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“I met your father.”

James took a step back, and his hands slipped from her waist. “You did what?”

“Your father sent me an invitation for tea. I couldn’t refuse. James, I just?—”

“You went behind my back?” James heard how hurt he sounded.

Diana heard it, too, under the rage in his eyes.

“James, I assumed you knew. I expected you to be there, but then I realized…”

“And yet you didn’t tell me.”

“Because I knew you’d react this way,” Diana countered.

“So, you thought to what? Ease me into it when I was too crazed to realize? It seems that the student has surpassed the master,” James spat. “You quickly learned to use your charms for your own gain.”

“James! I was trying to help.”

“Help?” James snarled.

“You don’t understand.” Her voice rose, her frustration flaring. “James, I sat across from a man who has spent years grieving for his wife, who has spent years regretting the distance with his only son. I know what it feels like to lose a parent. I know what it does to a person. I wanted to spare you?—”

“How dare you!”

Diana’s breath caught.

James stepped closer. His voice was lower now, sharper, lethal. “How dare you insert yourself into my family, into my pain, as if you had any right to interfere?”

“I only?—”

“So, we had some fun, a mutually entertaining agreement, and you thought that you had a claim on me?”

Diana’s chest rose and fell too quickly. His words landed like blows. He looked menacing like this, unhinged. As if he was utterly appalled that she dared more than a simple carnal exchange.

“I see,” she said flatly.

She stiffened, her hands shaking.

James saw it. The way her chin trembled, the way she blinked too quickly, fighting whatever storm raged behind her eyes.

But he was too furious to tamp down the rage inside him. He didn’t even know what he was angry at. His father abandoning him for years, him coming back, Diana betraying him, allowing her to come so close, foolishly believing that?—

“I think it’s best that I take you home.” James turned his back on her.

She said nothing on the way back, her hands fisting into the skirt of her dress. James was torn between his uncontrollable wrath and the undeniable need to comfort her. But he didn’t. It was better like that. She got too close.

He helped her out of the carriage, looking away as she took his hands. “Have a great day, Lady Diana.”

He turned to climb back into the carriage.

“My Lord,” she called. “We have one last promenade, do we not?”

James clenched his jaw. Then, without another word, without looking at her again, he stepped into the carriage and rode away.

CHAPTER 20

Brandy and Regrets