"How much worse?" Katherine asked, sick with dread.
Nancy drew a deep breath,"Much."
Well, that was descriptive and helpful. She had to think. Her eyes darted to the window.
"I fear the fall would kill you." Nancy read her thoughts.
Drat.
Allowing herself a few minutes of silent pity, Katherine closed her eyes and sighed. Things could always be worse. She could be deathly ill, or perhaps crippled, or blind, or…
She shuddered. After all, it was never a good sign when one had to think of death in comparison to her current situation.
Katherine managed to make it down the stairs, though she took great pains to methodically count each step, for in her mind, it was a reminder of how many steps she would take until she entered the inferno.
How was it, she wondered, that God allowed such a man to live?
Upon entering the room, she was given her answer.
For like Lucifer himself, the man was too beautiful to kill.
Curse him.
"Ah, my dear, there you are!" Her father embraced her and patted her on the head. But Katherine's eyes never left the duke's.
"Your grace." She curtsied quickly and walked behind the sofa to put distance between them. Merciful heavens, why weren't there any windows open?
"If I may be so bold, you look extravagant this morning, my lady." Benedict gave her a stare that made her heart flutter in all the wrong places. Treacherous body! Perhaps she should have taken her luck with the fall out of the window.
"You may not be so bold," Katherine clipped. "Especially when you freely give such compliments without as much as smiling."
"Apologies." He grimaced, though to be fair it was probably the closest to a smile she was going to get.
"Yes, well, as long as it doesn't happen again."
"Katherine!" her mother scolded. "After everything that has transpired, do you not think you should show a little more favor to the duke? After all, as of an hour ago, you are officially engaged."
Suddenly glad she was leaning on the settee, Katherine sputtered, "Ssurely not!"
Benedict's eyes shimmered with merriment as he narrowed his gaze and approached her. "But, my dear, you seemed so much more keen on the idea last night."
Fists planted firmly at her sides, it took every ounce of strength not to lash out at the man. He wanted this marriage less than she did. What the devil was he up to? What happened to the two weeks' time in which she had to court him, and he was going to cry off like the fool he was?
"Then perhaps you should refresh my memory, for I do not remember hearing any sort of proposal from your lips."
"No," he leaned in to whisper in her ear. Why weren't her parents doing anything? She looked from left to right. Drat, they had abandoned her, and the door was closed. Well, there was no way out of this one. She would just have to fight.
She pushed against him; he grasped her clenched hands. "So you want me to refresh your memory, do you?" His breath tickled her ear.
"If you touch me, I'll scream."
"Not the first time a woman's felt the need to do that in my presence, I assure you. Besides, with my certain skill set, your mother will simply blush profusely all the while fanning herself, and your father would be more likely to pat me on the back than shoot me."
"How can you be so sure of yourself?"
"Because." A smug look crossed his chiseled face. "I promised to fix everything."
Interesting that he would do anything so noble. "Just what do you intend to fix?"
"First, I'm going to fix this business about ruining you. Second, I'm going to pretend to be infatuated, though it won't be terribly hard considering you kiss like a courtesan. And third? Third, I'm going to get to the bottom of this business with my aunt trying to pair us up."
Katherine burst out laughing. Oh, the poor deluded man. "Your aunt was doing nothing of the sort, you arrogant beast!"
"Clearly, you've hit your head." Benedict stepped back and folded his arms across his chest. "She told me I was to be married, and mentioned you'd…"
Suddenly his face went very white.
"Mentioned what? Our names in the same sentence? Believe me, your aunt would never align us. She had much higher aspirations for me."
Benedict grabbed her shoulders turning her ever so slightly closer to his body. "Explain."
"She penned a note about the Winter's Festivities and mentioned to my parents how eager she was for me to meet the Duke of Paisley."
"Paisley? But he's to be with…"
While he was making calculations, she stepped back out of his reach. The man was too handsome by half, and it seemed near impossible to think in his presence. It was why she was always so clumsy around him. Paisley had always been kind to her as a child, and Benedict, well, he brooded and girls swooned.
At least now when he brooded, they guarded their virtue with fans.
"Look at it this way, your grace. It seems your aunt deemed Paisley good enough to have a choice between me and Lady Anastasia. I'm sorry all I have is the information given me, but I do not believe she was trying to trap you, at least not with me."