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CHAPTER FIVE

“ Y ou have a fine estate,” Cyrus said, hearing the door of the study open. He did not need to turn to know it was Vincent, the Earl of Grayling.

Instead, Cyrus continued to gaze out at the sprawling lawns, decorated with immaculate statues, glittering ponds, and spouting fountains.

He spied a pear orchard in the distance, and the outer edge of a walled garden off to his left, with ample forest bordering the estate for hunting and shooting.

It was certainly grander than Darnley Castle. Cheerier, too.

Teresa will be loath to depart such a place. Still, it cannot be helped now.

“ That is the first thing you say to me, after what you have done?” Vincent replied in a haughty tone that bristled down the back of Cyrus’ neck, irritating him.

Cyrus still did not turn. “It would have been unseemly to begin with the matter of your sister. I see a lack of courtesy is a familial trait.”

“I beg your pardon?” Vincent hissed.

At last, Cyrus turned to look at the gentleman. “No need to beg. I have come of my own volition to sweep away the mess your sister has made.” He paused, his eyes hardening. “And I suggest you adjust your tone, unless you want to be the reason she is thrown to the lions.”

“Is that supposed to be funny?” Vincent’s eyes blazed with anger, as he closed the study door and took a few tentative steps forward.

Ah… that ridiculous mask. It took Cyrus a moment to realize what he had said, and how it might be interpreted.

“A poor choice of phrasing,” he said, offering no apology. “Once you have found your manners, let us start afresh.”

Considering Vincent’s impressive fortune, his renowned manor, and his talent for business, there were very few gentlemen in society who would not immediately try to ingratiate themselves.

Anthony and Silas had warned Cyrus ahead of time that Vincent was accustomed to a certain level of…

respect, even from those who outranked him, but if anyone—especially Vincent—thought that Cyrus would bow and scrape, they would be sorely disappointed.

“ My manners?” Vincent choked, his hands balled into fists at his sides.

Cyrus nodded. “Indeed. I greeted you politely with a compliment about your residence, you decided to behave petulantly. I do not tolerate insults.” He leaned back against the windowsill, casually checking his fob watch. “Shall we begin again?”

His future brother-in-law had gone rather pale, aside from two livid spots of red on each cheek, his breathing harsh as if he had just run around the grounds twice. But whether he would explode or calm himself remained to be seen, and Cyrus was prepared for either eventuality.

When a few minutes had gone by and Vincent had said nothing, Cyrus took a breath and continued. “Very well. I am here to propose to your sister, Lady Teresa.”

“And why should I accept such a proposal?” Vincent replied with a curled lip, though he could not quite look Cyrus in the eye, a reaction that was all too familiar.

It is as if they fear that scars are contagious, or the misfortunes that caused them…

“Need I answer that?” Cyrus said gruffly.

Vincent sniffed. “Actually, yes, I think you do. Why should I accept a proposal from the man who has just ruined my sister? Why should I permit you into my family, when you are a thief of virtue?”

Cyrus had never been called that before, but he made a mental note to tell Anthony about it later. His friend would find it terribly amusing, and though he was no jester, Cyrus occasionally liked to surprise his friends by making them laugh.

Maintaining his composure, he levelled a cold gaze at Vincent.

“It was never my intention to ruin her. I will not embarrass the girl further by detailing the events, nor does it matter much, considering it would change nothing. All you need to accept is that I am here to make things right, though I had no duty to do so.” He paused.

“And all Lady Teresa needs to do is agree to the marriage.”

He mentioned nothing of Anthony’s theories about schemes and plots, for the more he had thought about it, the more certain he had become that it was never Teresa’s intention to be embroiled in a scandal with him.

He had absolutely no notion why she had done what she did, but deceit and subterfuge were at the bottom of his list of possible reasons, right where her name had been.

“You are in no position to make demands,” Vincent retorted, shifting awkwardly, crossing and uncrossing as arms as if he did not know what to do with them.

Cyrus had unnerved the man. Yet, there was no satisfaction in it. With a face like his, combined with his height and his stature, it was not difficult to put other men on edge.

“I would not call a logical resolution a demand,” he said bluntly. “Nor are you in any position to refuse. Only your sister?—”

The study door opened, and the woman herself came stumbling in, like she had leaned too heavily upon it while eavesdropping and it had decided to punish her by swinging wide. She stopped short of losing her balance, straightening quickly, raising her wild-eyed gaze to her brother first.

“You cannot have this conversation without me!” she urged, breathing raggedly. “No one can make a decision about my future but me.”

Cyrus puffed out an irritated breath. “And if you had waited outside the door a minute longer, listening in as is clearly your habit, you would have heard me say that.” He realized she had not yet looked in his direction, bracing for the reaction he knew would come.

“Only you have the luxury of refusing me, for the consequences are entirely yours.”

She seemed to be frozen for a moment, her eyes searching her brother’s face, as if he were the one who had spoken and not Cyrus. In that moment of stillness, he observed her, maskless, for the first time.

She was not at all what he had expected.

Then again, he had already discovered she was not quite the bore that Anthony had described.

A woman who would be gray if she were a color would not have come so close, or protested so fiercely about that list, or met his gaze without fear.

A spiny weed of a woman that no one wanted in their garden would not have compelled him to bend his head closer, leaning into the kiss that had been interrupted before it could begin.

A snail tucked into its shell she was not, though he suspected she wore some armor of the unseen kind.

“My dear mother would be more likely to find herself in the midst of a scandal than Teresa Wilds.” Anthony’s other words came back to bite Cyrus, the irony so perfect that he had to fight a smirk at the memory of it.

Indeed, Cyrus was beginning to wonder if Anthony had been the one scheming by putting Teresa’s name last on that list, knowing that his friend would look at it first.

Beneath the bear mask, there had been beauty all along.

She was not pretty, the way that a thousand London ladies were pretty, but truly, uniquely beautiful.

He could not put his finger on what it was, but she was unlike any lady he had seen before.

She was like the muse of a painting, set apart from those viewing the artwork, drawing the eye again and again.

She was neither tall nor short, though he had already known that, with the most luminescent skin he had ever beheld.

Her rounded cheeks were dusted with pink and dotted with freckles, while her eyes were feverishly bright, as though she had just come in from a brisk winter walk.

Eyes the color of a summer dusk, blue and somehow golden, though he could not understand how; he was not close enough to find out.

Her nose was almost feline, her chin and cheekbones and jaw defined—a sculptor’s dream muse—while her full lips brought his mind rushing back to the night before.

He had not noticed then, in the low light and obscured by the shadow of her bear mask, that she had a small mole, just above the right curve of her top lip.

“So, Lady Teresa?” he said, waiting for the shock when she finally looked at him. “Will you refuse me?”

Slowly, she turned to face him, her extraordinary eyes widening as if she had just seen a ghost… or a monster.