“Why should you think I would care?” she lied, not able to get her voice above a threadbare whisper.
“Because I have seen the way you look at him now and the way you looked at him then,” Kilgore replied, his gaze matching his soft voice.
Her shame, her embarrassment was so great she wanted to disappear. It was senselessly and sickeningly familiar. “Why should I believe you?” she asked, abandoning all pretense, still ridiculously desperate to find a reason not to take him at his word, not to take Asher’s own father at his word. Tears stung her eyes, and she blinked them back. She was a fool.
“Why shouldIlie?” he shot back.
“You wish to seduce me.”
“I have come to the conclusion that I could never accomplish that.”
“You sound relieved,” she said faintly.
“I am both relieved and irritated that you are a woman of such character. You are a rare species amongst thetonand only the second such female I am not related to who I have known in my life. The two of you make my life more complicated.”
“Are you referring to Lady Constantine?”
“I never said that.”
“You are protecting her,” Guinevere stated, firmly believing it.
“Forgive me, Lady Guinevere.”
It was the closest she would get to a confession from him. She knew it to be so.
“For what?” she asked, cold bitterness filling her. She wished a man loved her so much that he’d do anything to protect her. Quite obviously, Kilgore loved Lady Constantine just that much.
He looked suddenly as weary as she felt. “For telling you,” he said simply. “I did not want to.”
He sounded so miserable, it was impossible not to believe that he had not wanted to reveal what Asher had done, which meant Kilgore was almost certainly telling the truth.
Her knees felt suddenly weak. “I need to sit,” she said and fairly shoved past him to go to the closest chair which faced his aunt.
The woman looked up from her knitting and smiled. “Hello, Lady Constantine,” she said, seeming to confirm Guinevere’s suspicion.
Kilgore plopped into the chair next to Guinevere. “Auntie, this is Lady Guinevere. You are confused.”
Guinevere’s head and heart ached, and there was a heavy feeling in the pit of her stomach.
“Lady Guinevere?”
She had not even realized that she was staring at her slippers until Kilgore called her name. She took deep breaths until she was strong enough to raise her head and look at him. “Why did you choose this act for today? To make people think we are having some sort of liaison?”
He simply stared at her, which vexed her greatly. “It could ruin me, you know, if you follow today with more attention toward me. That is, unless you mean to follow it with an offer.” She could hardly believe she had said that, but in the moment, she was beyond caring about propriety.
“Is that what you want?” His stare delved into hers. “An offer from me? You do not strike me as the sort of lady who wishes to be shackled to any man just to have one.”
“For myself, I do not care,” she admitted, “but I have sisters.”
“Ah, I see.” He nodded. “Do you want an offer from me?” he repeated.
“Are you extending one?” Her heart had stopped beating, not out of anticipation but dread. She was about to enter into a union devoid of love.
“I will if you wish it, or I can vow not to give you a bit of attention after our skit so that anyone of reason will assume the skit was just a skit.”
Anyone of reason?She had no notion what he meant by that, and she was mentally too taxed to try to dissemble his words. For herself, she no longer cared about love. Her heart felt dead. But what of Lady Constantine? She could not ruin someone else’s chance at happiness. She would simply have to find someone else to marry for her sisters’ futures to be ensured.
“No, do not extend me an offer,” she said, a suffocating sensation tightening her throat.
