Page 39 of In the Prince's Bed
Jealousy has no place in a rake’s arsenal, for it makes a man foolish and liable to err.
—Anonymous,A Rake’s Rhetorick
Sydney glanced at the clock in the back room where all the poets were gathered. He’d seen Katherine leave Iversley and head into the hall. So where was she? Hadn’t she been coming to offer him her congratulations?
She hadn’t been waiting when Sydney entered, and the thinning crowd had revealed no sign of Iversley inside the assembly room, either. Sydney scowled. That dashed scoundrel had probably talked her out of coming back here, the way he had tried to keep her from attending the reading.
Unsuccessfully, of course. Satisfaction spread through Sydney as he remembered Katherine’s smiles.Take that, Iversley. She came anyway, didn’t she? Came to see me.And perhaps she was waiting for him even now in the hall…
He headed for the door, but Julian stepped into his path, blocking his exit. “For God’s sake, don’t make a fool of yourself over some silly chit.”
“Stay out of it, Napier. This does not concern you.”
Jules flushed. “So it’s ‘Napier’ now? What happened to ‘my dearest Jules’?”
“Shut up!” Sydney hissed. “We’re not alone.”
“I know that.” Glancing around the room to make sure no one noticed, Jules stepped closer and lowered his voice. “The same way you know, even if you won’t admit it, that anything concerning you concerns me.”
A delicious shiver swept Sydney. Jules’s hints about the nature of their friendship became bolder by the day, and—what was worse—more accurate.
No, what was he thinking? He didn’t feel likethatabout Jules. It was unspeakable, intolerable. Sydney loved Kit. He always had and always would. Jules—Napier—didn’t understand the pure and holy love that could exist between a woman and a man, purer than the…the wicked sort of friendship Jules wanted.
“Leave me be.” Sydney pushed past his longtime friend. “You’re wrong about me and Kit. Utterly wrong.”
Pain slashed over Jules’s face. “You only wish I were, because that would mean that you are not a—”
“Don’t you even say it!” Sydney snapped. “I’ve told you time and again—all I want is to marry Kit and have a family. But you won’t listen.”
“Because that’s not what you want. That’s what you’ve been told to want. But I know better.”
Sydney swallowed. He should never have responded to Jules’s surprising kiss a few weeks ago. Though they hadn’t spoken of it since, it had changed everything between them. Worse yet, it had crystallized all that had been wrong his entire life, and made him want—
No, he didn’t wantthat.He couldn’t. But Jules refused to see their one kiss for the mistake it had been.
“I can’t be what you want, Jules,” Sydney whispered. “Can’t you see that?”
“No, I can’t.” Jealousy turned Jules’s tone bitter. “I care more about you than she ever could. For God’s sake, man, she came here with Iversley!”
When Sydney glared at him, Jules added cruelly, “Or is that the real reason you’re trying to keep her? Because you can’t bear to lose even her tohim. And all because of some silly schoolboy rivalry—”
“Don’t be absurd.” But Julian’s words rang in his ears as he headed out the door into the hall. It was true—until Iversley had started sniffing around Kit, Sydney had actually toyed with the idea ofnotmarrying her.
But the earl was infuriating, with his title and easy manner and reckless disregard for rules. Sydney always followed the rules, was terrified not to.
Except when it came to Jules.
Heat flooded his face so powerfully that he scanned the hall to see if anybody had noticed. But it was empty. No remaining audience members and no Iversley and Kit.
Dash it all if he didn’t feel relieved. Relieved, of all things! What kind of man was he?
He sagged onto a bench that sat against one wall and buried his face in his hands. When had everything become so muddled? Kit was pressing him for marriage, Mother was against it, and Jules—
He sucked in a breath. Jules wanted him toreallybreak the rules, to leave England and go to Greece with him on an extended trip. Sydney laughed madly. Mother was actually enthusiastic aboutthatidea. She thought it would separate him from Kit so he could find some “better” woman.
If Mother only knew what Jules intended for them…
A thrill shot through him that he squelched ruthlessly. He mustn’t think of Jules like that. Hemustn’t.It was wrong. The man’s plans were simply impossible. A life outside of England engaged in—No, he couldn’t.
