up.”
Victoria stared at him blankly. She would know if she was betrothed, wouldn’t she? “You never asked me to marry you.”
“Your guardians proposed the match.”
Victoria stood there, frozen, as disturbing thoughts swirled around inside her. Her aunt and uncle had proposed the match. Alexander hadn’t even wanted her.
“How long have we been betrothed?” Victoria asked, her voice an aching whisper.
“I’m sorry.” Alexander recognized the pain in her eyes, regretted telling her that her guardians had proposed the match.
“How long?”
“Almost a year.”
“A year?”
In the next instant, Victoria marched across the drawing room to confront her guardians. “How could you?” Her tone mirrored her anguish. “You promised me in marriage but never asked what I wanted. You didn’t even bother to tell me.”
“We thought it for the best,” Aunt Roxie said.
“Stop the theatrics, Victoria,” Duke Magnus ordered. “The match is good.”
“I’m questioning your treatment of me, not the match.” Victoria turned to her aunt. “When is the wedding?”
“June the twenty-fourth,” her aunt answered, obviously flustered. “The invitations will be sent next week.”
“Were you planning to send me an invitation?” Victoria asked, her voice dripping sarcasm. “Is that how you planned to tell me?”
Without waiting for a reply, Victoria advanced on the card table. “And my sisters,” she said, her gaze on them. “When I think of your play-acting yesterday . . .” Then she mimicked them, “Practice your flirting on Alexander. Drop your gaze shyly. Look at him as if he had just placed the world at your feet.”
This last statement earned muffled chuckles from her brothers-in-law, nor did they escape her tirade. Victoria cast a murderous glare on Robert and then looked at Rudolf. “If my sisters knew, then you knew, too.”
“I asked everyone to remain silent,” Alexander said in a quiet voice. “I wanted to give you a chance to grow up.”
“I despise you most of all,” Victoria said, rounding on him. Without warning, she slapped him, eliciting shocked gasps from the gathering.
Catching her around the waist, Alexander lifted her off her feet. Surprise kept Victoria from reacting.
“Don’t touch those cards,” Alexander ordered, tucking her under his arm. He marched toward the doorway. “My sweet betrothed will pick them up.”
Victoria had never seen anyone as angry as Alexander Emerson. She didn’t dare struggle, nor did she give him the satisfaction of crying for help that would not come.
“Open that door,” Alexander growled at a footman when they reached the duke’s study.
Hanging from beneath his arm, Victoria kept her head down and closed her eyes against the humiliation of being carried like a recalcitrant child. She couldn’t imagine what he intended, but he seemed too angry to talk things through.
Marching into the duke’s study, Alexander set her down and closed the door. “Sit in that chair.” When she did, he leaned against the desk and stared at her. “Your actions were childish. You will pick those cards off the floor. Are you listening to me?”
Victoria nodded but remained silent. She refused to look at the triumph in his eyes. He was bigger than she. He would win when strength was the deciding factor, not that she expected him to strike her.
“Do you have anything to say?”
“You called me stupid,” Victoria said, raising her gaze to his. “I told you I’d misplaced my spectacles.”
“You are correct,” Alexander said, surprising her. “After throwing the mallet at me, I mistakenly believed you were losing on purpose.”
“You don’t know me very well if you believed that.”
“We need to become acquainted,” Alexander agreed. “We will return to the drawing room, apologize to each other, and pick the cards up together. Then you will rusticate in your chamber and consider the ways that horrendous scene between us could have
Kathryn Croft
Jon Keller
Serenity Woods
Ayden K. Morgen
Melanie Clegg
Shelley Gray
Anna DeStefano
Nova Raines, Mira Bailee
Staci Hart
Hasekura Isuna