“I-I’m merely a guest,” she lied quickly. “I just arrived a little late, nothing more?—”
“A guest.” His gaze swept over her with devastating thoroughness, taking in her rumpled riding habit, her windswept hair, the mud on her hem. “A plainly dressed woman, without a chaperone or a maid, looking as though she’s run for her life, about to burst into a church mid-ceremony. Do not take me for a fool.”
Heat flooded her cheeks. Whether from anger or something else entirely, she couldn’t say.
He was insufferably clever.
“Fine,” she snapped, abandoning pretense. “I must stop this wedding. Harriet is my best friend—shecannotmarry Lord Whitebrook. She despises rakes, and he’s the worst of them! I won’t let her ruin her life?—”
His eyebrows notched high on his forehead. “Ah. You must be Lady Cressida Whitaker then,” he said, as if uncovering some great mystery.
She blinked. “How do you?—”
“The bride mentioned you at her engagement party.” He tilted his head, studying her with unnerving intensity. “Though she failed to mention your propensity for melodrama. How did you even get here? Your parents would never permit you to rideunescorted. You must have eluded them this morning. Took your horse and fled.”
Every deduction struck true, and Cressida’s frustration mounted.
“Who are you?” She gave him a pointed look through narrowed eyes, her question cracking between her teeth.
He did not give an inch. “Answer my question first.”
“Fine. You are correct,” she bit out. “And yes, I left without permission. Are you satisfied? Now, let me pass?—”
“So you can humiliate your friend? Ruin her reputation and yours?” He caught her wrist when she tried to push past him. “Use your head, Lady Cressida. Storm into that church right now, and you’ll destroy her. Society will never forgive such a scene.”
Cressida’s nostrils flared. “She deserves better than a debauched scoundrel who’ll break his vows at every turn!”
“And you think causing a scandal will help her?” His grip tightened fractionally. “You’re being recklessandthoughtless. Do you ever consider consequences, or do you simply act on every impulsive whim that accosts you?”
Cressida gasped. “How dare you?—”
“I dare because someone must.” He leaned closer, and her breath caught at his proximity. “Your friend is inside that church making a choice, and it is her choice. Notyours.”
Those words made her anger spike. “It’s the wrong choice!”
“Then she’ll discover that on her own.” His voice dropped lower still, intimate and infuriating. “But if you storm in there like some avenging angel, you’re taking that choice away from her. Is that what you want? Not to mention the catastrophic consequences.”
Cressida opened her mouth to argue, and found she had no response. Because he was right, damn him. If she interrupted the ceremony, Harriet would be ruined. The scandal would follow her forever.
But surely that was better than marriage to a rake?
No,she thought, catching herself.
How could she think such a thing about Harriet? How could she wish something so dastardly on her only friend? What?—
She looked up then and met his dark brown eyes, trying to summon a crushing retort despite knowing she had none. Instead, she felt something shift in the air between them. A charge, electric and dangerous.
And then it struck her. He had known her name before she’d given it. He had known about the engagement party, known Harriet had mentioned her, known—with baffling certainty—that she could not stop this wedding. Not wouldn’t…
Couldn’t.
Why? What did this man know about Harriet’s circumstances that she did not? And why was he so determined to ensure the ceremony proceeded?
“Let me go,” she said quietly.
He seemed to consider it. “Will you try to enter the church?”
Cressida clenched her jaw once. “No.”
