Page 49 of The Viscount Who Vexed Me

He was contemplating any number of ways to take this conversation and happened to glance at his hand. Miss Raney apparently interpreted it as a sign of disinterest and blurted, “Do you?”

He lifted his gaze to her. “Do I...?”

“Care for art and music.”

“Ah.Sí, I like both very much.” He winced inwardly. Now he was the one who was uninteresting. “And the Sahara Desert.” He didn’t know why he said it, other than to see what sort of response it might prompt.

Miss Raney’s expression conveyed confusion and then what Mateo could only think was horror. Who could blame her? What would anyone say to that? Besides Miss Woodchurch, who would probably agree that she liked it, too, in theory, and launch into some tale she’d heard that it was quite beautiful in the morning but hot in the afternoon and had studied it in her atlas.

Miss Raney’s panic was reflected in her eyes, and he could imagine her searching her memory for even one mention of that desert. He was constructing an excuse to step away, to relieve the poor girl, when Lady Raney turned again and asked Mateo when his mother might return to London.

He didn’t remember mentioning his mother had left London. “Ah...a fortnight. Perhaps longer. She very much enjoys Paris.”

“Paris islovelyin the spring,” Lady Raney said approvingly. Her daughter, Mateo noticed, was speaking to Miss Woodchurch over her shoulder. “London can be so soggy in the spring, wouldn’t you agree? But Paris? The sun seems to shine on that city.”

“Indeed,” he said.

Her daughter had turned back to him, fully recovered. She was even smiling. Mateo wondered if it was possible to have a whisky brought to him. “I like to read,” Miss Raney blurted, as if the thought had just come to her. Lady Raney smiled thinly and turned away.

“Ah.” And she mentioned this...why?

“Very much.”

All right. If she wanted to talk about reading, he would need a little more than that. “History? Philosophy?”

“Novels.”

“You are the second person who has said as much this week. Is there a favorite you would recommend?”

She straightened her shoulders. “Well, I, ah... I recently readHonorineby Monsieur de Balzac.”

Mateo smiled with surprise.“Est-ce un roman Français?”

She blinked. “A French novel, yes.”

Now he was getting somewhere with Miss Raney. She understood French, which would, of course, recommend her to a small, dual-language duchy.

“What drew you to a French novel?”

Miss Raney blinked again. “Umm...I think that I, ah... I enjoy reading about other places.”

She thought she did? Did she not know? Why did it sound as if she didn’t know anything about the book or what had drawn her to it? Had he phrased his question in a confusing way? It wouldn’t be the first time. He tried again. “What did you think of it?”

“The book?”

“The book.”

“It was...interesting.”

She hadn’t read it, he was certain of it. “What was it about?”

Before she could answer, a footman appeared and held out a tray with glasses of port. Mateo shook his head. The footman offered the tray to Miss Raney, but she was speaking over her shoulder to Miss Woodchurch again. When the footman moved to Miss Woodchurch, she took a glass from the tray and handed it to Miss Raney, then took another one and turned away before Mateo could catch her eye. He had the distinct impression that she was trying to avoid him.

Miss Raney shifted back to him, all smiles, the port in hand. “I beg your pardon, my lord. You were saying?”

“I asked what the book was about.”

“Yes, of course. Unrequited love.”