He stared at her, dumbfounded. “You set someone’s dress on fire.”
“It wasn’t on purpose,” she snipped.
“Well,” he said, impressed despite himself, “I suppose if anyone was going to —”
“Don’t say it,” she warned.
“How did I not hear of this?” he wondered.
“It was a very small fire,” she said, somewhat primly.
“But still…”
“Really?” she demanded. “I set someone’s dress on fire, and your biggest question is how you missed the gossip?”
“I apologize,” he said immediately, but then he could not help but ask (somewhat gingerly), “Are you inviting me to inquire how you set this dress on fire?”
“No,” she said irritably, “and it’s not why I brought it up.”
His first inclination was to tease her further, but then she sighed, and the sound was so tired and disconsolate that his mirth slid away. “Billie,” he said, his voice as gentle as it was sympathetic, “you can’t —”
But she did not let him finish. “I don’t fit the mold, George.”
No, she didn’t. And hadn’t he been thinking the same thing just a few days earlier? If Billie had gone to London for a Season with his sister it would have been an unmitigated disaster. All the things that made her wonderful and strong would have been her downfall in the rarefied world of the ton.
They would have used her for target practice.
They weren’t all cruel, the lords and ladies of high society. But the ones who were… Their words were their weapons, and they wielded them like bayonets.
“Why are you telling me this?” he suddenly asked.
Her lips parted, and a flash of pain shot through her eyes.
“I mean, why me?” he said quickly, lest she think he didn’t care enough to listen. “Why not Andrew?”
She didn’t say anything. Not right away. And then— “I don’t know. I don’t… Andrew and I don’t talk about such things.”
“Mary will be here soon,” he said helpfully.
“For the love of God, George,” she nearly spat, “if you don’t want to talk to me, you can just say so.”
“No,” he said, grabbing her wrist before she could whirl away. “That’s not what I meant. I’m happy to talk with you,” he assured her. “I’m happy to listen. I just thought you’d rather have someone who…”
She stared at him, waiting. But he could not bring himself to say the words that had been on the tip of his tongue.
Someone who cares.
Because it was hurtful. And it was petty. And most of all, it wasn’t true.
He did care.
He cared… quite a lot.
“I will…” The word trailed off, lost in his turbulent thoughts, and all he could do was watch her. Watch her watching him as he tried to remember how to speak his mother tongue, as he tried to figure out which words were right, which words were reassuring. Because she looked sad. And she looked anxious. And he hated that.
“If you wish,” he said, slowly enough to allow him to pick over his thoughts as he spoke, “I will watch out for you.”
She eyed him cautiously. “What do you mean?”
“Make sure you…” He made an air motion with his hands, not that either one of them knew what it meant. “That you’re… well.”
“That I’m well?” she echoed.
“I don’t know,” he said, frustrated with his inability to put together a complete thought, much less translate it into actual sentences. “Just that if you need a friend, I will be there.”
Her lips parted, and he saw movement in her throat, all her words trapped there, all her emotions in check.
“Thank you,” she said. “That’s…”
“Don’t say it’s kind of me,” he ordered.
“Why not?”
“Because it’s not kindness. It’s… I don’t know what it is,” he said helplessly. “But it’s not kindness.”
Her lips quivered into a smile. A mischievous smile. “Very well,” she said. “You’re not kind.”
“Never.”
“May I call you selfish?”
“That would be going too far.”
“Conceited?”
He took a step in her direction. “You’re pushing your luck, Billie.”
“Arrogant.” She ran around the table, laughing as she put it between them. “Come now, George. You cannot deny arrogant.”
Something devilish rose up within him. Something devilish and hot. “What do I get to call you?”
“Brilliant?”
He moved closer. “How about maddening?”
“Ah, but that’s in the eye of the beholder.”
“Reckless,” he said.
She feinted left when he feinted right. “It’s not recklessness if you know what you’re doing.”
“You fell onto a roof,” he reminded her.
She grinned wickedly. “I thought you said I jumped.”
He growled her name and lunged, chasing her as she shrieked, “I was trying to save the cat! I was being noble!”
“I’ll show you noble…”
She yelped and jumped back.
Straight into the house of cards.
It did not fall gracefully.
Neither did Billie, to tell the truth. When the dust had settled, she was sitting squarely on the table, the wreckage of Andrew’s masterpiece scattered around like a Chinese firecracker had been lit beneath it.