Page 30

" Y ou came to breakfast," Victoria commented.

James didn't look up from his plate. "Did you think I wouldn't be here? I do have to eat."

"After our conversation last night, I didn't know what to expect," Victoria admitted. "You were very angry with me."

"I'm still angry," he informed her. "The fact that I'm eating a meal at my own table, in my own house, has nothing at all to do with my feelings for you. I did consider having your breakfast sent to your room, so that I could enjoy my meal in peace. Perhaps I should still do that."

Victoria had had enough of his controlling ways.

"You can send a meal up to my room if you'd like," she said.

"I suppose you even have the right to tell your staff to refuse to serve me at the table, if that's what you want to do.

But you don't have the power to send me upstairs, and if you try, I'm not going to go. "

Now he set down his fork and looked at her. "I beg your pardon?" he said quietly.

"You heard me. You've spent too much time lately trying to order me around, and I've allowed you to get away with it.

It's not going to work anymore. Unless you have a very good reason for giving me a command, I'm going to take your orders for what they are—merely your wishes.

You'd like me to go away, but I'm not going to do it. "

"What makes you think you have the right to speak to me like that?"

"Oh, please, James," Victoria said. "I'm not one of your servants, you know.

You might be the rightful Duke of Stormwell—I've accepted you as such.

I give you the respect I owe to your title.

But that doesn't give you authority over every little thing I do.

If you don't want to have breakfast with me, you leave the table.

" She reached for a roll and broke it in half to spread butter in the center.

Her heart was pounding. She didn't know how he would respond to what she'd said, and it was intimidating to stand up to him like that. But it had to be done. She couldn't allow him to keep treating her the way he had been, and he needed to know that she understood she deserved better from him.

"You act as if your rebellion is something new," he said, raising his eyebrows. "But you've been defying me for some time now, haven't you? Going out to meet with my brother when I expressly forbade you from doing that?"

"It's as you said last night," she said evenly.

"You don't have the authority to forbid me from doing anything at all.

I understand that you don't wish me to associate with your brother, but at the end of the day, I am empowered to make my own decisions about who I will and won't spend my time with. "

"And you choose to spend your time with the one person I have asked you not to associate with. That's the choice you're making?"

"I choose, when I see someone with whom I am acquainted, to be polite and friendly," Victoria said firmly.

"You have no authority to control the kind of person I am, James.

I have made no plans to associate with your brother, but you cannot turn me into someone who doesn't have a heart just because you hate your brother.

I'm sorry for what happened to you in your childhood.

Truly, I think it's awful, and nobody deserves that sort of mistreatment.

I'm glad you survived it. At the same time, Benjamin was not the guilty party, and nothing that happened requires that I should be cold or unkind to him. "

"Just tell the truth," James said sharply. "You have feelings for him, don't you?"

"I—what?" That question was so shocking that for a moment, Victoria couldn't figure out how she was supposed to answer it. "What on Earth do you mean?"

"You're supposed to be looking for a husband. I told you that you could have your choice, and now you think you're going to choose my brother. Just tell me why. Are you doing it to hurt me? To seek some kind of petty revenge?"

"James…what are you talking about? Of course I don't have feelings for your brother. Besides, he already has plans to marry. He's doing all this because he wants to develop a relationship with you . He's planning on getting married soon and he wants you to be a part of that celebration."

"And yet, I can tell that you feel something," James said stubbornly. "I know that he means something to you, Victoria. I think you should admit to it."

"I think you should cope with your own jealousy," she shot back. "I don't have to answer these questions."

"Jealousy! That's the second time you've made that accusation. I don't know what could possibly be giving you such a strange idea."

"Truly, you don't? What about the fact that every time I speak to a man, you tell me that I've done something wrong?

You claim to want me to marry, and yet you become angry when I do so much as engage in a conversation.

How could I possibly see it as anything but jealousy?

The way you act—it's as if you want to control my every move.

It's as though you're driven mad by the thought of me doing anything at all without your permission.

Is this even about your brother? Or is it merely about the fact that I spoke to him without consulting you first? "

"Do you even hear the way you sound right now?" he asked her. "How could anyone doubt that you have feelings for Benjamin? If you didn't, why would it even occur to you to make accusations of jealousy ? Why would you put things in those terms if that wasn't the way you felt?"

"He's a good man," Victoria said. "I like him. I like being able to spend time with him. I don't feel the need to explain myself further than that."

James rose from the table.

"Are you leaving?" she asked him, taken aback. Was he really so determined not to share a meal with her that he would leave the table before he had finished eating?

"We're both leaving," he said firmly.

"I'm not done with my meal."

"Come with me," he said. "Come with me now, or I will revoke my agreement to let you choose your own husband."

"You can't do that."

"Of course I can do it. And I will. Unless you come with me now, unless we settle this matter once and for all, I will marry you to whomever I deem most appropriate, regardless of your preferences in the matter.

She didn't want to give in to this. She wanted to stand her ground, to let him know that he had no right to treat her in this fashion.

But she couldn't take the risk that he meant what he said, that he would actually marry her off to someone regardless of her choice.

She rose from the table and followed him.

He led the way to his study and closed the door behind him.

Victoria understood at once why he had brought her here.

This was his territory. This was a place that made him feel as if he was in control.

She didn't like it, but she understood it.

She sat down in the seat that faced his desk, keeping her spine straight and he chin up.

He might want to think he was in charge here, and she wouldn't disabuse him, but she wasn't going to be pushed around either. She had had enough of that.

He folded his hands on top of the desk and looked across at her. "All right," he said. "Be honest with me. Why can't you stay away from Benjamin?"

"I've been honest," she said.

He rose and began to pace, clearly agitated by her answer.

"You're not," he said. "You're not being fully honest. You're holding back.

You may as well just admit it. There's something going on between the two of you.

This story about Benjamin marrying is just that—a story.

Perhaps something the two of you concocted to trick me. "

"And why would I want to trick you?" she asked cooly. "What on Earth do I stand to gain by it?"

"I don't know. Don't ask me to explain the machinations of your mind."

"Can you explain your own mind, though? I mean, what if I was interested in marrying your brother? Can you tell me why that would be so dreadful?

"You admit it, then!" He sounded triumphant. He stopped pacing and faced her directly, and Victoria found that she nearly felt sorry for him. The way he was behaving was just ridiculous.

"I haven't admitted anything," she said.

"I just can't understand why you're so against it, and you haven't given me a reason!

If your brother had been the one who had poisoned you, I would understand this strange attitude you have against him.

But he wasn't the guilty one. He never did anything to harm you.

You don't like him because he reminds you of a painful time in your life, and I understand that feeling.

But the part I don't understand is why you feel the need to punish him for what happened, when he wasn't the cause of it. "

"I don't need to explain myself. I didn't even have to tell you about my past. You never would have known had he not opened his mouth," James said sharply.

"So that's why you don't want me to associate with him?

You don't like the fact that he tells me the truth about things?

" Victoria asked. "You don't like the fact that I've found out something you didn't want to tell me.

That's right, isn't it? You don't want me spending time with your brother because you're afraid of what he might reveal. "

"I'm not afraid. What an idea."

"But I think it's the truth." She rose from her seat. "James, you don't have to be afraid. You don't have to be ashamed. Whatever your stepmother did, none of it was ever your fault. I know that.

"Tell me your intentions toward my brother," James said. "This is your last chance to be honest. I promise you, there will be consequences if you can't do that."

Victoria shook her head. "There's nothing you can say to me," she told him. "There's nothing you can do. I know what's going on now. I'm going to continue my friendship with Benjamin, because he's a good person. A good man. Regardless of your past, he is someone I'm happy to call my friend."

"Your friend," he repeated. "And nothing more, is that right?"

Victoria found she couldn't answer him. Not because of any question in her mind about what Benjamin meant to her.

The fact that that was even a discussion felt odd, for she had never had the slightest inkling of any romantic feeling toward him.

Nor did she believe he had ever felt that way toward her—she believed wholeheartedly the story he told about his upcoming marriage. He was in love with Lady Katherine.

No, the reason she couldn't find the words to answer James' demand was the way he was looking at her.

It was so possessive. She had never imagined a man would look at her in that way.

He was furious, she realized. He wanted an answer—he was adamant on getting one—and the only possible reason for his intensity was that he was jealous.

He had feelings for her .

But could that be true? He had poured all this energy into trying to find her a husband. Would he have done all that only to change his mind at the last minute?

The thoughts whirled in her mind like a storm, but before she could come up with any sort of answer, he reached out and grabbed her arm, pulling her close.

Her breath caught.

No words formed in her mind. She could think only of the heat that had sprung up between the two of them, the shock of his body so close to hers, and the strange desire to remain this close.

With no other man had she ever felt anything like this.

She hadn't believed, after what had happened with Jonathan in her past, that she could feel like this.

But she didn't want to push him away. If anything, she wanted to draw him closer.

His eyes searched hers as if looking for a sign, as if he sought some form of approval. She didn't know what he was looking for, but in the moment before the kiss came, she understood beyond doubt that he had found it.

Then his lips were on hers, a tender question that Victoria found herself answering eagerly.

She forgot what they had been discussing. She forgot that they had been having an argument at all. She forgot the fact that it was his intention to marry her off. All that mattered at that moment was the kiss, and the hope of prolonging it as much as she could. She didn't want him to pull away.

But eventually, of course, he did just that. He looked at her for a long moment, as if waiting for something.

"I don't have feelings for Benjamin," Victoria breathed. "I don't know how you could have thought that I did."

He didn't speak. After several moments, he turned and walked away, leaving her lips stinging and her thoughts in a storm.