Page 14 of A Wallflower to Win the Viscount

‘Hamish is not stupid. He’s a lovely, friendly goose with a nice nature. It’s not his fault that he hasn’t yet realised he’s no longer welcome here. He thinks you’re friendly. He doesn’t know how mean-spirited and unpleasant you really are.’

He’s been misled by your appearance, just like I was.

‘Well, why don’t you tell it? And while you’re at it, tell the rest of them they are not welcome here either. Don’t just coo at them and call them sweetheart. Act like a grown-up, and let them know they have to stay on their own property.’

‘Tell them yourself,’ she said, then lifted her chin and strode off down the garden, followed by Fluff, Pecky, Little Honk and the bunnies. At the gate Marigold gave a little bleat and joined the parade back to her property. Only Hamish and Clawdia remained behind, but she wasn’t going to go back and get them. It would make her look more foolish than he already found her and ruin her dramatic exit.

Despite that distasteful comment about goose pie, she wasn’t worried about them. He might not like animals being in his garden, but he was the man who had gently carried a purring Clawdia back to her home, so she could not imagine him ever actually harming an animal. And in the highly unlikely event that he was unwise enough to provoke them, Clawdia and Hamish were more than capable of defending themselves.

As soon as she entered her own garden, she leant against the wall. All pretence at anger dissipated, and the tears she had been holding back flowed down her cheeks.

It’s not normal.

How many times had she been told she was not normal? She’d lost count, but she had not expected to hear such an accusation coming from the viscount.

Whatever that look had been yesterday, it was obviously nothing more than an aberration. Or, more likely, she had completely misinterpreted the situation and seen what she wanted to see. That made far more sense. How could she possibly think that a man like him would give a wallflower like her a look?

Like every man she’d met during the Season, he saw her as someone who was not normal, a woman deserving only ridicule.

By now she should be used to being treated in such a manner, but for one brief, ridiculous moment she had thought him different from all other men. When they had talked yesterday, she’d clearly deluded herself into thinking he sympathised with her plight. She’d even thought he had some admiration for her, and then she’d gone so far as to think he actually desired her, just because of that imagined look.

He was right. She was not normal. A normal woman would realise that a man like the viscount would never see her as a young woman to be admired and certainly not one he would ever be interested in romantically.

She stood upright and walked back to the house, brushing away her foolish tears. She might not be normal, but who cared? Not her. And who cared what the viscount thought of her? From now on, she would treat him with the contempt he deserved. The same contempt she felt for every other man who had mocked her, all because she did not conform to what they considered to be the typical débutante.

Chapter Four

Lucian spent the remainder of the day storming around his house, exasperation at that irritating young lady interposed with an increasing sense of guilt that perhaps he might have been a bit unfair to her and had somewhat overreacted.

The wounded expression that had flickered across her face when he’d said normal women did not spend all their time with animals but had friends, husbands and children had not been what he’d expected from a woman with an irrepressibly sunny disposition.

He suspected he had unintentionally touched a raw nerve. But how was he to know? And she had just lost him an all but guaranteed sale.

His anger was perfectly justified. Of course it was. And if it kept those wretched animals out of his garden, so much the better.

He would not allow any misplaced feelings of guilt to distract him from his purpose of selling this house.

The next day his fuming had settled down to a manageable level of disgruntlement, so he took his carriage around to visit his solicitor, determined to discover just how much damage Miss Fairburn and those infernal animals had done.

It was even worse than he’d thought.

Not only had the estate agent informed his solicitor that the couple was not interested in buying a house next door to a property where farmyard animals roamed free but he’d declared he no longer wished to represent Lucian.

The solicitor assured him he would find someone else to handle the sale, but Carruthers’s expression did not fill him with hope, especially when he mentioned that word was likely to have spread among London’s estate agents about what had happened yesterday and why his agent had chosen to drop what should have been a lucrative sale.

The solicitor’s last words caused Lucian to feel even more aggrieved. ‘Don’t worry, my lord. I’m sure we’ll find a buyer for the house eventually.’

Eventually.

If it wasn’t for that damn woman and her ridiculous animals the house would already be sold and he’d be on his way back to America. She had not only cost him that sale, but there might now be a delay while another agent was found. Then they had to find a buyer who did not mind geese and goats for neighbours.

Thanks to Miss Fairburn, he might be stuck in that hated house with all its haunting memories for heaven only knew how long. That most definitely should excuse him from any of the insults he might have impetuously hurled in her direction in the heat of the moment.

When he arrived back at the house, he stalked through the drawing room and glared out of the windows at the garden where yesterday’s debacle had taken place.

‘This is all that woman’s fault,’ he said to the empty room, clinging to his anger in case guilt once again surfaced.

Surely no one could condemn him for being furious, and his behaviour yesterday was also completely understandable and forgivable.