First Comes Scandal (Rokesbys #4)(25)

“Bread?” she asked.

“We’re not savages.”

She raised a brow. “Speak for yourself.”

“You eat jam straight from the jar?”

“You don’t?”

He gave her a sideways glance. “Raspberry or strawberry?”

She threw a chunk of cheese at him.

He laughed and popped it in his mouth. “Fine, yes, I admit it. I’ve eaten jam straight from the jar. But I used a spoon.”

“So proper, you are. Next you’ll be telling me you’ve never drunk whiskey straight from a bottle.”

“I haven’t.”

“Oh, there’s no way,” she scoffed. “I’ve seen you and Edmund after a night out at the tavern.”

“Where we drank from mugs and glasses,” he said pointedly. “Gad, Georgie, do you know what an entire bottle of whiskey would do to a man?”

She shook her head. “I’ve never had whiskey.”

“How can that be?” he asked. It would be highly unusual for a well-bred lady such as Georgiana to drink whiskey on a regular basis, but surely somewhere along the way she’d had a sip.

Georgie started spreading jam on a slice of bread. “Well, I don’t live in Scotland, for one thing.”

“I suppose that would make it difficult. Your father doesn’t drink it?”

She shook her head. “Not that I’m aware.”

Nicholas shrugged. Whiskey was so ubiquitous in Edinburgh he’d forgotten that people didn’t drink much of it in England, especially this far south.

Georgie handed him a slice of bread and got to work preparing one for herself. “Here you go.”

“Aunt Georgie!”

They both looked up. Anthony was sidling over, one hand behind his back.

“Aunt Georgie, do you like worms?”

“I adore them!” She looked over at Nicholas. “I hate them.” And then back at the boys: “The more the better!”

Anthony conferred with his younger brother. They both looked disappointed.

“Clever girl,” Nicholas said.

“At least more clever than a seven-year-old.”

They watched as the two boys surreptitiously dropped a few worms on the ground. “Lofty goals,” Nicholas murmured.

She munched her bread and jam. “You do know how to flatter a lady.”

“Right,” he said, clearing his throat. It seemed as good an opening as any. “Speaking of which …”

She gave him an amused glance. “Speaking of flattering me?”

“No.” Good God. This was not going well and he hadn’t even started.

Her eyes turned to mischief. “So you don’t want to flatter me.”

“No. Georgie …”

“My apologies. I couldn’t resist.” She set her bread carefully down on a napkin. “What was it you needed?”

What was it he needed? He needed to go back to Edinburgh and resume his life. But instead he was here, about to propose a marriage of—he assumed—convenience.

Not his convenience.

Not hers, either. Not really. Nothing about her life had been convenient lately.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I wanted to talk to you, actually. It’s why I came out here this morning.”

“Not for the worms?” she asked cheekily.

This, more than anything, cemented his belief that she had no idea what was afoot.

He cleared his throat.

“Tea?”

“What?”

She picked up a flask he had not noticed. “Would you like some tea? It’s cold by now, but it will take care of your throat.”

“No. Thank you. It’s not that.”

She shrugged and took a sip. “I swear by it.”

“Right. Georgie. I really do need to ask you something.”

She blinked, regarding him with an expectant expression.

“When I came down from Edinburgh it was, as I told you, because my father wished to consult with me about something. But—”

“Oh, sorry, hold on one moment,” she said before turning toward the lake and yelling, “Anthony, stop that this minute!”

Anthony, who was sitting rather cheerfully on his brother’s head, said, “Do I have to?”

“Yes!” Georgie looked for a moment as if she might get up to enforce her will, but Anthony finally rolled off his brother and went back to poking holes in the dirt with a stick.

Georgie rolled her eyes before returning her attention to Nicholas. “Sorry. You were saying …”

“I have no bloody idea,” he muttered.

Her expression was somewhere between perplexed and amused.

“No,” he said. “That’s not true. I do know what I meant to say.”

But he didn’t say it.

“Nicholas?”

In the end, he blurted it out, just like he’d told himself not to do.

“Will you marry me?”





Chapter 7





“I’m sorry,” Georgiana said slowly. “I thought you just asked me to marry you.”

Nicholas’s mouth moved in an odd manner, as if he didn’t quite understand what she’d said. “I did.”