“Why didn’t you answer my last letter?” Victoria said, hugging her tightly.

“Because I only returned from Bath today. Tomorrow I’m being sent to France for two months to acquire what Grand-mama calls ‘polish.’ She’ll be mad as fire if she discovers I’ve been here, but I can’t just stand by and let you marry that man. Tory, what have they done to make you agree? Have they beaten you or starved you or—”

“Nothing of the sort,” Victoria said, smiling and smoothing her sister’s golden hair. “I want to marry him.”

“I don’t believe you. You’re only trying to fool me so I won’t worry. . . .”

Jason leaned back in his carriage, idly slapping his gloves upon his knee as he gazed out the window, watching the mansions parading past along the route to his house in Upper Brook Street. His wedding was tomorrow. . . .

Now that he had admitted to himself his desire for Victoria and made the decision to marry her, he wanted her with an urgency that was almost irrational. His growing need for her made him feel vulnerable and uneasy, for he knew from past experience how vicious, how treacherous, the “gentle sex” could be. Still, he couldn’t stop himself from wanting her any more than he could stifle his naive, boyish hope that they were going to make each other happy.

Life with her would never be placid, he thought with a wry smile. Victoria would amuse, frustrate, and defy him at every turn—he knew that as surely as he knew that she was marrying him only because she had no other choice. He knew it as surely as he knew that her virginity had already been given to Andrew.

The smile abruptly faded from his lips. He had hoped she would deny it the other afternoon; instead she had looked away and said, “I’m sorry.”

He had hated hearing the truth, but he had admired her for telling it to him. In his heart, he couldn’t blame Victoria for giving herself to Andrew, not when he could so easily understand how it had happened. He could well imagine how an innocent young girl, raised in the country, could have been convinced by the wealthiest man in the district that she was going to be his wife. Once Bainbridge convinced her of that, it probably hadn’t been too difficult to steal her virginity. Victoria was a warm, generous girl who would probably give herself to the man she truly loved as naturally as she gave her attention to the servants or her affection to Wolf.

After the dissolute life he himself had led, for him to condemn Victoria for surrendering her virginity to the man she loved would be the height of hypocrisy, and Jason despised hypocrites. Unfortunately, he also despised the thought of Victoria lying naked in another man’s arms. Andrew had taught her well, he thought tightly as the carriage drew up before #6 Upper Brook Street. He had taught her how to kiss a man and how to increase his ardor by pressing herself against him. . . .

Tearing his mind away from those painful thoughts, he alighted from the coach and strode up the steps. Victoria was over Andrew now, he told himself fiercely. She had forgotten about him in the past weeks.

He knocked on the door, feeling a little foolish for appearing on her doorstep on the night before their wedding. He had no reason for coming except to pleasure himself with the sight of her and, he hoped, to please her by telling her about the Indian pony he had arranged to have put on one of his ships from America. It was to be one of her wedding presents, but in truth he was absurdly eager to see her demonstrate her skill on it. He knew how beautiful she would look with her graceful body bent low over the horse’s neck, and her wondrous hair glinting in the sunlight. . . . “Good evening, Northrup. Where is Lady Victoria?”

“In the yellow salon, my lord,” Northrup replied. “With her sister.”

“Her sister?” Jason said, smiling with surprise and pleasure when Northrup nodded. “Evidently the old witch has lifted the restriction against Dorothy coming here,” he added, already starting down the hall. Glad to have this opportunity to meet the young sister Victoria had told him about, Jason opened the door to the yellow salon.

“I can’t bear it,” a young girl was weeping into her handkerchief. “I’m glad Grandmama won’t let me attend your wedding. I couldn’t stand to be there, watching you walk down the aisle, knowing you’re pretending he’s Andrew—”

“Evidently, I’ve arrived at an inconvenient time,” Jason drawled. The hope he had secretly cherished that Victoria actually wanted to marry him died a swift, painful death at the discovery that she needed to pretend he was Andrew before she could force herself to walk down the aisle.

“Jason!” Victoria said, whirling around in dismay as she realized he had overheard Dorothy’s foolish ramblings. Recovering her composure, she held out her hands to him and said with a gentle smile, “I’m so glad you’re here. Please come and show yourself to my sister.” Knowing there was no possible way to smooth things over with a compassionate lie, she tried to make him understand by telling him the truth. “Dorothy has overheard some condemning remarks made by my great-grandmother’s companion, Lady Faulklyn, and because of what she overheard, Dorothy has formed the most absurd impression that you are a cruel monster.” She bit her lip when Jason lifted a sardonic eyebrow at Dorothy and said absolutely nothing; then she bent over Dorothy. “Dorothy, will you please be reasonable and at least let me introduce Lord Fielding to you, so you can see for yourself that he is very nice?”

Unconvinced, Dorothy raised her gaze to the cold, implacable features of the man who loomed before her like a dark, angry giant, his arms crossed over his wide chest. Her eyes rounded and, without a word, she slowly stood up, but instead of curtsying, she glared at him. “Lord Fielding,” she said defiantly, “I don’t know whether you are ‘very nice’ or not. However, I warn you that if you ever dare to harm a hair on my sister’s head I shan’t scruple to—to shoot you! Do I make myself perfectly clear?” Her voice shook with angry fear, but she bravely held his cold green eyes with her own.

“Perfectly.”

“Then, since I can’t convince my sister to run away from you,” she finished, “I shall return to my great-grandmother’s house. Good evening.”

She walked out with Victoria at her heels. “Dorothy, how could you,” Victoria demanded miserably. “How could you be so rude?”

“Better he think I am rude than that he can abuse you without anyone exacting retribution.”