Abandoned to the Prodigal - Mary Lancaster Page 0,14
Just because of lies in a so-called newspaper everyone despises!”
“Well, he has ambitions to follow his father into politics and thinks he needs to be pure as the driven snow, even though Lord Alford won’t die for decades yet. I suppose he could stand for election to the House of C—” She broke off as the rest of his question penetrated her nervous brain. “Do you really think I’m beautiful and charming?”
“You must know you are. I can’t have said anything you haven’t heard a hundred times before.”
“People do say such things,” she admitted. “But I’ve always known it was more to do with who my father is than my own attractions.”
“You must have believed your betrothed, surely!”
“I believed in his devotion,” Juliet admitted. “He did say very sweet things, not about such nonsense as beauty but about his feelings for me. I felt very lucky, very honored to have won such a man. Only I hadn’t. His words were even less honest than the poetical rubbish about my eyes and lips and the way I turn my wrist in a beam of sunshine.”
“Your wrist?” Daniel repeated, apparently entertained. He lifted her hand from her lap, pushing back the glove with his thumb to reveal her wrist, which he examined with curiosity. “It’s very slender and elegant, certainly. As wrists go, it’s a very pretty example. But did someone truly write a whole poem about it?”
“Well, one verse. He wrote it out on parchment and sent it to me with a rose. I thanked him civilly, but I confess I laughed.” She smiled painfully. “However, he has the last laugh, since I promptly betrothed myself to Jeremy Catesby.”
“Do you regret your poet now?” Idly, his forefinger stroked her wrist beneath the glove. She rather liked the sensation, but her mind was more on his question.
She shook her head. “No. I just regret my own stupidity.”
His finger stilled. “It isn’t stupid to expect loyalty from friends or family or betrothed husbands.”
Tears prickled behind her eyes. “I had all the advantages birth and wealth could bring me. And still, I am not good enough.”
“Good enough for what?” he demanded, squeezing her hand in a comforting way. He even dragged it to his lips and dropped a kiss on the back of her wrist. “For some gutless little weasel? Trust me, you deserve much better than that.”
She let out a watery little laugh, hastily dashing her hand over her eyes.
Unexpectedly, his arm came around her in hug. “There, don’t cry,” he said comfortingly. “You’ve got home by yourself, and I’m sure your family will take care of everything. You are much better off without the weasel.”
Just for an instant, she let herself hug him back in gratitude. “You have been so kind to me, Daniel. Thank you.”
She was about to draw back, and his loosening arm was about to let her, when their eyes met, and she paused. A lock of black hair had fallen across his forehead. It came to her that his dark eyes, serious for once, were extraordinarily beautiful. As was the rest of him, in a careless, masculine kind of way. Her heart gave a funny little flutter.
A frown tugged at his brow. “Would you mind if I…? Oh, the devil.” He leaned closer and kissed her, a brief, sensual caress of his lips that parted hers the instant before ending.
Casually, he released her, dragging his arm back to his side. “A kiss of friendship,” he said, “so don’t get in a miff.”
She blinked to dispel the daze. From somewhere, laughter bubbled up. “A miff?”
He grinned. “Well, I wouldn’t blame you. Even I know kissing you is not considered proper, but it seemed appropriate at the time. Or at least irresistible.”
“I think you are the most outrageous person I ever met, and you don’t even know it.”
“But I am harmless. Mostly. Do you think your mother would receive me if I called?”
“She’ll probably be grateful in the circumstances! But would your grandfather not object?”
“I agreed to go and see him, not be locked in his mausoleum for a week.”
Abruptly, Gun struggled into a sitting position, throwing off their feet and squashing their legs while he sniffed the air around the door.
“Don’t you dare,” Daniel warned him.
“Oh, we are coming up to Myerly,” Juliet noticed. “Has he been here before?”
“No. But he’ll have caught a whiff of some unknown animal, like a cow or a sheep. I should probably put him on a leash. If only I had one.”