“That’s a very kind offer, but I wouldn’t want to interrupt your visit with Miss Woodville.”
Dashing her hopes, he was handing off his coat and the bottle of wine to Farnham before he even finished his sentence. He clearly intended to stay.
“Miss Woodville won’t mind, would you, Miss Woodville?” the earl insisted.
Marchand arched a brow at her. The glint in his eyes told her he was savoring the internal battle he knew she was waging between what she wanted to say and what she ought to say.
“Why should I mind?” she said pleasantly enough, through a clenched jaw. Everybody sat again.
Marchand took a chair across from her, because heaven forfend she should ever be spared a view of him.
“We were, in fact, just discussing a visit her brother, the Earl of Highgrove, recently paid to Lucifer’s Fall,” Sydenham said.
“Were you now,” Marchand said flatly.
“Miss Woodville is the daughter of an old friend of mine, rest his soul, the Viscount Woodville. Her brother is now the Earl of Highgrove. And Miss Woodville just popped in a few minutes ago, out of the blue.”
“How unorthodox of her,” Marchand said lightly.
Ginny scowled in her heart, because she didn’t dare scowl with her face.
“Her family was always a bit free-spirited,” the earl told Marchand, sotto voce.
This sounded as though he was actually apologizing for her family toMarchand, of all people, which made Ginny grind her teeth.
Marchand nodded sagely. “I understand. I’ve known a few libertines in my day, too.”
Nowhe was deliberately goading her.
“Oh, I’m certain you have,” the countess enthused, almost on a purr.
Ginny felt compelled to protect her family’s honor. “Oh, it’s not quite as exciting as all that, Mr. Marchand. My fatherliked fast horses,” Ginny said. “Other than that, we’re a bit dull and respectable.”
Mr. Marchand tipped his head skeptically.
“In fact, my brother never seemed interested in gambling until he heard of Lucifer’s Fall. I don’t mean to be unkind, Mr. Marchand, but I’m rather regretting that he did. Ha.” She tried to say it lightly for the benefit of the earl and countess. It emerged more tautly than she preferred.
“My dear, if Lucifer’s Fall didn’t exist, all the men would just go someplace else to gamble,” the countess said earnestly.
“We’d go someplace else to gamble,” Lord Sydenham affirmed, as if nothing had ever been more self-evident.
“They’d all go someplace else to gamble,” Marchand echoed grimly, to Ginny.
The Earl of Sydenham accepted a glass of Malbec from Farnham, who had returned with glasses on a tray. “I was explaining to Miss Woodville, who has quite charmingly and naturally been sheltered from gentlemen’s customs surrounding wagers, that gentlemen don’t typically, on a whim, tear up another man’s vowels if they’ve won fifteen thousand pounds at the gaming table.”
Every single time she heard that figure Ginny’s head went tight with disbelief. One of these times she would keel over into a swoon. Perhaps expire. Perhaps that would be all for the best.
“Ah. Is that what Miss Woodville asked you to do?” Marchand managed to sound only mildly curious.
The earl nodded sorrowfully and indulgently.
“Why, I’m afraid asking someone to return money theyrightfully won would be considered outrageous, Miss Woodville,” Marchand said gently.
The expression in his eyes was not gentle.
“Outrageous!” the earl repeated, as if relieved to hear just the word he’d been looking for all night. As if he’d been given permission to use it. “But forgivable, in light of the circumstances of her naivete.”
He smiled fondly at Ginny.
