Page 97 of My Wicked Earl
“Miranda, love, I’m so sorry.” Colin said. “Please, can we discuss this alone?”
“It was my mother, wasn’t it?” Miranda swiped at her eyes as the Dowager took her hand. “She did this.”
“Yes,” the Dowager stated. “I cannot imagine that anyone else would have done such a thing deliberately. And your mother,” the Dowager’s shoulders sagged, “well, she did wish a different match for you.”
“Bitch,” Cam hissed.
“Yes, we all know what my mother is, Sutton. God knows, she could never allow me any happiness. I’m not surprised she would do such a thing. But, you, Colin, should have known better.”
Miranda was angry. Furious. Hurt. He saw every emotion play along her beautiful features. Disappointment. That was the worst of all of them. She may never forgive him.
“I told you how I felt about you, Colin Hartley. You chose to believe the ravings of the woman who bore you and some ridiculous curse an ancient gypsy sprouted, but notme.” A tremor entered her words. “Not me. Who loved you. I’ve loved you all of my bloody life, and yet it wasmeyou chose not to believe.”
“I never received another letter from you. Not even after the Mad Countess carved me up like a Christmas ham. Why did you never write me?” Even to his own ears the defense sounded weak. “And the ring—
“I did.” Miranda shouted. “Youleftme a bloody ring? You couldn’t be bothered to give it to me and declare yourself?
She strode over to him, angry and so hurt it broke Colin’s heart. A lone tear ran down her cheek and she wiped at it furiously. “I wrote you nearly every day. I begged you to allow me to come to you when Father told me what happened. You never replied. Nor did you reply to any of Father’s letters. It broke his heart, Colin.” She swiped at another tear. “I even tried to bribe a groom to take me to you, but Mother caught me.”
“Miranda,” Colin wanted to weep himself. This was not going at all as he’d planned. Miranda was not going to forgive him. He may as well allow Cam to beat him to death in the study. The Dowager would no doubt assist in Cam’s endeavor by using her cane. He reached his hand out to Miranda in a silent plea.
“Don’t,” Miranda stepped back, pulling her skirts behind her. “Six years, Colin.Six yearsand you never once tried to see if I’d actually married. Hiding away at Runshaw Park, brooding. Probably sitting alone in your study, drinking in the dark. Did you ever even think of me?”
God, she knew him so well. “Jesus, of course I did.”
She flinched. “When did you find out that I did not write such a thing?”
“A sherry, Sutton. Please,” the Dowager said quietly.
“Yesterday,” he winced and wiped another trickle of blood from his lip. “Your grandmother and Alex showed me a letter you were writing to Arabella. The handwriting did not match.”
Her brows raised. “I wondered why I found my unfinished letter to Arabella in my chambers as I swore I’d left it in the drawing room.” Her face didn’t soften. “So, once you realized you’d made a mistake, you came to my chambers.”
“Miranda,” he implored. “I had already decided that it didn’t matter, that St. Remy didn’t matter. I told Lord Cottingham I would not marry his daughter before I knew the truth about the letter.”
The look on Miranda’s face told Colin he had saidexactlythe wrong thing.
“You idiot.” Cam muttered under his breath, handing the Dowager her sherry.
Miranda’s eyes hardened to bits of flint and her lush mouth grew taut with anger. “What a grand gesture for you to make. You assumed I wrote the letter but forced yourself to overcome your disgust and forgive me. How fortunate I am that you decided to overlook such a large flaw in my character.”
“Christ, that’s not what I meant. Don’t you want to know why I left this morning?”
“No. I find it doesn’t matter. Now, if you will all excuse me.”
She spun from Colin, her entire body vibrating with anger as she left the room, slamming the door behind her.
A choked sound came from Cam as if he found amusement in the horrible situation. He sat down next to his grandmother.
“You should bear in mind, Kilmaire,” he said, his voice still hinting at his earlier rage “that my sister is a crack shot.”
25
“Detestable man. Coward.Ass.”
Miranda sat back against a stone bench before the topiary garden, not giving a fig if the moss covering the ancient stone stained her dress. “A flirtation? Did he think I ran around London telling every man I loved him? Or gave my virtue so lightly?”
The three topiary monkeys making their way across the rolling lawn before her didn’t answer, of course. Perhaps the monkeys were more concerned about the topiary tiger that seemed poised to attack them. The tiger was her brother’s idea. Sutton hunted tiger in the jungles and described to Gray Covington’s master gardener, exactly what he wanted.
