Page 113 of Pride: The Rogue
Ha. And Livian was Joan of Arc risen from the grave. There wasn’t a thing this regal woman before Livian did without carefully planning each and every last detail. Nor did Livian fail to also hear something more in the duchess’ over-emphasis.
“My lady?” Livian ventured.
The duchess glided closer. She started to speak and then glanced about.
Livian tensed.
When the woman turned her focus back, she favored Livian with a charitable smile. “I trust it was not discomfiting for you find yourself presented before the other guests in such a way,” she demurred.
It hadn’t been, until Livian discovered Lachlan there. That’s when it’d all fallen apart.
She opened her mouth to give assurances.
“Truly, many people would have the very same reaction you did to finding Mr. Latimer in attendance, my dear.”
Livian’s muscles tensed. “M-My lady?” this time, her voice emerged threadbare.
“Come now, Miss Lovelace,” the duchess said succinctly. “You needn’t deny it. Your disdain for Mr. Latimer was clear to all.”
Oh, God. Her heart thundered against her ribcage. She tried to explain but couldn’t put her thoughts together to give the other woman anything that made sense—anything that wasn’t absolutely devastating and damning to Livian and Lachlan.
God help Livian—the duchess had more than enough words for both of them.
“I’d expected, Miss Lovelace,” this time, the duchess openly frowned, “given your own auspicious beginnings, you’d find yourself capable of more grace to one of Mr. Latimer’s origins.”
“No!” she cried out. Just like the obnoxious lords who’d surrounded Livian a short while ago, who’d assumed her response and reaction to be one of horror, the duchess too had reached the same opinion. “It was not that, Your Grace!” What other conclusion would Her Grace draw, though? “It wasn’t that at all. I neither know Mr. Latimer nor anything about him.”
It was the hardest lie she’d ever given—denying she’d never met the only man whom she’d ever love.
The duchess scrutinized Livian.
Some of the lady’s irritation dissipated.
“Forgive me, Miss Lovelace. It is not my intention to upset you. You must have assumed I’d included him as a potential suitor and husband for you, and, given Mr. Latimer’s background…”
Oh, what a world that would have been—one where after their fateful meeting, she and Lachlan, a man and woman each in search of a spouse, were brought together here, only to find one another.
She couldn’t hold back a pain-filled smile.
The duchess sighed. “I am so jaded by my own life, I sometimes forget how easily shocked or offended people are, and also how innocent and guileless young women are.”
Guileless women likeLivian? That was the conclusion the Duchess of Argyll reached? Livian could have laughed.
“Again, no apologies are necessary, Your Grace,” Livian said softly. “Truly.” And they weren’t.
Livian’s gaze drifted over the duchess’ intricate diamond-studded coiffure to the flames in the hearth. In her mind’s eye,Livian saw the different, older and cruder hearth Lachlan had lain before when they, two strangers at the time, shared the last room at an inn.
“Normally, I’d be more patient and understanding,” the duchess released another sigh. “I fear, however, since Mr. Latimer’s arrival, and seeing how he’s been looked down upon, I’ve become increasingly short.”
The young widow grew by bounds in Livian’s estimation.
“As Mr. Latimer will be my husband, any slight against him I simply cannot tolerate,” the duchess explained.
It took a moment before those words registered.
Livian shook her head. “Your husband?” she echoed dumbly.
“I should have known better than to judge you. It is simply since Mr. Latimer arrived, we’ve faced nothing but censorious looks and whispers.” Anger hardened the duchess’ eyes, and she began to pace. “In my own household, no less!”
