Page 27 of Bookshop Cinderella

“I’m a duke,” he said, giving her a look of mock apology. “We’re often cheeky. And I’m willing to reciprocate and let you call me Max. There, that’s friendship for you.”

She laughed, and he began to feel he was making progress. “Don’t you like your name?”

“Maximillian?” He made a face. “Would you?”

“It sounds quite ducal.”

“Even so, I don’t allow most people to call me by my Christian name, I assure you. So, you see? We have to be friends now.”

“Oh, very well,” she capitulated, “for though it’s not proper, I am coming to realize propriety makes no impression on you. As for Freddie’s sister,” she added, reverting to their previous topic, “I received the impression she was more than a friend?”

“Well, that’s my hope, at any rate. And when she expressed concern that her brother was becoming too wild, what else could I do but offer my help?”

“You seem to do that often.”

“In this case it’s self-preservation, since Freddie will become my brother-in-law if my hopes come to fruition. Besides, I’ve a soft spot for damsels in distress. What can I say?”

“Yes, you’re such a hero.”

He grinned at the barb. “Helen thinks so, since I agreed to watch over her wretched brother and keep him out of trouble until his father returns from America. Not the most agreeable favor I’ve ever done for a lady, I confess,” he added, his grin becoming a grimace, “but as a gentleman, I could hardly refuse to help keep the boy out of trouble.”

“I suspect you’ll have your work cut out for you there.”

“You have no idea,” he agreed with a sigh. “But now, thanks to the bet, he’ll be forced to behave himself.”

She frowned, understandably bewildered. “How do you make that out?”

“Simple,” he replied and proceeded to explain.

“So, that’s what you meant about them not being allowed to return to Oxford,” she said at the end of his narrative. “And having no money to spend.”

“Precisely. NowI have his promise and that of his friends to not only be discreet about our little arrangement, but also to stay on the straight and narrow path in their conduct until July, at which point they will once again become Oxford’s headache and cease to be mine. And since that will put them back in their fathers’ good graces, they will easily be able to pay our winnings when they lose.”

“And you will have fulfilled your promise to Freddie’s oh-so-charming sister without having to watch over him yourself.”

“Yes. A delightful outcome all around, wouldn’t you say?”

She studied him for a moment, a searching glance that made him wonder what she was thinking. “You do like arranging things to suit you, don’t you?” she asked at last.

“Doesn’t everyone?”

“Most of us don’t have the luxury,” she told him wryly. “Unlike your lot.”

He tilted his head, and it was his turn to study her. “You really don’t think much of us,” he said after a moment. “Aristocrats, I mean. Is that because of Freddie and his friends?”

“Well, that didn’t help, but no.”

“Then I can only conclude I’m the reason for your poor opinion of us.”

He waited, curious what she would say. Most women would be spurred into speech, either to demur out of politeness—not a likely possibility—or to explain and justify their feelings. But Miss Harlow, he was coming to realize, wasn’t like most women. She could speak her mind, as he was already well aware, but she could also refrain. She chose the latter course now, and after several moments, he was forced to admit himself beaten.

“I can see you’re of no mind to soothe my pride by disagreeing,” he said with a grin as he donned his hat, “so I won’t press you. But I do hope the next two months will serve to change your opinion—at least of me.”

She gave him that funny, quirky smile. “Don’t make any bets on that, Your Grace.”

7

For Evie, feeling like a fish out of water was not an unfamiliar sensation. Shy as a child, tall and awkward as an adolescent, neither athletic enough for games nor lively enough to garner attention, she’d always preferred to retreat behind the refuge of a book.

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