him know he’d gotten too close. “No. I jilted you, Lord Huntington, because I can’t…I don’t want to be a marchioness.”
Finn stared at her, once again shocked into silence. She didn’t want to be a marchioness? It was the last thing he’d expected her to say. His preference for Lady Honora, his mistress, his shocking preoccupation with silk scarves and blindfolds—she could have given any number of reasons to justify jilting him he would have no choice but to accept, butthat?
“Doesn’t every lady want to be a marchioness?”
She let out a heavy sigh. “No, they don’t. But even if I did aspire to the title, I wouldn’t…I don’t want to beyourmarchioness. I won’t be—that is, I don’t think I can do justice to it, or to you.”
Finn continued to stare at her, amazed. She was beautiful, accomplished, clever—a diamond of the first water. Why should she think she wouldn’t make a worthy marchioness? “I don’t understand. I chose you because I believe you’d bring honor to the title.”
“No. That isn’t why you chose me. I heard you say it yourself, Lord Huntington. You chose me because you want a lady with no inconvenient passions, no troublesome temper, and no surprises hidden under the surface. At one time I thought I could be that lady, but now…well, that’s not me, and it never can be. I can’t be the perfect marchioness, and I’ll only make us both miserable if I try.”
“What kind of lady are you?” It wasn’t what he’d meant to ask, and even as the words left his mouth a part of Finn hoped she wouldn’t answer. She wasn’this—not yet, and right now, that was the only answer that mattered.
“The kind that doesn’t become a marchioness. If we marry, you’ll regret me as your choice, Lord Huntington. Not today, perhaps, but someday.”
Finn didn’t argue, because he couldn’t deny it was true. He wanted someone predictable, steady, who’d behave with propriety like a marchioness should, a lady who’d never surprise him, and never challenge him. That was why he’d chosen Miss Somerset in the first place. Because she was naïve, docile, predictable—
Except she wasn’t, and she never had been. She was intelligent and complex, intriguing and spontaneous, and in Finn’s eyes, it made her a less suitable choice for a wife, not more so.
They stood there in the middle of the room for a long, silent moment after that, until Finn roused himself, and cleared his throat. “These ladies who don’t become marchionesses, Miss Somerset. What do they become?”
But he already knew the answer. Thetonwasn’t kind to young ladies who flouted the rules. Waywardness led to gossip, and gossip led to ruined reputations.
She shrugged, but the gesture looked forced. “Spinsters, I suppose.”
A strange feeling coursed through Finn then, something more hopeless than anger, or even regret, because whether she ended up a spinster or the wife of a man who didn’t care for her, it would be less than she deserved.
But she’d have him, because she had no other choice, and neither did he. “A spinster, ridiculed and sneered at by theton. Such a sad fate, for a lady who could be a marchioness.”
A smile drifted over her lips, but it was a sad one. “I’m willing to take that risk.”
Finn turned away from her, but when he reached the door to her bedchamber, he looked back, and his gaze caught and held hers. “I’m not.”
Chapter Eight
“There’s something shocking going on, and I demand to know what it is at once.”
Lady Annabel stepped from the breakfast-room onto the back terrace and gave Charlotte and Julian, who were seated at the table, an expectant look.
“What is it this time?” Charlotte was pouring more tea, and Julian was turning over the pages ofThe Times. Neither of them bothered to look up.
“Whatever do you mean,this time?” Lady Annabel dropped into a chair and held her teacup out to Charlotte. “This is the first interesting thing I’ve seen since I arrived in Hampshire. Goodness, the country is dull.”
Charlotte raised an eyebrow at her. “You only arrived yesterday, Annabel.”
