The Devil Claims a Wife by Dickson Helen

Author:Dickson, Helen [Dickson, Helen]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Romance, Historical Romance, fullybook
ISBN: 9781460312490
Publisher: Mills & Boon
Published: 2012-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

Something cold gripped Jane’s stomach. ‘Richard? Oh well, I suppose we had to meet some time. I pray there is no trouble. Please don’t let him provoke you, Guy.’

‘The only thing that galls me is the wound to my pride if I have to step aside.’

She shot him an irate glance. ‘You cared little for his pride when I was promised to him. How do you think that made him feel—and his parents? I know they are suffering very badly over it and I do not wish to inflict on them any further distress. For my sake, I beg you to set aside your pride for a moment and don’t allow him to provoke you. It will be all right. He—he will ride on by.’

‘If you believe that, then you are a fool, Jane,’ Guy growled without taking his eyes off the oncoming riders, ‘and if he tries anything, then he is an even greater fool.’

‘If we meet peaceably, then I will happily be a fool,’ she replied tartly. ‘But I ask you not to harm him. Please give me your word that you won’t.’

Meeting her eyes, he nodded. ‘I give it,’ he said reassuringly. ‘I will not harm him.’

‘Thank you.’

Having seen Sinnington and Jane from a distance, on the point of leaving Cherriot Vale with his companions to join John Neville in the north, Richard rode towards them with the arrogance and self-assurance of a man oblivious to anyone but himself.

Pulling his horse to a halt in a cloud of dust, his full lips were stretched in a lewd smile, but the eyes that rested on Jane’s face were hard as stone. ‘Permit me,’ he said, lightly mocking, with a slight inclination of his head, ‘to pay my respects to the Countess of Sinnington.’ His eyes flicked insolently to the darkly glowering earl holding his horse in check beside her, but he did not accord him the deference of his rank, which only served to increase Guy’s wrath.

Jane read the mockery on the faces of Richard and his companions. For a moment she studied this man, whom she had once thought she would marry, as dispassionately as if he had been a stranger. It was the first time that she had set eyes on him since she had told him she would not marry him. So many things had changed. Then, she had been someone to be sacrificed, a helpless victim in the hands of this heartless and unscrupulous man. Today she had Guy for strength and protection.

‘You may.’ Considering the turmoil within her, her voice was curiously calm. Her proud, disdainful eyes met and held Richard’s without flinching. She was discovering, agreeably, that now that she was face to face with him, in fact, the vague terrors which had haunted her ever since their last encounter had melted away.

‘Or perhaps you have no wish to speak to me,’ Richard went on, ‘that as a humble soldier I am an embarrassment to be brushed away like you would an annoying fly.

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