Page 36 of The Lady Was Lying
“To apologize and to assure you that I’ll cease bothering you.”
It took all of a second to recognize she wasn’t bothering him. Not at all. “Is that a lie?” he asked.
“I hope not.”
He hoped the opposite.
What was wrong with him? She was offering the exact thing he said he wanted, and now that he had it within reach, he no longer wanted it. Maybe he had been the one lying. Maybe he wanted to be seduced.
He opened his mouth but couldn’t figure out what to say. It would be exceedingly odd if he asked her to continue sneaking into his carriage.
When they halted, she climbed out without waiting for a footman and disappeared into the shadows.
Chapter Eight
The next morning, James had been up for less than an hour when his mother’s voice invaded his study. “Do you think it’s a good idea to align yourself so closely with the Earl of Greydon?”
He lifted his head to find her standing in the doorway with a scandal sheet clutched tightly in her fist.
“By socializing?” he asked.
“Socializing?” she repeated incredulously.
Rubbing his bleary eyes, he replied, “I have no idea what you’re suggesting. I attended a ball at the man’s house, and then we went to the theatre together one time.”
“That is not all you’ve done.” Frantically waving the paper in the air, she took a handful of steps into the room. “Are you or are you not courting his sister?”
Still off balance from his most recent encounter with Belinda, he shook his head. “Not.” He’d known as soon as he saw her in his carriage for the second time that if she kept approaching him, she would be discovered, but he hadn’t expected anyone to write about her escapades this quickly, especially since they’d never been in public together.
Had his coachman betrayed him?
Or had it been the lady herself?
“I hardly know Lady Belinda,” he added.
“Lady Belinda?” His mother’s nose wrinkled. “How many sisters does Greydon have?”
“Three,” he replied, not sure why the number mattered but unwilling to ask for clarification. The sooner the conversation was over, the sooner he’d be able to figure out what he needed to do to mitigate any damage to Belinda’s reputation caused by her late-night excursions.
“None of them are married?” his mother asked.
“The youngest is not even out.”
“Hmm. Well, there is no mention of Lady Belinda here, only Lady J.”
Of course.
He was an idiot.
As far as the public knew, he hadn’t even met Belinda, while he’d spent the entire evening in close proximity to her sister. The scandal sheets reporting on him and Jane made far more sense. “I’m not courting Lady Jane.”
“That isn’t what the paper says,” his mother replied, slapping the freshly ironed sheet onto his desk and pointing to an absolutely horrendous rendering of him leering at a young woman who was clearly meant to be Jane. In the image, he appeared comically happy, while she looked undeniably smug. The insinuation was rather damning, even if it wasn’t at all accurate.
“This paper is misinformed.”
“Is it?” His mother’s voice rose as she began reading the words that accompanied the image. “‘Newly arrived duke already off the market. Lady J desperate to be a duchess. An intimate tête-à-tête between the season’s most celebrated beauty and its most eligible bachelor suggests an imminent betrothal.’” She paused, dropping her voice to a mere whisper. “‘The Earl of G breathes a sigh of relief while Dowager Countess remains elusive.’”
“It wasn’t an intimate evening,” he countered. “The box was actually quite crowded.”
