Page 54 of How to Lose a Lord in Ten Days

‘Oh, cease acting so injured,’ Lydia said impatiently, reaching the hallway at the bottom and turning towards the next set of doors. ‘You are far more deceitful than I.’

‘What?’

‘You pretend to be the perfect gentleman,’ she said, ‘whilst thinking everyone is below you.’

‘I do not think—’

‘You pretend to be polite and considerate and agreeable, whilst truly acting only according to your own interests.’

‘I am not—’

‘You maintain this perfect, pristine mask at all times,’ she stressed, ‘hiding who you really are—’

‘I am hiding nothing!’

Lydia’s temper was climbing, now.

‘You pretended to feel something for me,’ she said. ‘You proposed in such language as to suggest your sentiments had been caught. Saying you felt certain of me – letting my aunt call it “love at first sight”.’

‘I could not exactly correct her!’ Ashford said. ‘It would have been so rude!’

Lydia let out a disbelieving laugh. ‘Deception is more polite, is it?’

‘When have I deceived you?’

‘Oh, then I must be mistaken,’ she said. ‘You must have mentioned, in your proposal, that you only wished to marry me for my dowry. I must have simply forgotten.’

‘What are you—’

Lydia stopped in her tracks, wheeling round to face him.

‘I heard you,’ she said. ‘I heard you tell Sir Waldo that you had thought me unobjectionable and biddable, and my dowry considerable. I heard that the duchy needs capital, which I assume is the only reason you offered for me, whatever you said in your proposal.’ She jabbed an accusing finger at him. ‘I heard it all.’

Ashford stared. ‘You were eavesdropping then, too? Is no private conversation safe?

‘I am glad I did,’ Lydia said. ‘It seems to be the only time you speak honestly. Were you ever going to tell me the duchy was in “dire straits”? Or was that a surprise you were saving for our wedding night?’

‘I – I did not—’ he broke off, pressing a hand onto the balustrade as if to steady himself.

‘Do you deny deception now?’ she demanded, with another jab for good measure.

He recoiled away. ‘It does not make me a villain to consider marriage a matter of business,’ he said defensively.

‘If it is business, then I must have missed the negotiation,’ she said. ‘You never said—’

‘One does not discuss such things with one’s bride,’ he said defensively. ‘It is not done!’

‘How terribly convenient.’

‘This is the way of the world!’ he protested hotly. ‘It is the entire purpose of the Season! It is why we were all there.’

‘It is not why I was there!’ Lydia said, so angry she felt she might cry from the frustration of it, and she turned to walk away from him, but Ashford seized her hand before she could.

‘Whatever our disagreement,’ he said urgently, pressing her fingers between his own, ‘we have to be sensible. Let us call a truce and speak properly.’

‘No.’

‘I cannot think properly with you behaving so wildly!’