Page 38 of A Dash of Scot
“What if there were a lady I was interested in?” Poppy’s face flashed before his mind, smiling, eating her iced cream—but the image blurred and then he saw her glaring at him from across a drawing room.
“Then I suggest you get in touch with her as soon as possible and see if she’d be willing to say ‘I do’ with you before the time is up.”
Dougal grimaced.
“What is it?” Aunt Judith’s tone was impatient. “Might as well tell me, as we’ve already crossed the lines of propriety by discussing how to thwart your current fiancée.”
“She’s no’ my fiancée.”
“Only according to you.”
Dougal felt like stomping his foot and groaning and shouting as he might have had he still been a lad—he was starting to feel much like one.
“There is a lady I’ve been acquainted with for some years. I had hoped to…to ask her to be my wife at some point, but I wanted to woo her more. She can be quite hard to read sometimes. And well, at the moment, she rather dislikes me.”
“Does she need to like you to say yes?”
Dougal gave an exasperated expression.
“Ah, you do not know if she’d accept.”
“Aye. Sometimes, I’m not certain she even likes me. And in the current hour, I’m certain she hates me.”
“Why is that?”
“Because she knows about Lucia Steventon and believes I was using her for my own entertainment.”
Aunt Judith gasped, her hand fluttering to her wrinkled neck. “You didn’t, Dougal. Shame! I ought to have you whipped.”
He frowned for half a second until he realized what she thought he was implying. “Oh, for shame, Auntie, no’ that. I merely flirted. A kiss or two.”
“A kiss to a woman is all but a declaration of love,” she said, her cheeks flaming, and she whipped open a fan to cool herself—either that or to shoo him away. “Unless she is a doxy.”
“Miss Featherstone is no doxy.”
Now, it was Aunt Judith’s turn to frown once more. “Poppy Featherstone? As in Mary’s husband’s sister?”
Dougal let out a long, affected sigh. The news was bound to come out at some point. Might as well be now without Mary hovering nearby to box his ears or plan some other form of revenge. “Aye, the verra one.”
“Oh, dear me, Dougal. You’ve really stepped in it.” Aunt Judith leaned back in her chair as if he might have a plague and she feared catching it.
“I have. And I think Mary is using my affections for Poppy to punish them.”
“She has always been a jealous sort.”
“It makes no sense.”
“She wants to be the most important lady in Edward’s life.”
“She is the most important lady in Edward’s life. She’s his wife.”
“Aye, but a mother and sisters can sometimes get under a man’s skin.”
Dougal laughed. “No’ likely with that one. Mary has got herself wrapped around him like a lethal snake. And before you admonish me for saying such about my sister, I do apologize for being unkind.”
“Think nothing of it. Whatever is said here will not leave the room. Besides, that might be true concerning Edward, but Mary doesn’t always think that far ahead. To her, three women invaded her domain.”
“She’s getting worse.”
