Say No to the Duke (The Wildes of Lindow Castle #4) - Eloisa James Page 0,5
with hazel eyes and cheekbones that came straight from some ennobled ancestor.
Her father liked him.
Her brothers liked him.
Aunt Knowe trusted him. She’d waved her hand and sent Betsy off with Lord Greywick without the faintest concern. Actually, since she sent them to the billiard room unchaperoned, she probably wanted Betsy to marry him.
Putting her family’s approval to the side, the viscount had no need to marry for her dowry or her status, so presumably he wanted her. He wasn’t lustful, precisely, but his eyes were warm and appreciative.
Betsy tried to make herself feel excited about that and failed.
“It is indeed a refusal,” she said, withdrawing her hand. “I regret to say that we would not suit, my lord. My answer is no.”
“Why not?”
That stumped her. No one had anything bad to say about Viscount Greywick. He was, hands down, the most elusive and sought-after bachelor in London. She hadn’t even tried to lure him, and yet here he was.
What could she say?
You’re a paragon and I have a weakness for rascals?
Or, worse: I’m so bored at this moment.
“We don’t know each other,” she said, realizing the moment the words crossed her lips that her reasoning was weak. She’d given him an opening to tell her about himself, or worse, suggest that they spend time together.
“Is there someone else?” the viscount asked. “Because if not, and with your permission, I would like to attempt to convince you otherwise.”
By now, the wedding guests knew that she had left the ballroom with a future duke. Lord Greywick was the picture of rectitude. He would never spend time with a young lady in private unless he had permission to ask for her hand in marriage.
The ton would be surprised to find that she had refused him, but they wouldn’t doubt it had happened.
The battle was over.
Won. Done.
A low, rough voice answered him before she could. “You should take him.”
Betsy barely stifled a curse that would have shocked her suitor. “For goodness’ sake,” she cried instead. “I should have guessed that you’d be hiding here.” She slid sideways so she could see around Greywick’s shoulders.
Sure enough, the bane of her existence was regarding her lazily from the corner of the room.
“I am not hiding,” Jeremy Roden protested, managing to sound halfway sober and—even more surprisingly—almost convincing. “To return to the important point, Greywick is a good man and was cleverer than the rest of us at Eton. That includes your brothers, by the way. Not me, but then I put myself in a different category.”
The viscount, who had swung about, chuckled at that. “I assure you that we all put you in a different category as well, Lord Jeremy.”
“Ne’er-do-wells?” Betsy suggested. “Or perhaps Lord Jeremy was already cockeyed with drink at that early age.”
“Tsk, tsk,” Jeremy said, regarding her with an expression that never failed to irritate. “Proper young ladies don’t use words like ‘cock.’ I’m pretty sure angels don’t either, and you happen to be wearing a halo at the moment, if you’ll forgive my reminder. Angels probably don’t even know what a ‘cock’ is.”
The infuriating thing was that everything in her prickled into life the moment Jeremy Roden threw down one of his challenges. He was an intoxicated mess of a man and she still—
The viscount intervened before she could come up with an appropriately blistering response. “I thought I saw you across the ballroom, Lord Jeremy. I was glad to hear that you returned from the army safe and sound.”
Perhaps Greywick had no idea what Jeremy had endured in battle, not that she did, precisely. But the viscount was about to say one of those commonplace things that would make darkness roll over Jeremy’s face like a storm moving in over the ocean.
“I’m amazed that you missed the spectacle when Lord Jeremy stalked off and left poor Miss Peters on the edge of the dance floor by herself,” Betsy said quickly.
Jeremy’s dark eyes moved to her face, and to her relief, exasperation smoothed away that other expression, whatever it was.
Well, exasperation or perhaps pure dislike.
She let her smile widen, just to annoy him even more.
She’d decided weeks ago that he was better off irritated than despondent, and fortunately for Jeremy Roden, she had an aptitude for irritating men, thanks to growing up with all those brothers.
Her adopted brother Parth had been the first to put a frog under her covers, probably in league with Alaric. The second time was definitely Alaric, though North had something to do with it.