cleared his throat and began, “I find the weather here more pleasant than I had expected. Is it always like this?”
“Usually it rains more this time of year,” Angela replied.
“I see.”
Again quiet lay upon them like a weight. Pettigrew tried again. “My compliments to your cook, Mi—I mean, my lady. The food is excellent.”
“Thank you. I will be sure to let Mrs. Fletcher know.”
Mr. Pettigrew seemed to have run out of conversational topics, for the silence stretched again. This time it was Angela who was pushed by the awkward atmosphere into attempting to make conversation. “How is your mother, Cam? Does she enjoy living in America?”
“She died a year and a half ago.”
“Oh. I’m so sorry.”
The last exchange seemed to end all hopes of polite conversation. Pettigrew ate swiftly and silently, and after a few moments, he rose to his feet, saying, “Excuse me, sir, ma’am, uh, my lady. I, ah, I am afraid I must excuse myself from the table. It was most delicious, but I have quite a bit of work to do.”
“Of course.” Angela smiled at him graciously, and Cameron gave him a short nod. Pettigrew left the room, and the servant cleared his plates. At a gesture from Cam, he, too, exited, leaving Cam and Angela alone together.
Angela pushed her eggs around, keeping her eyes on her plate, but she kept glancing at Cam out of the corner of her eye. He looked different—older, larger, harder—and yet so much the same that it made her heart skip a little in her chest. Over the years, she had forgotten exactly how thick and long his lashes grew, how fiercely dark his eyes were, and how angular his face was.
“Have I changed so much?” Cam asked finally.
Angela colored, aware of how she had been studying him. “I—I am sorry for staring. No. You have changed but little.” She turned back to her food. She did not expect him to say the same thing about her; she knew if he did, it would not be the truth. She saw herself in the mirror every day, and she knew that though her hair was the same texture and her eyes the same color, though her body was only a little less slender and more rounded, no one could think she looked the same as she had at sixteen. The spark that had once lit her face was gone, and her drabness was only emphasized by the plain, dark gowns she wore and the severe knot into which she wound her hair at the nape of her neck. Her skin, albeit still soft and white, no longer held a glow.
“I cannot say the same about you,” Cam told her bluntly.
Angela gave him a cool, measured look. “How kind of you to say so.”
“I did not mean,” Cam said stiffly, “that you are not still beautiful.”
“I am well aware what you meant. I have not aged well, shall we say? It does not matter to me.”
“I meant,” Cam went on stubbornly, “that you did not used to be so quiet. You were never timid.”
“Timid? You make me sound like a mouse.” Angela straightened her shoulders and fixed him with a firm, clear gaze. Once, she had looked at people in that way with ease; in recent years, she had learned to do it again. She could force herself to regard a man with no fear, though inside her stomach might coil. “I am hardly that, Mr. Monroe.”
“Mr. Monroe?” He looked at her quizzically. “I hardly think I am that unfamiliar to you.”
His words reminded her forcibly of exactly how close they had been years ago, and color flooded her face. She tilted up her chin, as if he had insulted her.
“I am sorry,” he told her quickly. “I did not mean—Well, I did not intend that as it sounded. I was talking about the fact that you had called me Cam since you were eight years old.”
“We are hardly in the same positions, however. You are a grown man, and one, moreover, who holds the future of Bridbury in his hands. I can hardly address you as a child does a groom.”
“I am still Cam.”
“All right, then. Cam.” She looked away as she said it, unable any longer to meet his gaze.
There was a moment’s silence while he studied her. Finally he said, “I think ‘tis time we talked. No more intermediaries. What do you say?”
“All right.” She turned back to face him. “However, I am afraid that we have little to say. My answer to you is the same as it was the other day. I will not marry you.”
“Indeed? I had thought you were a woman of greater common sense.”
“Common sense? Is that what you call giving in to coercion? I know some who would call it cowardice.”
“‘Tis common sense to marry where there is money. Look at it logically. You are facing living in genteel poverty. If you marry me, you shall be living in luxury. You married for money before. Why balk at it now?”
Angela blanched. His casually cruel words were like a slap in the face. She stood up abruptly, pushing back her chair. Her hands tightened into fists. “I did not marry Dunstan for money. However, I know that you will think what you will, no matter what I say. You always have. I thought I had good reasons for marrying him, but despite that, I regretted it bitterly.”
“So I have heard.” He looked at her levelly.
“I will not make that mistake again. I will not sacrifice myself, even for Jeremy.”
“Would marrying me be such a sacrifice?” His face tightened, and he rose to face her. “Once you were willing enough to come to my bed.”
Angela gasped. “How dare you! I never—”
“No. But can you say that you stayed away of your own volition?” His voice was as hard as steel.
Angela could say nothing. He spoke no less than the truth. She had been like wax in his hands back then; he could have done anything with her that he wanted, and she would never have said him nay. When Cam kissed her, her body had thrummed with desire. Her skin had been like flame to his touch. Even now, remembering that time, she could almost feel a stirring of warmth.
“No,” she admitted in a low voice. “To my shame, I cannot say that it was my virtue that kept me from your bed.”
“Nor from any other man’s, apparently.”
Angela stiffened as if a red-hot poker had been laid against her skin. She struggled to keep her voice neutral. “You have heard, then, of the allegations of my divorce.”
“Yes. I read a report about the proceedings. I read on what grounds your husband sued for divorcement, and I read the testimony of the three men.”
Angela hated the surge of anger and hurt that poured through her, hated most of all that it should hurt for Cam to think her promiscuous. But she had endured worse things without showing the pain. She had borne the testimony of Dunstan’s friends, knowing that with it she got what she wanted, freedom from him. And now, in the same way, she would use it again to help herself.
She shrugged elaborately. “I should
