The Seduction of Lord Stone (19 page)

Marianne whitened and lifted her hand from his arm. “His Grace and I would never have suited. And Penelope is one of my dearest friends. You do nobody a service by clinging to this dream.”

“My dream would have come true if that hussy hadn’t stuck her oar in.”

“Whatever you think of me, my sister deserves your respect, sir,” Elias said coldly as shocked dismay seized him. He should have guessed long ago that more than mere aversion for a fortune hunter lay behind Baildon’s hostility. Clearly the marquess would never forgive any member of the Thorne family for the fact that Cam and Pen had fallen in love and as a result deprived his daughter of a duchess’s coronet.

Baildon must have realized that he’d gone too far. He made a conciliatory gesture with one hand. “Your pardon, Wilmott. I had no right to talk down your sister in your presence.”

Which, Elias noted, didn’t withdraw the insolent remarks. About Pen or about him.

“Look, lad,” Baildon said with the closest thing to affability he’d managed. “I know you’ve got your eye on my girl. No sin in that. But she’s not for you.”

“Papa, I do have a mind of my own.” The softness of Marianne’s tone in no way lessened its determination.

“Aye, you do. You’re no silly chit, ready to tumble into the clutches of the first pretty fool who winks in your direction.” Baildon turned to Elias and spoke in a clipped tone. “I’d thank you to take yourself off, Wilmott.”

What a bloody disaster. Today Elias had hoped to claim Marianne as his. Instead, all he’d done was drive her further away. Suffocating frustration lodged in his chest. If she accepted Desborough while she was in Wiltshire, Elias wouldn’t know until the official announcements. That prospect struck him as unendurable.

“Lady Marianne—” he started, knowing it was too late to save his cause.

She sent him a blank look and stepped away so he couldn’t even kiss her hand in farewell. “Good morning, Lord Wilmott.”

Hurt and anger flooded him. She dismissed him, and he had the galling suspicion that if he didn’t go, Baildon would tell the footmen to throw him out, scandal be damned. With the bitter knowledge that today’s debacle threatened to place the one woman he’d ever loved permanently out of reach, he bowed shortly to the marquess and marched out.

Anna Campbell has written ten multi award-winning historical romances for Grand Central Publishing and Avon HarperCollins and her work is published in sixteen languages. Her most recent full-length release is
A Scoundrel by Moonlight
(Grand Central Forever, April 2015). Anna has won numerous awards for her Regency-set stories including
RT Book Reviews
Reviewers Choice, the Booksellers Best, the Golden Quill (three times), the Heart of Excellence (twice), the Write Touch, the Aspen Gold (twice) and the Australian Romance Readers Association’s favorite historical romance (five times). Anna lives on the beautiful east coast of Australia where she writes full-time.

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