Page 11 of Defying the Earl
“I am truly sorry, my lady.” Nate tried to seek her forgiveness. “I swear to you, I was not bandying your name about heedlessly. Those two louts were at my side when you came along last night. They thought to twit me about your coldness toward me.” He paused for a moment. “In fact, it could be said that you bear some of the blame. If you hadn’t tried to give me the cut, they wouldn’t have even thought about you.”
Nate wished to cut out his own tongue when Beatrice recoiled from him as though he had struck her.
“Really, my lord?” she asked in a scathing tone. “You are going to try to sit there with a straight face and claim this is my fault? That’s rich.”
Nathan couldn’t blame her for her derision. He was surprised she hadn’t wrenched her hand from his grasp and slapped him with it. He was grateful she hadn’t. The small hand was giving him more comfort than he could have ever expected. If only she wasn’t his aunts’ paid companion, he thought with a weary sigh. She was obviously perfect for him in so many ways. Not that she was at all interested in him, he reminded himself, remembering her reaction to Lady Frampton’s suggestion that she allow him to court her briefly. It was obviously anathema to her.
“You are, of course, absolutely correct, this is not in the least your fault, but I am not truly to blame, either. I promise you, I did not seek this situation at all.”
“Of course, you didn’t, my lord,” she replied, sounding weary. “I am well aware you have no interest in courting me. Since we are all in agreement that you shall lose your wager, can you not just tell them it is impossible and pay whatever it was andbe done with it? If you’re going to have to pay either way, why would you even consider going along with it however briefly? And surely it is to court scandal to even consider the appearance of courtship and rejection.”
“I am unlikely to be scathed by it, my dear, so you needn’t worry about that. And we can be sufficiently careful that your reputation need suffer no harm.” He paused for a moment, wondering how much he ought to tell her. “The thing is, Beatrice, if I didn’t accept the wager, there was another fellow who wished to do so. He doesn’t have the scruples I do. You would not enjoy being courted by him.”
Beatrice frowned. “Surely I could refuse his courtship just as I am trying to do with you. You don’t know what you’re asking of me, Braxton,” Bea protested, and Nathan wondered what she wasn’t telling him. She sounded truly troubled by the thought and her hand had begun to tremble once more. “Please, say there is some other way.”
“I’m sorry, Beatrice, but I truly don’t see any other way. I can assure you, you don’t want to have the other fellow trying to court you, that is for certain.”
She narrowed her eyes at him and her chin lifted. No longer trembling, she suddenly looked fierce and irritable.
“You cannot know that for certain, my lord. Perhaps he and I would suit.”
Everything within him rejected the thought. He would never allow his Beatrice to be in Robertson’s questionable presence. He should never have allowed those two drifters to take him up in the first place. He really was the only one to blame for the situation he had gotten both himself and the lovely lady before him into.
“Would it really be so terrible to allow me to court you?” he found himself asking, much to both their surprise if the aghast expression upon her face was any indication.
“How can you ask me this?” she demanded. “Yes, it would be dreadful. And the aftermath would be even worse. I cannot believe you would think I would even consider it, although I really shouldn’t be so surprised in all reality.”
Nathan was reasonably sure there was an insult in her words, but he wasn’t sure what it was. While it was true that he had flirted with her in the past and then left without further word, he had never made her any promises. Did she think she had been jilted? Had she worn the willow for him for these two years? Was he truly being callous toward her feelings?
“Could you please explain the problem to me, my lady?” he finally asked as calmly as possible, hoping to retain control of the situation. “What do you mean by aftermath? And how would that be worse than being seen to be courted by me? We were friends once. Would spending a little bit of time with me be so very terrible?”
“We weren’t friends, my lord, we only thought we were. And the aftermath would be other gentlemen courting me. I don’t want men of thetonto be reminded of my presence, to be frank. It happens from time to time. If I am noticed at some event, gentlemen come calling. I don’t want that.”
“They are not appropriate gentlemen for you, Beatrice, give them no mind,” Lady Charlotte called from the other side of the room, not even bothering to pretend she and Lady Frampton weren’t listening to their conversation. Bea cast her a slight smile.
“What sort of gentlemen?” Nathan demanded of the room at large while retaining possession of Beatrice’s hand.
“Usually gentleman with a passel of motherless children,” Lady Frampton answered caustically after the slight pause made it obvious Bea wasn’t going to answer.
“Why is that the only gentlemen who come calling?”
“Do you consider me countess material, Lord Braxton?”
Nathan almost swallowed his tongue with his shock over her frontal attack. How was he supposed to answer her question? She clearly hadn’t meant it as a real question, though, as she didn’t leave much time for him to answer it.
“I am not viewed as the sort of eligible young debutante who would wed a titled gentlemen and become a Society matron. Gentlemen with motherless children don’t see me, Beatrice Harrison, they see a young and healthy paid companion. I’m the perfect solution to their dilemma. But I don’t want that for myself. I might consider someone looking formycompanionship, not someone merely looking for any available companion. That is a significant difference.”
“What do you mean by saying you might consider? Are you not in search of a husband? This littlecontretempsmight be a solution for you,” Nathan insisted.
“For one thing, my lord,” Beatrice began scathingly, “This is not a little anything,” she exclaimed using her fingers as though to make quotation marks around the statement. “This is a very large, messy disaster that I had no involvement in the making. I don’t care if it was prompted by my lack of warmth toward your greeting last evening. That was my right and did not invite my name to be bandied about in betting books.”
“No, of course, you’re perfectly correct, my lady. I very much misspoke when I said that.”
Bea nodded, not very mollified by his words. “For another, no, I am not one of those ladies who think a husband is going to be the solution to my problems. I think men cause the problems and this is a clear support for my theory. So no, I do not wish to be courted, pretend or otherwise.”
“But Bea dear,” Lady Frampton called, trying to be kind in her delivery but evidently growing impatient with Beatrice’s reluctance to accept the situation. “Whether you like it or not, the situation is upon you. It’s much like after your mother passed and you were sent away to school. There was nothing you could do but accept the best solution you could find.”
Nathan didn’t like being the cause of something that might compare to the loss of her parent, but he didn’t protest audibly. His aunt continued.
