Page 46 of Historical Hotties
And Cassius… the only man who had ever shown Dacia any attention had evidently done the same with Amata. There had been nothing special in the compliments he’d paid her because he’d done it before– with a young woman who didn’t have thehandicap of freckles all over her face, and perhaps a thousand others, too.
It wasn’t just her.
God… she felt like an idiot.
“Then please visit with him since you came to see him,” she said, lowering her gaze and backing away. “I will not interfere.”
At that point, she was already turning around, heading for the keep, but Cassius called out to her.
“Lady Dacia,” he said. “Wait, please.”
Dacia kept going. Cassius called to her again and she started to run, all the way up the stairs and disappearing into Edenthorpe’s keep.
Cassius watched her go with a heavy heart.
“I wonder what’s the matter with her?” Amata asked as if she didn’t really care. “It is of little matter, I suppose. I shall find out later. Will you come into the hall with me, Sir Cassius?”
Cassius turned to look at her. Then, he pulled his arm away from her grabbing hands, stilling them rather firmly when she tried to grab him again.
“Nay,” he said steadily. “I shall not go into the hall with you. You came to see your cousin, so go see her.”
Amata’s face fell. “But… but we had such a nice time yesterday,” she said. “I thought you would be glad to see me.”
“I have no time for a visit, my lady.”
Amata was starting to look hurt. “What have I done to make you cross with me, Sir Cassius? Please tell me so that I might make amends.”
He looked at her, seeing the petty, vain, and spoiled girl he’d suspected from the start. She had been pretty to him, once, when he’d first met her. But her manner and her personality had cancelled out any beauty he thought she might have had. The disappointment on Dacia’s face when she had realized why her cousin had really come had sealed that opinion.
Cassius didn’t do very well with petty, vain women.
He’d seen too many of them in his lifetime.
“We had three dances yesterday and that was all,” he said evenly. “I’ve danced with a hundred pretty girls and they are all the same to me, including you, so think not that there was anything special with a few leaps and twirls. You were a few pleasant moments to pass the day with and nothing more. So if you’ve come to Edenthorpe because you thought I wanted to see you again, I am afraid you are gravely mistaken. Anything you thought I might want is a creation of your own mind. If you’ve really come just to see me, then you may as well return home. I am not interested.”
Amata was red in the face when he finished, deeply ashamed. “That is a terrible thing to say to me,” she said. “How dare you!”
Cassius cocked an eyebrow. “Feeling humiliated, are you?”
Amata was near tears. “If that is what you intended, then you succeeded.”
He pointed to the keep. “Now you know how your cousin feels,” he said. “Clearly, you made her think that you had come to visit her when it was me you really wanted to see.”
Amata opened her mouth to retort but nothing came forth. She huffed and stomped her foot, grunting unhappily.
“You’ll not school me on manners, Knight,” she said. “Dacia is my cousin. She knows I love her.”
He sighed impatiently. “Does she?” he said. “It seems to me that when I told you that I was coming to Edenthorpe, you made a point of warning me against your cousin with her witch’s marks. You mentioned that to simply look upon her was to be cursed. Is that what you tell everyone, Lady Amata? That your cousin has witch’s marks and she turns men to stone like Medusa?”
Caught in a web of her own design, Amata backed away from him. “Shedoeshave marks on her face,” she said defensively.“You just saw them, for she was uncovered. Everyone knows she has the marks!”
“Everyone knows because you tell them,” he said. “I was a virtual stranger and you told me, humiliating your cousin in the presence of a stranger. Why on earth would you do such a thing?”
Amata didn’t have an answer. Instead, she began to seethe. “Rude,” she hissed. “You are rude and horrible and I hope I never see you again, Cassius de Wolfe!”
Cassius looked at her for a moment before breaking down into a weak grin. “That can be happily arranged,” he said. “But remember one thing– you, my lady, are not nearly as pretty as you think you are. Your cousin, Dacia, is more beautiful than you could ever hope to be.”
With that, he walked around her, heading towards the keep because it was clear that he cared more about Dacia’s feelings than her own cousin did. He felt badly enough that he wanted to see to her, to make sure she knew he had no designs or intentions towards Amata. Odd that he should want to make that clear to Dacia, but he did. But as he walked, he noticed that Argos was not beside him and turned in time to see the dog lifting his leg on Amata, peeing on the back of her dress.
