The Devil She Knows - By Diane Whiteside Page 0,12
he loves you?”
Did he have to look as if he pitied her?
“Yes. My only doubts are my ability to be a good wife, a good English wife,” she asserted and silently damned her old playmate for reigniting all her old qualms.
St. Arles was a charming conversationalist—but he sparkled most when the topic was himself or he was on duty, as a diplomat serving his queen. He somehow turned tariffs into a series of jokes about the strong devouring the weak and thereby drew even her father’s most insular political cronies into his charmed circle. Yet he’d never exerted himself to discuss her family in detail. Instead he’d shared details about the run-down estates he’d inherited and his dreams of Britain’s future glory.
Gareth’s eyes narrowed, as if he were scouting a trail across very rocky terrain.
“Portia, I’ve asked the women of the town about him. The women of ill repute,” he emphasized.
“Gareth!” she protested, appalled by his forcing such harpies into this day’s solemnity. “Why are you telling me—”
“He treats them very poorly.”
She gaped at him. Albinia Townsend might believe female ignorance was the best road to marital happiness but Viola Donovan had no such hesitations. Portia considered herself quite well informed about intimate matters between men and women. But what did a bachelor’s wild oats have to do with her?
“Black eyes and split lips are the least of it. Two girls have suffered broken arms in the past—”
“No!” Portia flung up her hand. White ribbons fluttered from her mother’s bible like an Indian’s delicate amulets.
“One day, he’ll handle you the same way. Your only hope is that he needs your healthy body to bear his sons.”
“He calls me his princess and swears life will hold no meaning for him until I am his wife.”
“Your father’s gold doesn’t drip from his fingers yet,” Gareth said crudely. “Grow up, Portia, and start seeing the world the way it truly is, not a bonbon offered on a silver platter to you.”
She slapped him. The few hopes she still cherished, that Gareth Lowell might one day see her as a lover, fled screaming from her memories’ bleeding grasp. St. Arles might not be perfect but at least he wanted her, unlike Gareth.
He caught her wrist and held it, breathing just a little too fast. His eyes narrowed under their dark brows and she was fiercely glad she’d finally riled him up enough to shake his self-control.
“If you’re marrying him because you want to hurt me—”
“Don’t flatter yourself!”
A muscle twitched hard in his cheek before he inclined his head, silently agreeing with her.
Why did that make her want to hit him again? Couldn’t he acknowledge at least a bond of friendship between them?
“At least remember William and Viola Donovan will always take you in. You need only turn to them, even when you stand at the altar.”
“Are you mad? Do you know how much gossip that would cause?” Even her corset seemed to gasp in outrage.
Gareth released her as if dropping a scorpion. “Better a little chatter now than a lifetime of bitterness. But you can trust William and Viola to do—”
“What? The most notorious deed possible?” Walter Townsend’s golden tones resonated through the drawing room, harbingers of the famous orator and backroom politician he was. His wife hovered at his shoulder, smugly certain of both her position and the situation’s outcome.
Portia gulped unhappily. She could imagine several endings for this encounter, none of them gracious. She immediately caught her train up, ready to move in any direction.
“Why, everything possible for their niece, of course,” Gareth said smoothly, betraying no discomfort whatsoever. “Excuse me, sir, I’m Gareth Lowell. You may not remember me but we were introduced at the Vanderbilts’ horse race last week.”
“Vanderbilts.” Portia’s father, patriarch of a far older lineage, sniffed loudly before fixing his gaze on his daughter. “My dear girl, you are not yet ready and society abhors tardiness.”
She glanced down at herself, startled by the unjust description. Her stepmother chuckled and smoothed her dress over her ample hips, making her own bid for superiority in a blaze of over-corseted Parisian finery and clanking masses of rubies.
“And, you, young man, are an intruder.” The master of the house looked Gareth over as if a servant had unaccountably left behind dead flowers. “Society’s leaders are waiting at the church and I will not allow you to ruin our family’s triumph.”
Portia hesitated, uncertainty running like a spring storm through her veins. But staying near Gareth would only heat her father’s ire higher.