Read Online One Snowy Night by Amanda Grange - Free Book Online Page B

became serious. ‘Rebecca, I was wrong to
let you go last night. I shouldn’t have let you return to the ballroom after
our meeting in the morning-room until things had been settled between us.’
    Rebecca felt
her curiosity rise. Until things had been settled between them? What did he mean?
    Joshua was
continuing. ‘I should have realized when it happened that we might have been
seen together at The Queen’s Head . As soon as I met you again I should
have taken the necessary steps to protect your reputation and keep you free of
the interference of people like George Lacy. However, what’s done is done. What
matters now is not the past but the present. We must salvage the situation, and
marry without delay.’
    ‘We must . . . what ?’ exclaimed Rebecca.
    In her
astonishment she dug her toes instinctively into the ice and came to a swift
halt, leaving Joshua to come to a sharp stop beside her.
    ‘Marry,’ said
Joshua, turning to face her. ‘Without delay.’
    ‘Have you run
mad?’ asked Rebecca. ‘We scarcely know each other, and yet —’
    ‘I can assure
you I have never been more sane.’
    He spoke
sharply, and she was surprised at the harshness of his tone. A moment’s
reflection, however, told her that he had expected her to fall in with his
plans - although knowing her stubborn nature he should have been prepared for
her to have her own opinion on the matter - and she realized that her reaction
had shocked him.
    ‘I have no
more wish to be leg-shackled than you,’ he went on, ‘but as I have compromised
you we must marry as soon as the banns have been read.’
    ‘You have run mad!’ said Rebecca.
    ‘You think we
should have some pretence of a courtship?’ he asked, misunderstanding her. ‘Perhaps
you are right. If we marry too quickly tongues will be sure to wag, and it’s no
use our marrying in order to scotch one kind of rumour if all we do is succeed
in creating another. We will take our time, then, and have a three-month
engagement period. That should be long enough to silence the gossips, and
convince them you are not . . . ’
    ‘With child?’
she asked forthrightly.
    He gave a provocative
smile. ‘I was going to say, enceinte, ’ he remarked.
    ‘Which is
simply society’s word for the same condition,’ she returned. ‘However, you
misunderstand me entirely if you think I object to the length of the
engagement. I object to the whole idea. I have no intention of marrying you,
either with or without a pretence of courtship. I have seen you but three times
before today, and even on that short acquaintance I can say that you are the
most impossible man I ever met. You cannot seriously expect me to spend the
rest of my life with you. I would not —’
    ‘Would not
what?’ he enquired. ‘Save your reputation?’
    ‘My
reputation? What, pray, makes you think it needs saving? No one saw us together
that night save for George Lacy, and he will not say anything. I will certainly
not tell anyone. Will you?’ she challenged him.
    ‘No, of course
not,’ he said. ‘But the fact remains —’
    ‘The fact
remains that you must have taken leave of your senses. Marry you, indeed!’
    ‘It seems a
bad bargain to you?’ he asked in surprise.
    Looking at him
then, with his firm chin and square-cut jaw, his broad shoulders and muscular
physique, she had the startling feeling that it might not be such a bad bargain
after all.
    But what was
she thinking? Of course it would be a bad bargain. The whole idea was
ridiculous!
    ‘I see no
point in continuing with this conversation,’ she said aloofly. Then, turning
away from him, she began to skate back towards Hetty and Charles. But he caught
up with her with a powerful thrust of his firmly-muscled legs and took hold of
her round the waist.
    To the crowds
who skated past them they looked to be skating along in perfect amity, but nothing
could be further from the truth.
    ‘Let go of me,’
she said.
    ‘No.’
    ‘I demand that
you unhand