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"No," she said, the single word sounding like gunshot in the roo stopped, halfway around the foot of the table

"I shall take my leave," she repeated "Alone"

Hethe distance between them with speed and purpose "You needn’t be alone," he said, the words firht before he added, softly, "He needn’t come between us, love"

The endearment did her in

What a terrible lie he told

What a terrible ain "He’s not between us," she said, her voice calm and cool and filled with truth "He is not the problem"

"It certainly isn’t you who is the problem"

"I’h he’d been struck with a soup ladle, just on top of his handsome head, but she took no pleasure in the ht and her tears at bay as she turned and left the room

Chapter 15

SAD SOPHIE SEEKS

SOLACE IN SWEETS

Sophie was turning out to be very good atwhat to do next

She couldn’t return to her rooms, as she did not wish to be found, and she couldn’t leave the house, because it was the dead of night and she had nowhere to go She did not think the Duke of Lyne would take well to her appropriating one of his carriages, either way He’d likely consider it stealing

And so Sophie followed her nose and her appetite, and went to the only place she ever felt comfortable in massive houses like this one The kitchens

The roo, just as all kitchens seee tables at its center, one set with oose, a platter of young asparagus greener than she’d ever seen, a towering pyramid of perfectly matched rosemary potatoes, a rack of lamb on a bed of herbs, a pot of mint jelly, and a tower of strawberry tarts that she was fairly certain she could smell from the doorway

As it had been days since she’d had a proper meal, the food should have captured all her attention, but in these kitchens, the heavy-laden table was not thefeature No, it was the second table that drew her attention, filled with servants all eating their own eveninglike the elaborate plates waiting to be served to the now and future dukes she’d left behind

The servants’ laughter drew her through the doorway, the sed up onto her toes to see what they were eating, envy flaring when she identified the food Pasties

The little pouches of h on several platters at the center of the servants’ table, and the chatter reached a fever pitch as they ate She heard the gossip, about the angry duke, about the returned irl who had arrived with him About her

"Are they very much in love?"

"He h it’s done"

"She doesn’t even have a chaperone," someone whispered