Page 21 of The Viscount's Unwanted Bride
Provided he didn’t want to killher, of course.
Sophie looked uncharacteristically serious as she whispered, “If you don’t marry him, you might be ruined.”
“I know,” Kate admitted.
“But even if you don’t, I’ll stand by you.” She raised her chin, her blue eyes defiant. “It’s just… it’sunfair.”
Kate didn’t argue. She agreed with Sophie. But some things wouldn’t change overnight, and society’s expectations of young unmarried ladies were one of them.
“Do you think he’s truly a killer?” Sophie asked, glancing around as if afraid Lord Blackwell might be hiding behind the curtains, listening in. “Did he seem violent?”
Kate tilted her head back and forth. “I only spoke to him for a few minutes. He came across as being solicitous but perhaps not overly fond of society’s rules.” After all, he hadn’t introduced himself, and he’d not thought twice about escorting her to the balcony.
Sophie’s nose crinkled. “You must have gotten some kind of impression of the man beyond that.”
“Not really.” Kate wished she had more to offer. All she knew of him was that he had an air of mischief about him that contrasted with the weightiness she’d thought she’d noticed when she’d seen him prior to the ball.
Boden coughed discreetly into his handkerchief. Kate jumped in place, shocked by his presence. She hadn’t noticed him enter.
“Lady Bowling is at the door, my lady.”
“We’re not at home, Boden,” Lady Drake called as she swept into the room. “Good lord, that woman is a dreadful gossip.”
“Understood, my lady.”
“Wait.” Lady Drake stopped him. “The only person we are at home to is Lord Blackwell.”
Boden bowed. “Very well, my lady.”
Lady Drake turned to Kate and Sophie. “I suggest you hide somewhere deeper in the house. No doubt Lady Bowling is only the first caller of many. Everyone will want to know what happened at the Wembley ball, and what better way than tocome by under the guise of being concerned for your well-being?”
“We’ll go upstairs,” Kate agreed. “If Sophie wants to stay.”
Sophie rolled her eyes. “Of course I do. You need me. We can sit in that window in the library with a view of the front door and keep watch.”
That was as good an idea as any, so Kate went along with her, although she darted into her bedchamber to retrieve her sketchbook and a pencil before heading to the library.
“Would you like tea?” she asked Sophie, realizing she should have done so earlier.
“No. I wouldn’t mind one of Mrs. Baker’s cakes, but not quite yet. Let’s get comfortable first. Something tells me you’ve had a long night.”
“You’re very perceptive.”
They arranged their armchairs in front of the window, and it wasn’t long before a pair of women similar in age to Lady Drake approached the front door and knocked. Boden turned them away.
Kate sank lower into the chair even though she knew they weren’t visible from the street. The last thing she wanted was to feel like she was on display.
And yet, as one person after another traipsed up to the door and tried their luck at persuading Boden to let them in, she couldn’t help feeling like she was theton’schosen entertainment for the weekend. Very few of them actually cared about her. They just wanted to be the one to hear what actually happened between the previously faultless Lady Katherine Drake and the notorious Lord Blackwell.
When Kate couldn’t stand watching for a moment longer, she began to sketch Sophie, from the slightly upturned slope of her friend’s nose to the freckles she refused to hide beneath powder,to the faintest lift at the corner of her mouth that always hinted at trouble.
“Do you think Andrew will challenge the viscount?” Sophie asked, propping her chin on her hand.
“I hope not.”
“That would be romantic, in a way.”
Kate made a noise of disagreement. “Do you know what would have been romantic? Lord Blackwell telling those terrible gossips to mind their own business and then waxing poetic on the beauty of my eyes or some such thing.”
