Two Wrongs Make a Marriage by Christine Merrill Read Free Book Online Page B

what honesty is worth,’ he said with a dramatic gesture. ‘The least you could do, now that you are trapped with me, is to spare my feelings and pretend that you once liked me.’
    She had not intended to hurt his feelings, not that she truly believed he had them. ‘I liked you as well as any other man,’ she allowed. ‘I have always known that the match I would make might be decided after a brief acquaintance, and based on fondness rather than grand passion. Had we married in truth, I would have given you the same wholehearted devotion that I’d have given to any other man.’
    If possible, he looked even more injured. ‘It is faint praise to know that any man could have taken my place and received similar affection.’
    ‘You would not have minded, I assure you.’ She raised her head with pride at her one accomplishment. ‘I have been properly educated on that score and would have made you a fine wife.’
    ‘This I must hear,’ he said with a lascivious smile. ‘Tell me what sort of education you have that would lead us to be in the situation we are sharing. Did it involve tricking men into having you? Or are there other skills I might appreciate?’ He gave a waggle of eyebrow to imply the sorts of things her mother had all too candidly explained to her.
    ‘I have no idea what you are talking about.’ She did her best, but the thought that he might see easily through the falsehood was acutely embarrassing. ‘I know all that is important for a wife to know. I can sing and dance and play the pianoforte. My watercolours are deemed to be quite good. I can net a purse and embroider with silks. I can manage the servants of a large household and plan all sorts of entertainments. My manners are impeccable, whether on a morning visit to a friend or a court presentation. In addition, I am quite well read, can speak and understand French and read a bit of Italian. Most importantly, I am willing to be led in all things by the wisdom of my husband. What more could a man expect?’
    ‘I stand corrected,’ Jack said with an ironic smile. ‘Apparently, you are all I could want. The fact that you are poor as a church mouse and cannot hide your contempt for me does not enter into the equation.’
    ‘The poverty cannot be helped. It was not my doing. And I hold you in contempt because you lied to me,’ she said. ‘You pretended to be someone you were not. Your name, your family, your stories of India—not a word of it was true.’
    ‘I was acting,’ he insisted. ‘I played the role I was hired for.’
    ‘But I believed in you and your stories.’ And she was most thoroughly disappointed to find that the man she had convinced herself she could love did not exist at all.
    He brightened. ‘Which is proof that I am a better actor than I have been given credit for. I wish, my dear, that I could take you to meet some of my critics and show to them how completely convincing I am in this part. They would take back what they said about my performance of Mordaunt Exbury in Love and Fashion. They said I was not lordly enough,’ he added indignantly. ‘And some wag in the audience had the nerve to throw a rotten potato.’
    ‘I hope he hit you, you miserable cur,’ Thea said with sincerity. ‘You stood before God and lied through your teeth about staying with me until we were parted by death.’
    ‘And as far as you knew, we would have been.’ He thought for moment. ‘It is almost the truth, when you think about it. A real Kenton existed. But he is, in fact, dead.’ He smiled at her in encouragement. ‘Perhaps you are already a widow.’
    ‘But I did not wish to be his widow. I wished to be his wife. And in any case, I did not marry that man, rest his soul. I married you.’ She raised a finger in a dire gesture of accusation, hoping that he would see the difference and the dilemma it put her in.
    He caught her hand out of the air and pressed it to his lips for a quick kiss. ‘And we must endeavour to make the