Over the sounds of the piano, Bella could almost hear the gears in the gentlemen’s minds spinning, trying to find the chink in her armor. The way into her heart, as her mother would put it. Lady Yardley was nothing if not a hopeless romantic.
When her mother approached, Louisa stood. “I’ll go and see what the missing bachelors are up to.”
“Mr. Nix isn’t titled, but he may be the handsomest of them all,” Bella’s mother whispered as she settled next to her on the settee.
“Handsome men have proposed marriage to me before, Mama.”
“I know.” Her mother patted her arm. “And I understand you prefer a man of wit and intelligence. So do I. Why do you think I married your father?”
“Papa is handsome.”
Her mother’s mouth curved into a mischievous smile. “Indeed, he is. But he isn’t perfect. No man is.”
“I don’t seek perfection.” What she desperately wanted to add is that she wasn’t seeking a husband at all. But they’d had the conversation so many times her mother could probably recite the arguments from memory.
As if she could sense the turn of Bella’s thoughts, her mother changed tack. “Seek kindness, my dear. A kind man will bring you contentment and a home and family of your own.”
The old Bella had been just the sort to build those dreams up in her mind. She’d even sketched pictures of the home she wished to have, the children. One boy and two girls. Of course all of them would have Rhys’s blond locks. Recalling how naive she’d been, how thoroughly she’d let her fancies run away with her, all of it stung.
New Bella would never give in to such romantic nonsense again.
“Lord Hammersley is a viscount, of course. I did try for a duke.” Bella’s mother had been speaking, reviewing the merits of the various gentlemen she’d wrangled into spending two weeks in Essex. “But I thought it best not to invite the Duke of Claremont.”
“No,” Bella said sharply. She needed to get used to hearing the title and realizing it was Rhys’s now. But she wasn’t there yet. “We shouldn’t invite him.”
“You were such close friends once.” Her mother’s gaze was steady, too inquisitive.
Bella had never divulged the details of that day to anyone, but it wasn’t difficult for her perceptive mama to note her tears and Rhys’s hasty departure. But to Bella’s relief, she’d never pressed for more. She’d made overtures about inviting the duke or Rhys to a dinner event now and then, but those stopped too when word of Rhys’s reputation got back to Essex and spread through the families in the village.
“We were friends. Once. Not anymore.”
Louisa slid to a stop at the edge of the settee, her cheeks flushed, as if she’d dashed the whole way back from wherever she’d gone. “Forgive me, Aunt Gwendoline. I must speak to Bella.”
Her mother narrowed her eyes but offered them both a tiny nod of approval. Bella stood and followed Louisa to the edge of the drawing room.
“I found them,” she said in an agitated whisper.
“I had no doubt you would. In the billiard room? I hope they aren’t in their cups this early in the evening. And if they’re smoking in that room, Mama will have—”
“No, none of that. Well, they may be drinking, but what’s important is what they said. You need to know what I overheard.”
Bella arched a brow when Louisa said no more.
“Tell me, Lou.” Her cousin did have a flair for the dramatic but Bella was too out of sorts to have the patience for it tonight.
Louisa leaned in. Bella took a step closer. But rather than telling her what she’d discovered, her cousin looked around the drawing room, reached for Bella’s hand, and pulled her into the hallway.
“Loui—”
“You need to hear for yourself. If we’re quick, they’ll still be at it.”
“At what?”
Rather than answer, Louisa broke into a dash and pulled Bella along with her. At the billiard room threshold, she stooped and turned back to Bella, a finger pressed to her lips.
The men weren’t difficult to hear. Their booming laughter echoed into the hallway. Mr. Edgar Nix, the wealthy mill owner her mother claimed was the most handsome of all the gentlemen guests, and Lord Teasdale, a widowed viscount with eight thousand a year and a crumbling castle in the north of England.
“One poor fellow claimed she wouldn’t even shake his hand after she refused him. The lady is a cold one.”
“It’s true,” Nix agreed. “Gent I know still tells the tale of the time he tried to kiss her. She didn’t flinch. Didn’t push him away. Just turned to offer him her cheek. He said her skin was cold as winter.”
A scream welled up and Bella felt anything but cold. The words stoked a familiar anger inside her to white-hot fury.
Both men chuckled, echoing each other.
“Perhaps we should increase the bet. Two hundred pounds? We must have some reward. After all, we’ll have our work cut out for us and a rather chilly prize if we win.”
“Two hundred pounds it is.” Glasses clinked. More belly-low chortles followed. “Hardly worthwhile for a lady to be such a beauty if she hasn’t an ounce of passion in her.”
Bella’s whole body vibrated. Heat rushed across her cheeks and her heart beat in her ears loud enough to drown out the men’s chuckles.
She moved past Louisa, pushed the billiard room door open, and marched toward the two men.
They turned as one, eyes wide, backs stiffened in what she hoped was shame. Maybe they weren’t so craven that they were capable of embarrassment.
“Lord Teasdale.” He was the one who’d called her passionless. She was proud of herself for getting his name out in something less than a shout.
Bella strode toward him. He couldn’t look her in the eyes, but he was mumbling. She didn’t stop. Anger drove her, a vibrating outrage that was more instinct than thought.
“Miss Prescott, I don’t know what you heard—”
Bella lifted her arm to strike. Teasdale reeled back.
“Arry, don’t do it.” The voice came from behind her. Deep and warm and achingly familiar.
Bella froze. Her arm still raised. Goose bumps spread across her skin.
It wasn’t possible.
Teasdale lifted his gaze to the man who’d entered the room. The look in his eyes, a mix of consternation and begrudging deference, told her that the voice she’d heard wasn’t some conjuring of her mind.
Bella lowered her arm, breathed deeply, and glanced over her shoulder at the man she should have slapped five years ago.
Chapter Four
Arabella Prescott was not at all as he remembered.
The girl he’d disappointed at that long-ago garden party had been all softness and sweet innocence. Her hair had hung down in loose ringlets, arranged over the shoulder of a frilly candy-sweet pink gown. The same rosy shade had colored her cheeks and tinted her full lips.
The woman who stood before him now was all bold colors. She wore a rich blue velvet gown buttoned to her chin, revealing nothing of her freckled skin. A wash of crimson colored her cheeks and her wavy auburn hair was trapped under pins, though a few strands gave off a fiery glint in the candlelight.