“That is not true.”
“It is.” His tone cut neatly. “By securing last night’s disaster behind a door, we made a bargain, one you insisted upon by forcing me to make it. I now have six days to find you a husband. You, therefore, have six days to be as close to useful as possible. This morning you were not.”
“Useful.” She tasted the word and found it bitter. “I am not a parcel to be wrapped and sent.”
“You are a woman who asked the night to do what daylight had not,” he said. “The night refused and placed the task into my hands. I will require you to help me with it.”
“I was…nervous,” she said.
“So? Are you waiting to be less so?” Stephen raised an eyebrow. “You must understand that is not the right way to go about things. Sometimes, even when we are nervous, we must do the thing that is required of us.”
“It sounds much easier to prescribe such a thing to me,” Maria replied. “But I hope you can empathize that it is much harder in practice.”
“Perhaps so, but my advice to you is accurate and realistic,” He tipped his head. “You were polite to Mr. Morton to the point of insult. You answered his kindness with curtness. You do not have to be a flirt, but you do have to be present.”
“I do not…” she sighed. “I will do better this afternoon.”
“No.” He smiled very slightly. “You will do better tonight.”
“Tonight?” she found herself growing irked at the way that he was simply ordering her to do things. The arrogance of it all.
“Midnight.” He said it like a place rather than a time. “The library.”
“I cannot meet you at midnight in the library,” she said, her eyes widening. “That is precisely the kind of behavior that got me into trouble in the first place. Besides, I am not too fond of the manner in which you are simply ordering me.”
“There is a difference,” he reminded her. “Our first meeting had been entirely decided by you, and I did not have much of a say. This time, I am inviting you. And if I am to get you out of trouble swiftly, you must learn to accept my orders.”
“I am supposed to accept?”
“You will,” he replied simply.
He left her with that, just walked away down the corridor, and turned toward the back stairs and was gone, confident as ever.
Maria stood and burned for a long minute.How arrogant,she fumed privately. It was infuriating to be spoken to in this manner, but she knew that he was trying to help her. In his own infuriating manner.
It was going to take a while getting used to it.
Once she had calmed herself down, she returned to the breakfast room and stood for another moment, watching the way people rose and sat and smiled. She found Prudence with her eye.
“Letters?” Prudence said mildly when Maria reached her side again.
“Later.” She sighed. “Will you walk?”
“If you like.”
They went out together to the terrace while the house finished eating itself full.
“Prudence.”
“Mm?”
“Do you believe I was too curt with Peter at the breakfast table this morning?”
Prudence gave her a long, worried look.
“I believe you appeared to be a bit distracted, is all. One might interpret that as curtness.”
“Did he?”