Quint rose. “I know what I’m doing, Lady Madeleine. I don’t need your advice.”
She rolled her eyes. “That’s what men always say. You do realize that you almost lost her tonight?”
He inclined his head civilly, but inside, his stomach pitched and roiled. “I won’t lose her,” he said. “You can be certain of that.”
Later that night Quint rose from where he lay beside Catie’s warm, naked body. He paced the room and eventually went to sit at his desk. He had more work to do tonight, and the new rules his wife had forced him to agree to would not lighten his load.
He looked at his sleeping wife. Her goddamn cousin was right; he’d almost lost her. She’d almost slipped right through his fingers while his mind was on political matters. The thought terrified him, even now. He would have probably said or done anything she’d asked to get her back.
He didn’t know what terrified him more—that he was completely at his wife’s mercy or that he no longer seemed to mind that he’d lost control of their relationship.
She had all the power now. She all but had him in the palm of her hand. If he were not careful, he would soon find himself in love with her.
Quint swallowed and glanced back at his wife.
Did she feel anything for him? Did she love him?
Damn! He rose and paced the room. He didn’t need her to love him. Her needed her to trust him, to obey him, to host his friends.
He didn’t need her to love him.
And yet he wanted her to, he wanted to hear her say those words.
He’d made love to her tonight with a possessiveness he did not know was in him. He would never let her go. Never. But he would not abandon his dream of the Cabinet position either.
Quint looked at the papers on his desk. The two desires—his wife and his career—should not be mutually exclusive, but increasingly Quint feared that’s exactly what they were.
Chapter Twenty
“No, that one is too white,” Madeleine told Josie. She held up another sheet of vellum from the sheets spread over Valentine’s dining-room table and admired it. “What about this one?”
Josie huffed. “There’s absolutely no difference. Those two papers are exactly the same shade.”
“Ridiculous,” Maddie scoffed, holding the first up again. “This one is bright white. This is ivory. What do you think, Mr. Meeps?”
Catie looked up from the menu she was trying to perfect and watched the poor, overworked Mr. Meeps look from one of her cousins to the other. The small man pushed his glasses back on his nose. “I think—”
“This one, right?” Josie said, holding her choice out.
“Don’t influence him!” Maddie broke in. She waved her choice at him. “This is better, is it not?” Catherine shook her head. “Leave poor Mr. Meeps alone, girls. The invitations are Valentine’s responsibility, and I told him he had to do it himself.”
“But, Lady Valentine, his lordship has given me leave to make decisions in his stead,” Meeps told her.
“I don’t care. He is going to keep to his end of our bargain. Either he does the invitations or there are none.”
“Good for you, Catie!” Josie said, applauding.
Catherine smiled, but it was short-lived. Valentine’s housekeeper bustled in and said breathlessly, “The table covers you ordered are here, milady. Where should I put them?”
Catie pressed her lips together and thought for a moment. “The drawing room, I suppose.”
“But milady, we can hardly open the door for all the items crammed inside. You told Webster to store the extra tables in there yesterday.”
“Oh, that’s right.” Catherine glanced at Josie and Maddie for help. They blinked back at her. “Um, I suppose we have no choice but to put them in Lord Valentine’s study.”
Mr. Meeps shook her head. “Oh, no, Lady Valentine. I do not suggest—”
“You absolutely must taste this cake!” Ashley said, rushing into the dining room, a slice of white cake balanced on a fork before her. “It’s divine. We should order at least three for the ball.”
