A Portrait of Love (The Academy of Love #3) - Minerva Spencer Page 0,54
held her ground.
“I ask you not to go against my will on this matter, Miss Keyes.”
“Or what? You will cancel my commissions and refuse to pay me for my time?” She raised her chin. “Go right ahead. I will be glad to leave this place behind and never return.”
“I will pay you for your time and I still expect the portraits to be delivered.”
His emotionless tone drove her beyond common sense, beyond self-preservation.
“Or what?”
His thin lips flexed, but it was not a smile. “I do not engage in the exchange of baseless threats, Miss Keyes.” He paused to let that sink in and do its work.
Goose pimples rose on her naked arms, but she refused to look away.
“None of us have any choice in the matter of your marriage to my brother. I cannot have my family’s name dragged through the filth in this way. My brother has dishonored you in my home, in front of my guests. He knows there is only one thing to do now, and so do you.”
She shook her head. “Trust me when I say I am deeply grieved by any harm I have inflicted on your family name. But you are the Duke of Plimpton. Surely your credit in the world is high enough to suffer such a setback.” She rushed on, not waiting for an answer. “In any case, I will not sacrifice my future for your reputation. I will get commissions, even with this black mark against my name.” She gave a shrug that was far more insouciant than she felt. “And if I do not, I will simply pack up my things and go to the Continent. My father left me in a position that does not require me to either marry or work.”
She might as well never have spoken.
“I will give you two weeks to consider my brother’s offer and return the appropriate response, Miss Keyes.”
A disbelieving laugh broke from her. “I don’t need two weeks, your grace. The answer is emphatically no.” Honey shook her head and tried to calm down. “This will pass, sir—for both of us. We are strong enough to weather such a small tempest.”
The duke nodded slowly. “That might be true—you might weather this scandal.”
Honey cocked her head, as if she were straining to recognize a tune, but could not quite hear the notes. “I beg your pardon?”
“I understand Lady Winifred Sedgewick lives with you—the Earl of Sedgewick’s widow,” he added, just in case Honey didn’t know who her dearest friend was.
The tiny hairs on the back of her neck rose. “What of it?”
“She is a woman of limited means who makes her way as something of a matchmaker.”
“Why are you asking about her?”
“Two weeks, Miss Keyes.” He turned and opened the door to the room she’d just left.
“Your grace,” she said, but he did not stop. “Why are you asking about Lady Winifred?”
He disappeared inside the library and the door clicked quietly shut behind him.
Chapter Seventeen
Honey could not believe how thrilled she was to be back in smoky, smelly, crowded London; back in her relatively small, snug house; back in her less than luxurious bedchamber—at least when compared to her accommodation of the past weeks.
Freddie, of course, knew something had happened to Honey during her trip their very first night.
They had eaten dinner together, just the two of them, since their other housemate, Serena, was now working at the country home of the wealthy young industrialist Gareth Lockheart.
“You look different, Honoria,” Freddie said as they sat down to tea in Honey’s favorite room, the tiny sitting room she thought of as the parlor.
“I’ve got oodles of freckles on my nose, haven’t I?” Honey said, purposely misunderstanding her friend’s gentle probing. “I’m afraid I was outside in the sun and forgot my hat several times.”
Freddie was the last person to ever push or pry. As close as they’d been for the last six years, they had never spoken of their pasts.
Oh, Honey had talked about her father, of course, but never about her girlhood infatuation with Simon Fairchild.
An infatuation which had officially ended just after midnight on her last day at Whitcomb.
“Have you seen Miles?” she asked her friend, hoping to lead the topic away from herself.
“Yes, he has returned. He will come to dine tomorrow if you are free.”
Honey reached across to take the teacup and saucer. “I have no plans.” She shook her head at the offer of biscuits and sat back in her favorite chair, kicking off her slippers and tucking her