understand perfectly why he would wish to marry her. In her travelling dress, he had thought her slender, but her figure, revealed by the flimsy fabric of the evening gown, was certainly not lacking in curves. She was the kind of enigma that unwittingly brought out the most primal instincts in men: innocent yet sensual; fragile yet resilient; a woman who yearned to be protected, and one who desired nothing but to be left entirely alone. Was it unwitting? Impossible, surely, for any woman to be so accomplished an actress.
‘Would you care to join me?’ he asked, holding the decanter aloft, unsurprised when she shook her head. A woman who liked to keep a clear head. And who was, he told himself, simply doing the job she had been brought here to do. It was not her fault that he was distracted by her. Though one would have to be made of stone not to be.
Jean-Luc set his brandy impatiently aside and resumed his seat. He had his faults, but woolly thinking was not one of them. ‘Let us plot the arc of our romance. Obviously, we met in England,’ he said. ‘Fortunately, I was there on business in February for a few weeks. It was not long after I returned, at the beginning of April, that Juliette de Cressy found her way to my doorstep.’
‘So we met and married in the space of a few weeks,’ Sophia said.
‘We met and fell deeply in love and married,’ Jean-Luc corrected her. ‘It was a coup de foudre, for both of us. One look was enough.’
‘You don’t really believe that can happen? That one would decide to bind oneself for ever to a complete stranger, on the basis of a—a heated glance, without knowing anything of them, or of their intentions?’
It was, in fact, a notion he had always derided, but the scorn in her voice made Jean-Luc contrary. ‘Doesn’t love triumph over all?’
‘Love does not put food on the table, any more than it puts a roof over one’s head. In fact, in my opinion, love is the flimsiest possible reason for anyone to marry.’
‘What would you consider more sound reasons?’
‘It is a matter of quid pro quo, isn’t it?’ Sophia answered, as if this was perfectly obvious. ‘Pedigree, wealth, position, influence, these are the bulwarks of marriage contracts. Where there is a fair exchange, then affection may flourish, but there are so very few fair exchanges, aren’t there, and in most cases, it is the women who has least to offer, and so must sacrifice the most.’
She was staring off into the distance, having almost forgotten that he was there. ‘And even then,’ she continued coldly, ‘it is often not enough. Lies are offered in exchange for promises. Could any such marriage flourish? No,’ she concluded firmly. ‘No. It is best that it does not even begin. No matter what the consequences.’
Could she be referring to herself? Fascinated, Jean-Luc had a hundred questions he was burning to ask and frustratingly, he could not ask any of them. ‘Fortunately, we do not have to concern ourselves with that, since our marriage is entirely fictitious,’ he pointed out instead.
Sophia blinked. ‘You’re right. It is just that, a figment of our imagination. They say everyone loves a romance, don’t they? Why should they question ours?’ She pursed her lips. ‘So, we met in England. I expect you bumped into me when you were shopping for some shirts, and I was looking to match some ribbons for a new hat. I dropped my packages. You picked them up. Our eyes met, and we knew, yes?’
Her smile was as brittle as the spun sugar which decorated the honey cake. Jean-Luc returned it, like for like. ‘I took you to tea,’ he said, ‘and then the next day for a carriage ride in Hyde Park, and we met every day after that. A week before I was due to return to Paris, I realised that I could not return without you, and so I proposed on the spot.’
‘And I accepted with alacrity, and we were married by special licence—that is something one can easily accomplish, if you have sufficient funds,’ Sophia added, her smile turning bitter. ‘But I could not travel with you immediately, because I had...’ She faltered. ‘Why could I not come with you?’
‘Perhaps you had family, loose ends to tie up?’
‘No, none. Recently I have lived alone.’ She blushed. ‘Oh, you meant did the Sophia who married you live alone. No, she wouldn’t have, would she, a genteel unmarried woman like that? She would have had a companion of some sort.’
Which made him wonder what sort of woman that made Sophia, if not a woman like that? She had been completely confident with his servants, and quite at home taking this long, elaborate dinner. Her manners, her general air of refinement, were completely natural, the product of good breeding and habit. His butler had taken to her at once, and like his chef, Fournier was another of the aristocracy’s old retainers. Who was she? He itched to ask, but it would be futile. Subtlety was the key to extracting any information from the real Sophia. For now, he must concentrate on the fictional one. ‘So, this companion of yours, she has to be settled elsewhere, then?’
‘In the country,’ Sophia said, nodding. ‘In a cottage of her own, in the village where she grew up. I could do that for her. As the wife of a wealthy man, it would be the least I could do. And I’d want to make sure she was comfortable too, wouldn’t I, since she had been my companion for so long? So I remained in England, counting the days until we were reunited.’
‘And I waited here in Paris, counting the days until you came.’
Sophia frowned. ‘Why didn’t you tell anyone though?’
‘I did, I told Maxime, my oldest friend. It would have been he who drew up the settlements. I wanted to keep you a secret, to unveil you in person, knowing that when they saw you, everyone would understand in a moment why I fell so madly in love with you.’
‘And your servants?’
‘Our servants,’ he reminded her. ‘Have known of your arrival from the day after I received confirmation of your appointment, from The Procurer, but they won’t have talked.’
‘You are very confident of that.’
‘I have every reason to be. I pay very well, and I do not suffer insubordination.’
‘So your intention then, is to present me to Mademoiselle de Cressy...’
‘As soon as possible, now that we have our story straight.’
She smiled tentatively. ‘Do you ever shop for your own shirts?’
He laughed, as much with relief that their story had lifted her mood, as at her acumen. ‘Never, if I can avoid it. What if I had business with Berry Brothers, the wine merchants in St James’s Street—a company I do have dealings with, as it happens. Walking back to my town house, I’d go along Bond Street, wouldn’t I, and that was when I bumped into you. There, does that work?’
‘I think so. Will you relate it?’
‘We shall tell it together, just as we did there.’ Jean-Luc grinned. ‘Although we’ll have to add in a few loving glances.’
She clasped her hands together at her breast and fluttered her lashes at him. ‘Cornflower blue, the ribbons I was trying to match. You said they were the colour of my eyes.’
He smiled. ‘Ah no, I would not have said that, for your eyes are no such colour. I was wondering to myself only this morning, what colour are they, those beautiful eyes of my beautiful wife, for I would not call it turquoise or cornflower or even azure.’
‘What then would you call it, my love?’
She was not laughing, but there was laughter in her eyes, just as there had been before, when she had forgotten to act. Heat prickled down his back and his belly contracted as desire caught him in its grip. ‘I have no name for the colour, but it is the blue of the Mediterranean in the south on one of those perfect days, when the sun is almost white in the sky, and the sea glitters, and the heat makes your skin tingle.’
Sophia nodded. ‘I know,’ she said softly.
He leaned closer. She smelled of flowers, like an English springtime after