Say Yes to the Marquess(39)
She’s not.
She’s not yours.
He lifted his head abruptly. They were both breathing hard.
“I—”
“Don’t,” she said. “Don’t explain or make excuses. Please. If I have to hear again how this is just a bit of impersonal lust, or to settle a score from your adolescence . . . you’ll crush me.”
“I won’t tell you that.” He would be lying if he did. This was more dangerous than lust or envy.
Rafe rolled to the side, staring up at the ceiling. He didn’t know what the hell to call this feeling in his chest. But labels didn’t matter. He wasn’t free to explore it.
“You’re. Engaged. To. My. Brother.” Maybe if he spoke the words aloud, and slowly enough, they might sink into his conscience.
“I don’t have to be.” She struggled to a sitting position. “I could be not-engaged with a stroke of the pen.”
“It’s not that simple.” He sat up, too.
“It truly is.” She reached to wipe a bit of cake from his face. “Emotionally, he and I have no attachment. It’s just a matter of legalities. The moment you signed those dissolution papers, I’d be free. We’d be free.”
“To do what? Something you’d immediately regret?” He flicked a morsel of cake from his trouser leg.
“Why would I regr . . .” Her voice trailed off, and she frowned. “Oh, God. Oh, no.”
“What is it?”
“My engagement ring.” She flashed her naked, sticky hand at him. “It’s gone.”
He swore.
“We have to find it. It’s worth a fortune.” She rose from the carpet, looking high and low in her search. “It must have come off when I was sticking my hand in one of the cakes. I think I remember having it after the chocolate. And the almond. That would mean it got stuck in the . . .”
“Plum cake. Which I threw to the floor when you cried out.” He looked to the far corner. “Over there.”
Together they dashed around the table.
“Oh, drat.”
Well. The plum cake had been there, on the floor.
It would now appear that the entirety of it—and Clio’s ring, as well—were currently inside Ellingworth’s stomach.
At first, Clio struggled not to laugh.
The picture was so comical—the ugly old bulldog’s flattened face snuffling over the empty platter.
Rafe, however, didn’t seem to find it amusing.
“Ellingworth, no.” As he ran to the dog, he let loose a string of curses, many of which Clio had never heard before and couldn’t have dreamed existed. “How did he get in here?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps he waddled in and fell asleep in the corner hours ago.”
“No. No, no, no.” He lay flat on the floor and pressed his ear to the dog’s stomach. “It’s gurgling.”
“Isn’t that normal?”
“I don’t know.” He sat up and speared his hands through his hair. “It could be. I’ve never listened to it before.”
“The poor thing.” She knelt on the bulldog’s other side. “But he’ll probably be fine.”
“What should we do? Should we make him puke? Turn him over and give him a shake?”
She stroked the dog’s ear. “I don’t think so.”
“He feels warm.” Rafe pounded his fist against the carpet. Then he punched to his feet, stripped off his coat, and began waving it up and down to fan the bulldog.
Clio was starting to feel a little less touched at the protective care Rafe had displayed toward her. Whisking her away from the falling portcullis, catching her misstep in the tower—those acts had seemed dashing at the time, but it was nothing compared to this effort. And to her, the dog didn’t even appear to be ill. If anything, he looked rather fat and content.
If he died now, he’d go happily.
“It’s just a plum cake,” she said.
“No. It’s not just a plum cake. It’s a plum cake and an enormous gold-and-ruby ring.”
This was true. “At least it’s a cabochon setting. No sharp edges. Give him a bit of cod liver oil, and it ought to go right through.”
“It had better.” Rafe only fanned harder. “Do you hear me, you deaf old thing? Damn you, dog. Don’t you die on me now.”
In response, Ellingworth belched.
Clio tried not to giggle.
“We need a veterinarian,” Rafe said, throwing the coat aside. “A proper surgeon if you have one near. An apothecary, if not. Send for whoever is in the neighborhood.”
“Of course.”
Good Lord, she’d never seen him this way. She wasn’t overly concerned about Ellingworth’s health, but she was starting to worry for Rafe.