And the Miss Ran Away With the Rake - By Elizabeth Boyle Page 0,102
temporary valet.”
She almost pitied him, for the shave he’d gotten this morning looked as if it might have been done by a blind man.
Nicked, battered and rumpled, and still he wouldn’t confess.
And whyever not? She’d spent nearly every waking minute trying to answer that one question.
What was it Lady Zillah had said about him? You are too nice by half. Respectable and kindhearted.
Was he not telling her the truth—that he was Dishforth—simply because, as a man of honor, he wanted to avoid hurting her?
Or might it be a way of avoiding a scene when she discovered his deception?
Certainly she was avoiding the moment when he discovered she’d known of his duplicity all this time and could well have put her foot down . . . including saving him from that butchering barber . . .
One thing was for certain: it made little sense that Lord Henry was attempting to avoid marrying her by running off with her all the way to Gretna Green.
Which left her right back at the beginning of this terrible muddle, to the one possibility that tended to haunt her in the middle of the night:
What if he was simply waiting for her to cry off? To beg him to turn the carriage around and take her back?
Waiting for her to disavow Dishforth so they could return to Owle Park, where she would be whisked away by her family in a complete state of ruin and he could go about his normal existence—his Seldon reputation affirmed and no one overly shocked as to his hand in all this.
After all, he was a Seldon and allowed a few scandals.
And her? Well, she’d be ruined and shuttled off to the farthest reaches a Dale could travel.
Yet when Daphne looked at Lord Henry, or caught him studying her—on those rare moments when he thought she wouldn’t catch him—she felt, oh, how she wondered how he could remain silent.
If only . . . if only . . . he’d kiss her again.
Then she’d be able to know . . . she was sure of that.
But he hadn’t tried. Not once in these past few days.
Apparently such mischief was only for the confines of Owle Park.
She glanced down the now empty road and sighed. At least they had the basket the innkeeper’s wife had packed for them this morning—even though they hadn’t ordered one. The thoughtful lady had insisted, saying that it was impossible to know what was ahead but anything could be faced better with a full stomach.
So Daphne had accepted the proffered basket gratefully.
Looking back, one might suspect the lady had known what was in store for them.
But how could she have known? Ridiculous, romantic notion, really.
As if the entire Manchester-to-Glasgow road was conspiring for them to fall in love.
Fall in love. Too late, she would have told them all.
Glancing over at Lord Henry, where he was bent beside a hedge examining something—she frowned, for romance was in very short supply on this misguided and unwitting elopement.
But when he turned around, she realized how wrong she was. In his hands, Lord Henry held a fistful of forget-me-nots.
He walked over to her—well, a Seldon never just walked, they had this way of striding about as if the very soil beneath their boots was theirs to command.
He handed the flowers over without so much as a word, and she took them.
Now he’s going to confess, she thought, biting her bottom lip in anticipation. Now he will finally tell me.
And she dared to look up.
The moment their gazes met, it was so magical—wasn’t it to him?—that it left her trembling. Her heart hammered, her throat went dry, her every limb was a-shiver, as if calling out to him to sweep her into his eager grasp.
But once again, Daphne found herself disappointed.
“Yes, well,” he began, before he turned from her, took up the basket and headed over to the low stone wall by the side of the road. He nodded toward the flowers clenched in her hand. “Perhaps those will last until we reach Gretna. They can be your wedding bouquet when you find Dishforth.”
Like the music sheet back at Owle Park, the forget-me-nots very nearly ended up being tossed at a Seldon’s head.
Very nearly.
Since Lord Henry had made off with the basket, she had no choice but to follow. He’d climbed over the stile and plunked down in a spot under the large oak and was plundering the basket like a pirate by the time she joined him.