The Duke's Indiscretion by Adele Ashworth

Author:Adele Ashworth [Adele Ashworth]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780061741401
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2007-06-10T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

Charlotte had never had to act so well in her life. She was furious, really furious with him—and confused and uncomfortable and angry with herself for experiencing such unrefined feelings and then expressing them aloud. But she couldn’t, in any way, let him know what a mess he’d made of her emotions, which was turning out to be the most difficult thing she’d ever done.

The first hour at rehearsal had gone rather well considering the events that took place earlier in her dressing room. Nobody at the theater seemed suspicious to her, or treated her differently than they did every other day. Most were actors by profession, of course, but at least one person had to know she’d found her dressing room vandalized and hadn’t said a word about it to anyone.

But after she and Porano sang their first duet, and the cast took a five-minute break, she decided to look for Colin. She felt rather subdued about how he’d reacted to their last verbal exchange, and she wanted to apologize, although truthfully, she had been honest. But the moment she found him, behind the stage in a darkened corner, practically head to head in quiet conversation with Sadie, making amends vanished from her mind.

Unsettled, and taken aback by their closeness, she’d watched them quietly from the shadows a good distance away, which made it impossible to hear their conversation. But as the minutes progressed, she found herself growing more and more annoyed, even concerned, because she didn’t know if she could trust him to stay silent about the Handel piece. Then she heard him laugh softly at something her friend had said, Sadie smiling and touching his arm in response, and in a matter of seconds she became completely incensed, concluding that she just couldn’t trust him, period. Colin Ramsey, always the charmer.

Initially, she decided to ignore them, forget the entire incident, and return to the stage to begin the second hour of rehearsal, knowing Sadie would have to be available as well and their little rendezvous would end of necessity. But as the day wore on, her imagination took over, her anger grew, and by the time they left for the day, she could hardly speak to her husband civilly. During the coach ride home, which again seemed overly long and miserably hot, she feigned exhaustion so she wouldn’t have to converse with him, and for the most part he managed to leave her alone with her thoughts. That only seemed to make matters worse for her, she decided, because it gave her time to ponder the entire episode.

It wasn’t as if he’d done anything wrong, exactly; flirting seemed a natural thing for many people and he and Sadie were both discreet and decently clothed. But by the time they reached home, she’d become infuriated again, of course by the entire incident, but even more in herself because she couldn’t, in any way, say anything to him about it without sounding like a shrew. Especially after suggesting he take a mistress just that morning.

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