Lady Bridget's Diary (Keeping Up with the Cavendishes #1)(34)

But after Rupert confessed what he had confessed, everything had changed. Parliamentary matters could wait. An issue regarding a drainage ditch on their Lincolnshire estate could wait. He needed only to find his brother so they could find the blackmailer and ensure Rupert’s secret was safe.

Nothing else mattered.

Which was why he was in an open carriage with none other than Lady Bridget Cavendish of the American Cavendishes, fueling rumors that there was some romance between them. It was better that the ton speak of them, rather than Rupert. Or Amelia.

It was only logical.

And yet, Lady Bridget had brought a book. They were supposed to be searching all the faces in the crowds or at the very least, giving the appearance of a suitor calling upon a lady. He hated what it suggested about his company and her interest in him that she had brought a book.

He hated that he hated that.

There was no reason for him to care in the slightest what Lady Bridget, the girl who fell, thought of him.

“Well, I tried, Lord Darcy,” she said, heaving a sigh. “My apologies that you are now embroiled in my family’s affair and stuck spending hours with me when surely you have more lordly matters to attend to.”

“Lordly matters?”

“Yes, such as stomping around your various properties, issuing orders to servants, answering extremely important correspondence with very important Persons of Quality, and generally putting on airs.”

“Is that what you think I do all day?”

“You and every other lord I’ve met since I have arrived.”

“Let me assure you that I am able to spare a few hours from my important work of strolling around my properties and answering my correspondence to search for missing siblings. After all, it has been impressed upon me that nothing is more important than family.”

He glanced at her, to see how she took his reference to their earlier conversation when she dared to do what no one else in the haute ton would do: chastise his behavior.

“I am glad you have your priorities in order,” she replied. “Where do you think Rupert has gone off to?”

“He is not with his . . . friend,” Darcy said. He’d gone to call on Frederick Croft but Croft was not at home. Not that Darcy could say that to her. “I thought he might have spoken with you.”

She was quiet for a long moment, while they traveled the length of Curzon Street. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her tapping her fingers on the book—-that book—-in a nervous manner. Something was vexing her.

“Do you think they are together?” she asked, finally.

Ah. Of course. She was nervous that her sister had run off with the man she fancied herself in love with.

“I have no idea. But it would be for the best if she were with him.”

“How could you say that?” she asked angrily.

“Because I am thinking rationally. It is vastly preferable that she be in the company of Rupert, who will respect and protect her, rather than some nefarious creature who would use her in the worst ways imaginable.”

“Well, when you phrase it like that . . .”

“Furthermore, if it were discovered or suggested that they were together, they could marry to avert scandal.”

It was the truth. It was logic. It was reason. And it was, according to Lady Bridget, a personal affront.

“How could she do that to me?” There was no denying the anguish in her voice.

He didn’t know how to reply. Especially not when confronted with the depths of her emotions. He thought she fancied Rupert because Rupert was charming, but glancing at her now, he realized she seemed actually heartbroken at the thought of him with another woman. Worst of all, he knew what he knew about Rupert and couldn’t say his brother wasn’t interested in any woman.

Darcy, being either diplomatic or cowardly, changed the subject.

“What are you reading?”

“It is Amelia’s guidebook to London,” she replied, and he felt vastly relieved. “I found it while snooping through her room because I am the sort of person who will snoop through someone’s rooms. You probably disapprove.”

“In this instance, I think it’s a laudable activity,” he said, noting an expression of slight surprise on her face. “In other circumstances, less so.”

“We shall never suit, Darcy. For I would snoop through all your things while you were at Parliament or your club or wherever you go to be lordly all day.”

“You wouldn’t find anything of interest.”

She leaned in and peered up at him. “Oh, Darcy, you don’t have any deep, dark secrets?”

He glanced down at her. At her breasts. At the wicked smile on her lips and the spark in her eye. His deep, dark secret was how much he fantasized about tasting those lips, caressing those breasts . . .

“If I had any secrets, I wouldn’t be so foolish as to leave them about where any snoop could find them,” he said stiffly.

“You would make an excellent spy.”

“Yes, in all my free time,” he remarked dryly, and she laughed.

“I suppose one could trust you not to snoop through their private belongings. Why, I bet I could leave my diary lying around and you wouldn’t read it.”

Ah, again with that diary of hers. He would rather read parliamentary reports on taxation and agricultural treatises on the latest technological advances in drainage ditches than the intimate ramblings of a young woman. She probably had pages with nothing but Rupert and Bridget written on them. And he knew she had a list of things she disliked about him, the Dreadful Darcy. No, he did not need to read all that.