That’s why Grey had to start it on the pianoforte.”
Sheridan frowned. “Is that why your fichu is hanging out of your gown?”
Beatrice’s hands grew clammy. Lord help her, she’d forgotten to finish fixing her fichu! “I got hot.” What other excuse could she give?
“I’m sure my brother had something to do with that,” Sheridan said.
“Now see here—” Grey began.
“I took it off while we were dancing.” Beatrice struggled to gather her composure. “I was about to restore it when you came in.” She drew in a few deep breaths to steady herself. Then deliberately leaving her fichu hanging down, she approached Sheridan. “If you have something to accuse me of, Cousin, I suggest you do so.”
Sheridan shot her a remorseful look. “It’s not you I wish to accuse.” He glared at Grey.
“Don’t be silly,” she broke in. The last thing she needed was Sheridan trying to force Grey to marry her when the man clearly couldn’t stand the idea. “Grey is merely doing what you asked, and quite capably, too.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Grey shoot her a sardonic look, which told her she was doing it up brown, but she pressed on. “So I’m not sure why you must subject us to an inquisition.” She crossed her arms over her bosom . . . and the nipples still hard beneath her bodice. “What business is it of yours how I learn to dance? I’m a grown woman of some years. I can take care of myself.” She tipped up her chin. “And now, if you gentlemen will excuse me, I shall go to the retiring room to repair my fichu.”
“You might wish to go through the garden,” Sheridan said blandly. “Mother and Gwyn are returning, and I’ll be partnering one of you ladies, since Thorn is definitely heading back to town. But you mustn’t let them see you as you look right now, or they’ll make the same assumptions as I.”
She gulped down her mortification. “True. Thank you for the warning.” As she marched off to a garden door, she prayed she didn’t look as guilty as she felt.
Chapter Thirteen
Still aching to bed her, Grey watched Beatrice march off.
“What just happened?” Sheridan asked.
“Hell if I know.” Grey’s blood pounded in his veins . . . and his cock. “I have yet to figure out your cousin. She blows hot and cold.”
That was his own damned fault. His body wanted her in his bed; his mind warned him to be a gentleman. He couldn’t blame her for not knowing which one governed his true intention. Half the time he wasn’t sure.
“You shouldn’t have maneuvered her into being alone with you,” Sheridan said. “It’s not right.”
Taking a leaf from Thorn’s book, Grey said, “Has it occurred to you I might actually be looking for a wife?”
Sheridan irritated Grey by bursting into laughter. “That’s rich.” The man could hardly choke out the words for laughing so hard. “You . . . looking for a wife in the wilds of Lincolnshire . . . Don’t even try to convince me . . . of such a mad thing.”
“I do intend to marry one day, you know,” Grey grumbled.
His brother sobered. “When you do, it will be to some elegant lady as haughty and sure of her place as you. Not to the likes of my self-conscious, awkward cousin.”
Grey bit back the urge to tell Sheridan that Beatrice wasn’t awkward and self-conscious when she was in her element . . . or in his arms. But telling his brother that would only make matters worse.
That was proven when Sheridan glowered at him. “Which is precisely why I don’t like you being alone with her.”
Belatedly Grey remembered how he’d ended up here in the first place. Damn it, he would wipe that scowl off Sheridan’s face if it was the last thing he did. “How the devil do you expect me to find out about Wolfe’s involvement with the deaths if I can’t speak to Beatrice alone? It’s not as if she’ll confide in me in front of the entire family.”
His brother shoved his hands in his trouser pockets. “I told you, she doesn’t know anything.”
“She knows more than you think, at least about her uncle Armie’s demise.” Grey drummed his fingers on the top of the pianoforte. “Every time I bring it up, she gets nervous. She wouldn’t even show me the site of the accident when I asked her to. And what have you done to investigate Wolfe?”