Page 2

Ah, damn.

“Second thoughts?”

“No!” she said quickly. “None. How could I have second thoughts about marrying Charles?”

Easy, the way Andrew saw it. Charles, as she referred to him, or the Marquess of Thornton, was outrageously fat in the pockets. Respectable in ways Andrew had never been and would never be. And an absolute bore.

Nay, Thornton could never be good enough for Marcia.

He’d just trusted she was cleverer as to have realized it.

He studied Marcia as she studied the fountain at the back of the gardens.

It wasn’t his business.

He should go.

But she was a friend.

A woman whom he’d known since his early university days, back when she’d been a girl.

“Do you love him?”

“Yes,” she said. “He is kind and respectable and well-read and kind—”

“You said that one already.”

“And he’s a devoted brother to his three sisters, and he has a stellar reputation and a wonderful sense of humor.”

“Thornton?”

She nodded.

“As in theMarquessof Thornton?”

Marcia let out a sound of exasperation. “Yes, as in my betrothed.”

He snorted. “This would be the first that I’ve heard anyone claim the fellow has a sense of humor.” At least not the kind of humor that was clever enough to leave a fellow laughing.

She wrinkled her nose. “Well, he does.”

“Do you know what it sounds like to me, Marcia?”

The lady hesitated and then shook her head.

“It sounds like you’re trying to convince me as much as yourself that he’s the love of your life.”

In reality, she was too young and too innocent to know that there was no such thing asthe love of one’s life, or even love.

There was lust.

There was grand passion.

And those base desires merely tricked people, like his siblings and their spouses, and the woman before him, into believing that love was real.

Except now he wished he hadn’t spoken those words as Marcia’s eyes grew stricken.

Oh, bloody hell.