Page 16 of Whiskers and Wiles

Kat and Lord Headland both turned to the parlor doorway just as Waldorf was shown in by the butler. Lady Thistlewhite was just behind him.

Kat wanted to growl with frustration and throw her hands up. Once again, Waldorf had discovered her in too close a proximity to Lord Headland, and knowing the lunkhead the way she did, he would likely misinterpret what he was seeing once again.

“Oh, Lord Headland, you have arrived,” Lady Thistlewhite said, sweeping into the room and approaching Lord Headland with her arms outstretched and a look of sympathy on her face. “You poor man.”

Waldorf was already looking at Kat, but his expression changed to one of indignant questioning.

Kat glared back at him, visually chastising him for whatever judgmental thoughts she was certain he was having.

“Lady Katherine, have you met Lord Headland?” Lady Thistlewhite asked, holding Lord Headland’s arm and turning him toward Kat. “The dear man was married to my sweet friend, Caroline, who passed away before Christmas last year.”

“We’ve met,” Kat said, knowing she was being rude, but unwilling to show so much as a crack in her resolve to the man who had made her life a misery.

That went for Waldorf as well. Waldorf’s brow flew up in shock and alarm, and he sent Kat another, different look. That one had an uncomfortable patina of protectiveness about it that Kat did not like any more than his judgmental look.

“Are you acquainted with Lord Headland, Lord Waldorf?” Lady Thistlewhite continued her introduction.

“We knew each other many years ago,” Waldorf said in a low, flat voice.

“Lord Waldorf.” Lord Headland bowed curtly to Waldorf.

Lady Thistlewhite either did not catch the undercurrents in the room or she did not wish to acknowledge them and let them affect her supper party. She was fortunate enough to havehelp in diffusing the suddenly volatile situation as the butler announced more guests.

“Lord and Lady Sumac, your ladyship,” the man announced, showing a grey-haired couple into the room.

Kat breathed out reflexively the moment she was no longer the center of attention, particularly since Lady Thistlewhite drew Lord Headland across the room and away from her to make more introductions. That only left an opening for Waldorf to approach Kat, however.

“What is the meaning of this?” Waldorf hissed when he came close enough to speak to her without being heard by the others.

Kat turned to him, her eyes wide with offense. “What do you mean by that question, sir?”

Waldorf huffed impatiently. “Were you aware thathewould be in attendance this evening? Thathehas been widowered?”

“No, of course not,” Kat snapped in return.

She wanted to give Waldorf a large piece of her mind, but Lady Thistlewhite turned toward them and said, “You know Lord Waldorf Godwin and Lady Katherine Balmor, of course,” as she introduced not only Lord and Lady Sumac, but another older woman who had a young lady with her.

Kat forced herself to smile, and stepped away from Waldorf so that she might be properly introduced to the new arrivals. The younger lady turned out to be a dear friend of Lady Beata by the name of Lady Vivien, and the woman with her was her mother, Lady Pollock. Judging by the way Lady Thistlewhite introduced Lady Vivien to Lord Headland, Kat was beginning to see that their hostess had the ulterior motive of introducing Lord Headland to what she must have considered eligible candidates for the bastard’s second wife.

That knowledge helped nothing at all, however, as the growing company of guests finally adjourned from the parlor to the dining room, when Waldorf caught Kat’s wrist and draggedher aside to say, “I do not want you to have anything to do withthat manthis evening.”

Kat’s eyes widened, and she yanked her wrist out of Waldorf’s grasp. For the second time that evening, she found herself caught between two terrible positions. On the one hand, she wanted nothing at all to do with Lord Headland and had told him as much. On the other, she resented Waldorf’s implication that he could order her not to speak to someone simply because he did not like them.

“You no longer have a say in who I speak to or not, sir,” she told Waldorf, narrowing her eyes. “You lost that right years ago.”

“He is a snake,” Waldorf hissed in return.

“So are you,” Kat fired back at him. “A snake who does not have the right to dictate a single thing that I do or say, particularly not who I choose to associate with.”

“Kat—”

Kat turned to march on to the dining room before he could continue. Until that moment, self-preservation had eclipsed her pride. But if Waldorf intended to humiliate her in public once more by behaving as if he owned her, then she would do whatever it took to thwart him. Even if that meant joining hands with her bitterest enemy.

Five

That blasted woman!What in God’s name did she think she was doing?

Waldorf sat across the richly appointed supper table from Kat, sandwiched between the elder Lady Pollock and a Mrs. Thomasina Bowman, who Kat had taken a particular interest in, for some reason, the moment the woman and her wealthy, mill-owning husband walked through the Thistlewhites’ front door.

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