To Love and to Loathe (The Regency Vows #2)(44)
She lay back in bed, sipping her chocolate slowly, contemplating the view out her window. It looked unfortunately… gray.
Dark gray.
Since the world tended to look gray when there was water falling from the sky in a torrential downpour.
Which there currently was.
Every curse word Diana’s brother had ever taught her—along with a few she had picked up on her own—flashed through her mind. Weather like this meant there would be no hunting today. Which meant the gentlemen would be scattered about the house, generally making a nuisance of themselves, poking their heads into every conversation, offering a never-ending litany of unsolicited opinions, et cetera. Male things.
However, in the interest of total honesty, Diana was forced to admit to herself that this prospect was not what truly concerned her—after all, if a lady found the specter of unwanted male opinions so daunting as to force her to remain abed, she would never leave her bedchamber again. No, it was the possibility of encountering one gentleman in particular that she found so alarming.
Diana wasn’t quite sure what had occurred between herself and Willingham the night before, but it made her deeply uneasy. Their discussion of his brother’s death was unquestionably the most serious conversation they’d ever had—and it was, she thought, the most vulnerable she’d ever seen Willingham.
She had been perfectly comfortable with their arrangement when it had seemed that she would be able to continue to keep Willingham tidily in the mental box she had assigned to him: charming, flirtatious, utterly maddening. She was far less comfortable now that she had seen this other, even more appealing side to his character. Did anyone else see this, or was it only her? Even thinking that made her feel laughably presumptuous, and yet she knew that he must keep his more serious side buried deeply away, for the sake of his reputation if nothing else.
She sighed, allowing her head to flop back upon the mountain of pillows behind her. She and Willingham were too much alike—that was the problem here.
Not Willingham, she mentally corrected herself. Jeremy. The name sounded strange even in her mind, despite the fact that she had heard Penvale, Audley, Violet, and most of his other friends address him as such for years. But she supposed it was past time she started using it—after all, he used her Christian name.
Not, of course, that she had given him leave to do so. She wasn’t sure when she’d grown accustomed to hearing him call her Diana rather than Lady Templeton, but she found she rather liked it—he had always said her title with just a touch of laughter in his voice, too faint for her to object aloud but present nonetheless.
It was one of the countless things about him that made him easily the most frustrating man of her acquaintance. Or, she was quite sure, of anyone’s acquaintance.
She raised her cup to her lips only to find that it was empty—she had finished her chocolate without realizing it. Blinking down at the tray on her lap, she realized that she had eaten all of her toast, too. This was truly a worrisome sign—no matter how perturbed her mental state, Diana prided herself on being able to enjoy her meals. She sighed again and rang for Toogood. There was no avoiding it: she would have to go downstairs for breakfast.
By the time she arrived downstairs, it was late enough that much of the party had already breakfasted, leaving only a few stragglers behind. Jeremy, mercifully, was not one of them; Emily, however, was—and, more interestingly, so was Lord Julian Belfry. They were sitting next to each other at one end of the table, several chairs removed from their closest breakfast companion, and though both were silent and appeared rather dedicated to the food before them, Diana had the distinct impression that the air around them was vibrating with some sort of tension, indicating words either recently or soon to be spoken. For the sake of her own nosiness, she hoped it was the latter.
Being the shameless creature that she was, Diana loaded up her plate at the sideboard and dropped into the seat directly next to Emily. Smiling at both of them—it was difficult to say who looked less comfortable—she lifted the teapot and said brightly, “Tea?”
Belfry shook his head jerkily and gave a sort of grunt that Diana supposed she was meant to interpret in the negative; it was a far cry from his normally urbane conversation. Emily, however, gave a halfhearted smile and a nod.
“And how are you this morning, Lord Julian?” Diana asked as she refilled Emily’s cup.
“Quite well, thank you,” came the stiff reply.
“Sleep well?” she asked innocently. His appearance indicated quite the opposite—the circles under his eyes rivaled Emily’s, and she had the distinct impression that, were he not bound by the manners of good society that constrained them all, he would have taken great pleasure in telling her to bugger off.
Which was another insult she had picked up from her brother, incidentally. He had proved distressingly unforthcoming when pressed to actually define the word bugger; that, however, was what books were for.
“I feel that I should be asking you that question, Lady Templeton,” Belfry replied mildly, and Diana arched a brow, one worthy opponent acknowledging another.
“You are too kind, sir,” she said, her tone indicating that she felt just the opposite. “I myself passed quite a restful evening.”
“Indeed? How… unexpected.”
“And why should it be?” She smiled sweetly at him, daring him to state outright what he was implying. Any other man of the ton would have backed down at this point, unless he were an utter blackguard—she was a lady, after all, and it was beyond the pale to accuse her of loose behavior to her face. Behind her back, of course, was an entirely different matter, as more than one unfortunate lady had cause to know. But to make such an accusation directly… no. It would be entirely unseemly.