To Have and to Hoax: The laugh-out-loud rom-com you don't want to miss! by Martha Waters

Author:Martha Waters [Waters, Martha]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781472275004
Publisher: Headline
Published: 2020-04-06T18:30:00+00:00

Ten

“Violet,” Diana said, rising from the chair upon which she was seated, dropping her paintbrush in the process. “This is a pleasant surprise.”

“I needed to speak to you at once,” Violet said as soon as Wright had closed the door behind her. “I apologize for arriving so early—it’s barely past noon, but I knew you would be awake—”

“Not at all,” Diana said, waving a lazy hand at a chair and sinking back onto her own. “Shall I ring for tea?”

“No,” Violet said, not wanting the distraction, then paused, reconsidering. She liked to think she was a sensible person, and any sensible Englishwoman knew that life was more easily tackled with tea. “Well, perhaps a spot of tea wouldn’t go amiss.”

Diana rose again to ring the bell, and after a moment’s murmured request to a maid, she resumed her place in her chair. They were not in her sitting room but in the solarium, Diana’s favorite room of the house and, she often joked, the reason she had agreed to marry Lord Templeton in the first place.

At least, Violet thought she was joking. It was rather difficult to tell with Diana sometimes, and her motives for marrying the viscount had certainly been mercenary.

The room was littered with chairs and a couple of settees, all given a warm glow by the ample light flowing in through the windows that lined the walls and roof. Diana spent most of her mornings in this room, painting, as she had been doing when Violet interrupted her.

“Darling, what’s all this about?” Diana asked after she had settled herself once more. “You don’t look quite the thing at all.”

Violet, who had perched on the edge of an armchair as she waited for Diana to resettle herself, barely able to contain her impatience, burst out, “I think James knows I’m not ill!”

Diana blinked once, twice, and Violet, with effort, relaxed her posture slightly, doing her best to attempt to look casual, rather than like an escapee from Bedlam.

“How could he possibly have found out?” Diana asked, waving a dismissive hand. “He’s a man. They’re sheep.”

Now it was Violet’s turn to blink. “Meaning . . . they follow each other?”

Diana sighed, impatient as always with anyone who couldn’t quite keep up with her. “No, meaning their minds can only focus on about three things at once—and I’m quite certain your husband doesn’t have the mental capacity to think overmuch about the symptoms of your malady.”

“He did take a first at Oxford,” Violet felt compelled to mention, out of some lingering sense of wifely loyalty. “He’s not a complete idiot, you know.”

“Oh yes, Audley’s clever enough, as men go”—Diana’s tone indicated that she had her doubts as to the extent that any man could, in fact, be considered clever—“but they’re all the same. None of them question anything too terribly much. It’s why in any real marriage the woman should pull all the strings.”

“I pity your next husband,” a voice sounded from the doorway. Startled, Violet turned in her seat, only to relax upon realizing that it was Penvale, leaning against the doorjamb.

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