Page 77 of The Danger of Desire
Brilliana colored. “Notmyold friend. I barely know him.”
“Don’t lie to me, dearest,” Delia said. “The two of you clearly had more than a brief acquaintance years ago.”
“If we did, it is well in the past,” Brilliana said firmly. “Notwithstanding that he’s the brother of your friend, he is not to be trusted.”
“I don’t see why not. If you mean to marry for the sake of Camden Hall, you couldn’t ask for a husband better suited to handle Silas’s inheritance and help improve it.”
The woman snorted. “Have you not heard why Lord Margrave ended up abroad in the first place?”
Delia sifted through her store of gossip. “Because he dueled with a man over some woman?”
“Over somesoiled dove.A mistress the two men shared, apparently.”
“Or so the gossips say.”
“In this case, the gossips are right.”
“You know that for a certainty?”
Brilliana rose to go throw open the curtains. “I know enough. And having endured the results of Reynold’s ruling vice, I shan’t marry a man whose vice is even worse. Because the kind of men who become enamored of such women—”
When she stopped short, Delia sighed. “You’re thinking thatmyhusband is that kind of man.”
To her shock, Brilliana rushed over to seize her hands. “Then don’t marry him. To the devil with the scandal. We’ll get through it all somehow.”
Delia tugged her hands free. “He’s not like that now. And he says he’ll be faithful to me.”
Brilliana’s expression grew troubled. “Reynold said he wouldn’t gamble, yet he did.”
“Iwantto marry Lord Knightford. Mad as it seems, he makes me happy.”
“Do you love him?”
The pointed question startled her. She hadn’t thought about it, too caught up in worrying over how much he knew of her circumstances and what he’d do about them. “I don’t know,” she said truthfully. “I enjoy his company and—”He excites me physically.
No, she could hardly admit that to her sister-in-law.
“Does he loveyou?” Brilliana asked.
That was an even harder question. Somehow she couldn’t see Warren being the sort of man to fall head over heels for anyone.
And I can tell you right now that I bloody well won’t ‘look the other way’ ifyougo hunting for some other man in your bed.
Then again, did men say such lovely possessive things if theydidn’thave some affection for a woman? “I don’t know that, either. It’s not as if we’ve been acquainted with each other very long.”
“That’s what worries me.”
“Please don’t fret over it.” Delia rose. “He’s a good man at heart, I believe. Aunt Agatha said he gave me a most generous settlement, and he’s even promised to help with Camden Hall until arrangements can be made to keep it from being foreclosed upon.”
Brilliana blinked at her. “He has?”
“Oh, right. I haven’t had a chance to tell you about that yet.”
But even as she started laying out what of Warren’s conversation yesterday she could reveal, her mind kept circling that one question of Brilliana’s.
Does he loveyou?
How she wished she knew the answer.
