Hold hard—like him? Why the devil should he be concerned whether this aggravating chit liked him or not? He had never cared one whit for another’s opinion. And he would not, most definitely not, care about hers either.
Which resolve lasted until the moment she turned her face up to his, and said, with a tremor in her voice, and stress creasing her brow, ‘I don’t, do I? Please tell me I don’t look as though I’m going into a decline.’
‘Well, Miss Gibson—’
‘Because I am not going to.’ She straightened up, as though she was exerting her entire will to pull herself together. ‘Absolutely not. Only a spineless ninny would—’ She shut her mouth with a snap, as though feeling she had said too much.
Leaving him wishing he could pull up the carriage and put his arms round her. Just to comfort her. She was struggling so valiantly to conceal some form of heartbreak that his own concerns no longer seemed to matter so very much.
Of course, he would do no such thing. For one thing, he was the very last person qualified to offer comfort to a heartbroken woman. He was more usually the one accused of doing the breaking. And the only comfort he’d ever given a female had been of the hot and sweaty variety. With his reputation, and given what he knew of her, if he did attempt to put his arms round her Miss Gibson would no doubt misinterpret his motives and slap his face.
‘This is getting tiresome,’ he said. ‘I wish you would stop pretending you have no idea why I sought you out.’
‘I do not know why you should have done such a thing. I never expected to see you again, after I left that horrid ball. Especially not when I found out that you are an earl.’
‘Two earls, if you count the Irish title. Not that many people do.’
‘I don’t care how many earls you are, or what country you have the authority to lord it over, I just wish you had left me alone!’
‘Tut tut, Miss Gibson. Can you really believe that I would not wish to take the very first opportunity that offered to thank you for coming so gallantly to my rescue?’
‘To thank me?’ He had gone to all this trouble to express his thanks?
He watched her subside on to the seat, her anger visibly draining away.
‘Oh, well...’
‘Miss Gibson, I do thank you. From the bottom of what passes for my heart. It is not an exaggeration to say you saved me from a fate worse than death.’
‘Having to get married, you mean?’
‘Oh, no, never that. Had you not intervened, I would merely have repudiated Miss Waverley, stood back and watched her commit social suicide by attempting to manipulate me,’ he corrected her. ‘Absolutely nothing would have induced me to tamely fall in with her schemes. I would rather take a pistol and shoot myself in the leg.’
‘Oh.’ To say she was shocked was putting it mildly. She had grown up believing that gentlemen adhered to a certain code of morals. But he had just admitted he would have allowed Miss Waverley to ruin herself, without lifting so much as a finger to prevent it.
‘Oh? Is that all you have to say?’ He had just, for some reason, confided something to her that he would never have dreamed of telling another living soul. Though for the life of him he could not think why. And all she could say was Oh.
‘No. I...I think I can see now why you wished to speak to me privately. That...kind of thing is not the...kind of thing one can talk about in a crowded drawing room.’
‘Precisely.’ He didn’t think he’d ever had to work so hard to wring such a small concession from anyone. ‘Hence the ruthless abduction.’ Well, he wasn’t going to admit that a large part of why he’d detached her from her family was because he still harboured a suspicion there could be some sinister reason for her having been sent to them. It would make it sound as though he read Gothic novels, in which helpless young women were imprisoned and tyrannised by ruthless step-parents, and needed a daring, heroic man, usually a peer of the realm, to uncover the foul plot and set them free.
‘I had hoped to find you at the kind of event where I could have drawn you aside discreetly and thanked you before now.’
‘Oh.’ She wished she could think of something more intelligent to say, but really, what was there to say? She had never met anyone so utterly ruthless. So selfish.