"I will damn well use whatever language I choose. Why didn't you tell them the truth and defend yourself?"

"The truth? You mean, about Iversly and Bronwyn?"

"The truth about your lack of blame in Thomas's muddle."

She shook her head. "You know how it is with Mama. She becomes very agitated when I suggest she hasn't the right of it. And Papa is so disappointed with how poorly Thomas has turned out-in his estimation, of course."

"Not only his."

Bea's slender brows lowered. "He is my brother, and if you choose to insult him again, or my loyalty to him, I will walk straight out of this room, Peter Cheriot."

Her threat had no effect on his mood. "Then what about your father, accusing you of being at fault?"

"I believe it is easier for him to fault me instead of his only son."

"So you accept wrongful blame from both your parents because of their delicate sensibilities?"

"They are merely acting as good parents should." Her teeth worried her lush lower lip.

"To whom?" he challenged. "And no doubt your brother welcomes your championship, so he can avoid responsibility for his own misdeeds."

She glared at him, her lips clamped tight now.

"What of the other matter, Bea? Why didn't you tell them about us?"

"Us?" Her dark eyes flickered with alarm.

"That you are marrying me," he clarified, a hard stone of discomfort gathering in his chest.

She did not wish to answer. He could see it as clear as sunlight in her distressed gaze.

"Why not?" he prodded, when she remained silent.

She looked away, apparently studying the gray stones of the wall.

"I could not bear to," she finally whispered.

Tip's heart thudded hard. "The fact of it is so abhorrent to you?"

Her eyes opened wide. "Oh, no," she said hurriedly. "It's just that I know how they will respond."

"How?"

"Not well," she muttered.

Tip's spine stiffened. "They require more than a title and ten thousand a year for their daughter?"

Her lips parted and lashes fanned wide. "Ten thousand?"

"Thereabouts."

"But I thought your father ran the estate nearly to ground."

"Yes, well, I remedied that."

"So quickly? It has only been four years." She seemed truly astounded.

"I've been very busy," he snapped, then regretted it when her gaze shuttered. He took a steadying breath. "Is that insufficient for your parents? Do they expect more for you?"

"For me?" She seemed to choke, then shook her head vigorously.

"Then what?" It must be something more significant. Something he would not want to hear.

"It's only that," she began slowly, "They will say . . ." Her voice faded, her eyes again distressed.

Tip stepped toward her, wanting to touch her but restraining himself. "What will they say?"

"They will not believe me." Her gaze remained upon the floor. "Papa will be irritated that I cannot speak rationally, and Mama will prose on about what a considerate brother you have been to me all these years, and say what a feeble joke I am playing."

Tip struggled with his warring emotions-anger and a peculiar sort of nausea.

"What we did last night, Bea, was hardly brother-and-sisterly."

Her glittering gaze shot to his and her breasts rose on a tight breath. "I cannot very well tell them that, can I?"

Anger won out. "Why not?" he exclaimed. "This is absurd. Speak the truth and make them accept it."

"I am not absurd, and it is not as simple as it seems. You don't understand the way of it."

"I didn't say you are absurd. I said the situation is absurd. And it is simple. You are merely afraid to put yourself forward."

"I-I am not."

"You're stammering, for God's sake. When do you ever stammer? You are afraid, but you cannot even admit it."

"They are difficult to speak with." She swallowed the words.

"Then pretend they're me, and tell them off," he said, hoping she would grin in response and dissipate the burning inside him. Instead, her eyes lit with vexation, which he supposed was better than misery. And it suited his ill humor perfectly.

"This is not amusing, Peter," she said between clenched teeth.

"It is to me," he countered unwisely, but the words kept coming. "Your father must listen to you if you insist upon it, Bea. And your mother, while admittedly unpleasant, is somewhat rational when not complaining. At least they are able to have calm, measured conversations with one another, however infrequently. Try having a pair of untrammeled dramatists for parents and then tell me you know what it is to be afraid."

"You don't know anything about my family." Her brow was dark. "You have no idea what it is like to live in the shadow of-"

"People who behaved with such a thorough lack of modesty that you spend every day of your life endeavoring to make up for it?" he shot out. "Parents who allowed passion to so thoroughly overcome them that they died because of it? Who bequeathed to their son the same unruly sensibilities so that sometimes each moment is a struggle to withstand it, like now, when I'm so angry that you won't simply go in there and tell them what they need to hear that I nearly wish to throttle you?"

Her mouth formed a perfect O.

Tip gulped in air. Dear God, what had he said? He reached for her, but she backed to the wall.

"Oh, Lord, Bea, my cursed tongue."

"I can withstand their criticisms. I have been doing it for two decades. But I cannot bear this censure from you too."

Panic gripped him. With her eyes flashing in anger, she was exquisite, and he wanted her with every fiber of his being. "I don't mean to censure you."

"Then why are you shouting at me?" she hurled back.

"Because I only wish them and you to regard you as highly as I do."

"So highly that you never once asked my father, or even my mother, for permission to court me?"

He blinked, clearly stunned, confirming Bea's long held suspicion. It had simply never occurred to him to show her that sign of respect.

The last modicum of her hope collapsed.

"I don't wish to do this. I cannot do this." She went to the door.

"Cannot do what?" His voice was unyielding. "Speak your mind to them? What does it matter how they respond? Who cares?"

"I do."

"Why, dammit?"

"Because they are my parents!"

"And they have made you feel worthless for your entire life, your mother lavishing Sylvia with attention and your father always overly impressed with Georgianna."

Bea halted before the closed door. Tip had never before spoken of Georgie critically. But for all that she'd longed for a sign that he no longer cared for her sister in that manner, she could not like it. Georgie had done nothing to merit blame for Bea's own foolish weaknesses.

She sucked in a breath and turned to face him. "It was not my sisters' fault."

"Then whose was it?"

Her throat closed. "Mine," she forced out.

He stood perfectly still, staring at her. "Then it is yours to remedy. Go in there and speak to them, Bea, or I will do it for you."

"No, you will not. It is not your business."

"You are going to be my wife. It bloody well is my business now."

Her misery flashed into temper. "Stay out of this, Peter. I will speak to them on my own terms when I am ready. I cannot be expected to be thinking straight when Aunt Julia is so ill and-" And she'd had so little sleep because she had spent the whole night making love with the man of her dreams. "And I-" And all she truly wanted now was to curl up in his arms until her parents vanished.

He looked so angry, so disapproving. She couldn't bear it.

"I wish to help," he said between tight teeth.

"Well, you don't sound like it." Her cheeks felt damp. "Or even look like it." She dashed the tears away with the back of her hand and whirled toward the door.

He grasped her arm, staying her. His eyes were overbright.

"Have I done this? Have I made you cry?" He sounded horrified.

"No. Yes. I don't know!"

He took the side of her face in one large hand and brushed a tear from her cheek with his thumb. He bent to her mouth.

His kiss was sweet and hot, shimmering into her raw senses. She leaned into him, welcoming his arm cinching her waist and drawing her against him. She opened her lips and drank in his warmth, his comfort and desire.

It amazed her that he still wanted her, just as she had always wanted him. His hands holding her were so strong and certain, filling her with that fire she couldn't escape now. He had awakened the spark of it in her so many years ago, stoked it to a blaze the night before, and now it could only be fed by him.

A murmur of voices came through the thick wooden door at her back. Tip drew away from her mouth, but he did not release her from his arms.

"She has already gone to find her brother," her father said, his boots scuffing on the corridor's stone floor.

"She ought to have remained here to assist me. No doubt Lord Cheriot would be better off without her making a nuisance of herself while he searches for our son."

"You say he visits Hart House regularly?" They seemed to have paused at the base of the stairway.

"Three or four times a year. He comes to see Lord Marke, of course, and makes his bow to me when he is in the country, like a true gentleman," she said in a slanted tone, as though she expected her husband to do the same. "Marke is collecting a fine stable and dear Lord Cheriot counsels him, you know. But of course you would know that if you had not abandoned me to my fate, all alone in the horrid wilds of Yorkshire."

"He does not have any intentions toward Beatrice, does he?" He sounded skeptical.

"Lord Cheriot? Heavens, no! He used to be so fond of Georgianna, of course, before Kievan returned from Ireland. But Beatrice? Whatever would a gentleman such as he see of interest in her?"

"She's pretty, Harriet. Doesn't have Sylvia's beauty, naturally, or Georgie's mind. But she looks something like my Aunt Mabel did in her youth."

"And now Mabel is eighteen stone if she is an ounce," Lady Harriet tittered. "But there is no point in refining upon it. Our third daughter is regrettably very foolish, entirely unable to appreciate the attentions of fine gentlemen. Even when several did court her during her first seasons, she never showed any interest." A pause. "Do you know, Alfred, I have long suspected that she developed a tendre for some inappropriate man while I lived in town, before you exiled me. Perhaps a footman or a groom."

"And you failed to mention this to me at the time?" His voice rose.

"What would it have mattered? Beatrice is too much of a mouse to act on that sort of infatuation. And since then, she has showed such little enthusiasm over any gentleman, it simply never crosses my mind to worry about it."

"You must have the right of it."

"A compliment? Dear me, Alfred, it must be years since we have agreed on anything."

"No doubt it will be years again before the next occasion."

"Now where is that wretched Claude with my bandboxes? I will ring a peal over Beatrice's head for abandoning me to my fate with these careless servants. It was horrid enough on the road."

Their voices receded within the stairwell.

Bea's heart beat so swiftly she could barely breathe, a thick knot clamping her belly. She drew out of Tip's loosened hold and turned to the door.

"You must make yourself plain to them." His tone brooked no argument.