Page 66 of The Lady's Last Mistake
Without more conversation, they got underway, the two of them alone, enclosed in the interior of his carriage. He breathed evenly and kept his attention on the window. Flakes of wet snow collected on the glass. The silence intensified with every passing minute. His fingers drummed on the black superfine encasing his thighs. He needed to say something.
Grant turned away from the window, and she was waiting for him. Their eyes connected, and he could not look away. Not without appearing cowardly.
“Mr. Youngdale hasn’t been located.”
Cassie lifted her chin, and he saw her disappointment. She wanted to speak about the kiss. He could not think of anything he would like to discuss less.
“Hugh suggested he could be keeping Isabel in anundisclosed location. Or perhaps the aunt was lying, and she is helping Youngdale after all.”
He kept his words flat. Emotionless.
Cassie took a bracing breath. “Shouldn’t we speak of what happened the other night?”
His eyes clashed with hers again. He then squared his shoulders. “No. It was a mistake. Let’s leave it at that.”
Cassie stared at him as if a realization was dawning, one that now slid through her like oil. She made no reply, and Grant again looked out the window. “The marquess is going to test the veracity of this courtship. Are you prepared to keep up your end of the bargain?”
“My end? You rule over all of this charade, Lord Thornton. Not me.”
He looked at her again, the void between them yawning wide and hollow.Good. It was what he needed.
“Can you make the marquess believe you are interested in my suit or can you not?” he asked.
Cassie breathed thinly, her temper beginning to visibly flare. And why shouldn’t it? He was being unforgivably callous.
“I will make him believe it.” She ground out each word. At the chilled glare that followed, Grant had the notion that she was devising something in that crafty mind of hers.
Neither of them spoke another word as the carriage bore them across the Thames, toward Lindstrom House in Kennington. For as long as Grant could remember, he’d considered the place a prison. Though it faced the distinctive and landscaped Oval, it was the wild lawns out back of Lindstrom House where Grant had preferred to spend his time when he’d been younger. There were some outbuildingswhere he’d taken shelter if the weather was cold or rainy, and he’d kept them stuffed with supplies—hampers of food, pilfered bottles of his father’s good whisky, books, and blankets to keep warm.
Almost always, one of his brothers would find him and drag him back to the house, where he’d receive a lecture from the marquess regarding his irresponsible behavior and commands to strive to be more like Lawrence or Harold, or at the very least, like James.
As the carriage stopped, Grant realized he was about to lead Cassie into a house that had, from the beginning, seemed to swallow him whole whenever he entered it. Not once had he possessed even a shred of true confidence within these walls, and if he was going to pull off these next few hours with any semblance of success, he would need all the confidence he possessed.
Grant handed Cassie down onto the pavement out front of Lindstrom House and noted that her slippers made deep impressions in the snowfall. By the time they made it to the front step, they would be soaked.
“I can carry you, if you’d prefer to keep your feet out of the snow,” he said, though immediately wished he hadn’t offered. He could not put his hands on any part of her body again.
“Carry me? Don’t be absurd,” she snapped, and then started forward without him.
Half thankful and half vexed, he followed, flecks of snow shuttling into his eyes. The front door whisked open before he could bring down the knocker, and upon entering, the voices of his brothers and their wives barreled into his ears. They were a loud lot and always had been. Hisfather’s longtime butler, Harding, greeted them with a bow.
“Welcome, my lord. My lady,” he said, taking a second bow toward Cassie. The footman, a new one Grant did not know, divested her of her snowy pelisse and gloves, and then took Grant’s outer trappings.
“The marquess and his guests are in the drawing room,” Harding intoned.
The butler started away, expecting them to follow. With an arm gesture for Cassie to proceed, she gave Grant her back and crossed the entrance lobby. Gray was the overarching theme inside Lindstrom House. A cold pewter. Grant recalled yellows and greens when he’d been young and his mother had been alive, but after her death, the marquess had tried to eradicate all traces of her. Any memory of her would be salt in an open wound. When Sarah had died, it was the closest Grant had ever been to understanding his father.
A moment before Harding announced them, Grant braced himself. Then slipped his arm under Cassie’s, hooking it. The touch sent a bolt through him, and surprise was still bright on her face too when they entered the room together.
His father stood, along with Lawrence, Harold, James, and Penelope’s husband, Alfred.
“Lady Cassandra, may I present my father, the Marquess of Lindstrom; his heir, Lawrence, the Earl of Cranfield and his wife Lady Cranfield; Lord Harold Thornton and his wife, Lady Priscilla; Lord James Thornton; and Mr. Alfred Farrington and his wife, my sister, Mrs. Penelope Farrington.”
Had he been in any typical humor, having spat out thatmouthful of introductions, Grant would have made some quip about his family having more members than the Houses of Parliament. But he couldn’t find it within him. A heaviness had settled in his chest and stamped out any humor at all.
His siblings and their spouses, and his father too, greeted Cassie in turn, who continued to clutch Grant’s arm. He was almost positive she was tightening her grip due to nervousness. Even still, he was entirely too aware of her arm against his.
“We wondered if the snow had hampered your carriage,” Harold said.
