Priya’s mouth twitched with mirth, and she nearly stumbled as she finished sitting. Particularly when Lord Cathraiche hissed, “Mother!”
Immediately and unbelievably, Priya relaxed. Lord Cathraiche hadn’t seen that jab coming. Furthermore, it had clearly put him on the back foot. The cocksure manner he’d had when Priya stepped into the room and noticed him gave way to a hint of petulance that would have been right at home on a boy half his age.
“I quite agree, Lady Vegas,” Priya said, determined to make the most of it and to stake her claim on a place of independence where Lord Cathraiche was concerned. “For too long, ours has been a fate of subverting ourselves to the whims of gentlemen who do not understand us and have no interest in doing so. But I do believe the tide is changing.”
“Do you now?” Lady Vegas asked, her smile broadening to the point of delight. She gestured for the maid attending the tea to pour for Priya while she herself heaped a small plate with a variety of tarts and cakes. Priya took that as a sign of approval.
“We do so have an interest in understanding,” Lord Cathraiche said in a quiet voice. “We have quite a strong interest in it.” He met Priya’s eyes and grinned.
“Is that why so many of you stood at the edges of the meeting Mrs. Pankhurst organized the other evening, heckling the female speakers and muttering behind your hands?” Priya asked, then bit into one of the tarts with particular viciousness.
Lord Cathraiche coughed. Lady Vegas chuckled and exchanged a look with her sister.
“Not all of us were opposed to the things that were being said,” Lord Cathraiche said, warmth in his eyes, but tension clear in his body. He turned to his mother. “Could I have one of those tarts, Mother?”
“No, you may not,” Lady Vegas said imperiously. “Not until you tell us which particular points of the speeches that were given you agree with most.”
Lord Cathraiche’s mouth fell open as he scrambled for something to say. Priya nearly swallowed the rest of her tart wrong.
She reached for her tea to clear her throat, then said, “I assume you had been standing at the edge of the crowd for some time when I spotted you, Lord Cathraiche. Tell me, what drew you to attend the speeches that night in the first place?”
She suspected, from the way things had unfolded, that he had come there to accost her, but she was uncertain whether he would own up to it.
“I am fascinated by Mrs. Pankhurst’s views on the rights of women,” Francis said, squirming to sit a bit straighter. He had evidently been served tea earlier and reached for the dainty cup resting on a small table beside him. The gesture was clearly meant to buy him time.
“And what are those views, my lord?” Priya asked, staring pointedly at him over the rim of her own teacup.
“They are…er…that is…Mrs. Pankhurst believes….” He took another long sip of his tea as Priya grinned triumphantly at him. The gentleman was far more enjoyable to play with than she would have thought. Especially when he surprised her by continuing in a far stronger tone with, “Mrs. Pankhurst believes that the franchise should be extended to all married women, just as it should be extended to all men of property.”
“Very good,” Priya said, deliberately sounding as though she were his governess and that she was giving him top marks for an exam. “I take it you use your position in the House of Lords to vote in favor of these views?”
Again, she had Lord Cathraiche squirming. “It is not that I am opposed to the franchise being extended to women,” he said, sending his mother and aunt a covert look as well. “But do you not agree that it is vital that the vote be extended to all men of property before the issue of women’s suffrage is taken up?”
“Do you think that women of education and class are less worthy than working men, Lord Cathraiche?” Priya asked.
“Oh. Erm…do I think that?” Lord Cathraiche mumbled. He shifted forward on his seat, reaching for the plate of sweets, once again attempting to buy himself time.
Lady Vegas smacked his hand, causing him to recoil. Priya snorted despite her best efforts to maintain her dignity.
“You have not earned your pudding, young man,” Lady Vegas said. “Your sweet friend has asked you a question, and you have yet to answer it adequately.”
“I, for one, am very interested in your answer,” Lady Dorrington said, grinning smugly at her nephew.
Priya stared at him as well. It was an extraordinary moment. Never had she felt such kinship with a pair of British ladies. Against all odds, Lady Vegas and Lady Dorrington had drawn her into their circle, not as an aberration or an amusement, but because they shared viewpoints and a common goal—to make Lord Cathraiche as uncomfortable as possible. Oddly enough, that female camaraderie endeared her to Lord Cathraiche even more.
“Touché,” he said, raising his teacup to all three of them. “I know when I am outgunned, which proves the point I am certain you are attempting to make. The so-called weaker sex is a force to be reckoned with when they combine their powers.”
“And what opinions do you now have about women’s suffrage based on this conclusion?” Lady Vegas asked, her brow raised in challenge.
Lord Cathraiche finished his tea and put his cup aside with a sigh. “I conclude that when women do finally enter politics, we men will be crushed under their heels. Which is, perhaps, why so many men fear the competition they represent.” He looked straight at Priya and said, “The will of women is the most difficult obstacle in the world to overcome.”
“Something more men would do well to remember,” Priya said, sending a conspiratorial look to Lady Vegas before taking another drink of her own tea.
“I will certainly remember it,” Lord Cathraiche went on. “I will remember it at all times, even in the midst of wooing a maiden fair.”
Priya nearly choked on her tea as her eyes met Lord Cathraiche’s rakish grin. She took a second swallow to clear her throat from the first, then set her tea aside. “One must be careful in matters of the heart, my lord. More often than not, one does not know what they are up against.”
“I know precisely what I am up against,” Lord Cathraiche said, lowering his voice. “I know what I would like to be up against as well.”
Priya’s entire body flushed hot at his double entendre. She sucked in a breath, unable to drag her gaze away from the rakish spark in his eyes. It would have been so much better if Lord Cathraiche’s comment had frightened or offended her, but instead, it thrilled her. She’d never had a man make inappropriate suggestions at her, certainly not a man of Lord Cathraiche’s status and beauty. How was her heart supposed to resist such bait? How was her body supposed to resist it, for that matter?
“Francis!” Lady Vegas snapped. “Mind your manners. Teasing is one thing, but I will not countenance vulgarity.”
“What could you have taken as vulgarity, Mother?” Lord Cathraiche asked, playing the innocent role.
Lady Vegas frowned and pursed her lips at him.
“Even if I spoke out of turn,” Lord Cathraiche went on with a slight shrug of one shoulder, “what harm could there be in a little flirtation? Particularly as I fully intend to deepen my acquaintance with Miss Narayan to the point where such flirtation is right and natural.”
Priya sucked in a breath, losing all sense of fun and lightness that the morning had brought her. If Lord Cathraiche’s words weren’t a clear statement of intention, she didn’t know what they were. The man had no idea how painful and impossible those intentions were—or how desperately Priya wished she were able to do anything about them.
“I must leave,” she said, standing suddenly without looking any of her hosts in the eyes. She only just managed to grab her reticule with its priceless contents before it would have slipped to the floor. “I…I should not have come in the first place. I have…a prior engagement that I must attend to.”