Page 5 of The Proposition
“Modest? Good Lord, man, you will own the entire south of France by year’s end from what I hear; that is hardly what I would consider modest.” Frank shook his head, tumbling his dark curls this way and that. “Wealthyandhumble. Is it true you’ve taken up a different kind of sport?”
Audric stared at him, knowing perfectly well what he implied.
His eyes widened as if afraid. “You’re now a kind of man hunter?”
“Clemency Fry,” Audric prompted him, weary. He didn’t suppose a man of Frank’s country narrowness had the imagination to understand how Audric spent the majority of his time.
Frank turned and set down his sherry on a folding table near the liquor cabinet, flustered and maybe disappointed, then led Audric back through the room of cherrywood bookcases and embroidered sofas to the open double doors, where they joined the handful of gentlemen surveying the field.
“I can arrange an introduction, Cousin, of course, but we shall have to find some other maiden to tempt you,” Frank explained. His jacket was crooked; his cravat sprayed with a fine mist of sherry.
“And why is that?” Audric knew, but this was a play, and he would respect the script.
“Well, because you see she is quite attached, and expected to marry soon.”
“Marry whom?”
He braced to hear the name, knowing it would send a delicious shiver of deadly anticipation down his back. And it delivered.
“Lord Boyle,” Frank said, playing his part beautifully.“You wait here, Cousin, I will bring her to you. Perhaps instead you might be interested in her sister, Honora. She too is very pretty, prettier some say, and recently widowed.”
“Perhaps.” Audric would consider no such thing.
“I will return shortly,” Frank promised with a flash of a smile before disappearing into the crush of people veering away from the gallery and back into the ballroom.
Audric did not wait idly; he kept his vigil, studying every face that went by. Hunting. It was tedious to stare at so many strangers in turn, but his diligence paid off. Before Frank could return, he spotted a familiar face. Well, familiar in that he had seen a small portrait of the man, a likeness kept in a large silver locket. But the resemblance could not be clearer. The thin nose, ivory skin, and garish red hair. It had to be him.
The woman accompanying him bolstered Audric’s suspicions; she fit the description of a fair-haired, freckled, rather short young woman. Her face was now glossy and pink from exertion. Audric took one step outside the billiards room, ready to follow them at a discreet distance. As he eased into the crowd, the young woman turned toward him, glancing over her shoulder, and somehow, of all the dozens of folk she might have laid eyes on, it was him she saw.
Audric almost gasped. Her eyes were startling, gray and icy, and within those arresting eyes he saw a hint of confusion and something else, something he knew intimately, something that had been his bosom companion for the last five years: rage.
3
Clemency hugged herself, following Turner out into the vicious cold. The contrast stole her breath away, for the dance had grown hot enough to make her dizzy, but one step outside the door and she was covered in gooseflesh. Her dancing slippers crunched across frost, teeth chattering as Turner strode to the ornate bannister at the edge of the south-facing veranda. He appeared immune to the cold, and immune to her pleading, his back to her as he gripped the railing and sighed.
But she was not deterred, not by his icy reception or the icy weather. This was the first attention he had paid her all evening, and she was determined to take advantage of it.
Clemency marched up to him, arms still wrapped around herself for warmth.
“Why will you not dance with me?” she asked. No, demanded. “Turner. Look at me. Please, will you look at me?” He would not.
“I have no interest in dancing this evening,” he muttered. His shoulders had bunched up around his ears.
“And yet you happily led Tansy out!”
Turner let go of the bannister to rub his temples. “She is your sister by marriage, of course I led her out.”
“I thought I was to be your wife.”
That drew only another disgruntled sound from him. More and more infuriating. Clemency threw her hands up in the air, pacing back and forth behind him. Other couples emerged from the large doors at the back of the house, bringing with them snatches of the merriment inside, but Clemency ignored them. Let them see how desperate his behavior had made her, it didn’t matter to her anymore. He had already humiliated her by refusing to dance, repeatedly, rudely snubbing her.
“Truly, Turner, I have resorted to begging just for a scrap, a morsel of your regard, when only months ago I could do no wrong in your eyes. You pursued me relentlessly, followed me like a trained puppy, and I, a woman who thought never to be induced to marry, accepted you. What has changed so?” Clemency stopped, eyes fixed on the back of his head. “Please, I beg of you, just tell me what have I done to give such offense? Do you even wish still to marry me?”
At last she heard him draw in a ragged breath, and his words began slowly at first, then came faster and faster, building in volume and intensity. A dam had broken, and she was standing right in the path of it.
“The Clemency I fell in love with could not give two figs about marriage, or romance, or sentiment, or any of it! You were a sphinx, but now you are a kitten!” He whirled to face her, raking both hands through his hair, his cheeks prickling with red heat. “One whiff of an engagement and you are a completely different woman. Perhaps your so-called aversion to matrimony was simply a ruse all along, a snare meant to entrap me!”
Clemency glared up into his face. “Ah. So nowIam theliar?” He scoffed and turned away again, retreating to the railing. “Forgive me. Forgive that my affection for you was too ardently and genuinely given once I knew that you shared my regard. Forgive the intensity of my feelings—”
