Desire and Deceit [bxb]

14. The invitation

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...

Alvin stared at his teacup with unblinking eyes.

Lord Frazier and Lady Dowager Frazier talked over the breakfast table in polite, clipped words, the tension in the room as thick and pierceable as the butter they spread on their breads.

".... Alvin, would you care to fill us in?"

He jumped, the startling voice of his grandfather snapping him out of his glaring.

"Yes?" He prompted, smiling tightly under the eyes of everyone present at the table.

Wasting away the night paining had not been the brightest idea.

"Tell us about your... escapade... with the duke last night." The dowager demanded, looking at him over her teacup, a dreadful smile plastered on her painted lips.

Wilhelm snorted into his glass of milk. That little bastard.

"It was just as usual, Mrs. Frazier." He replied, forgoing her title on purpose, and by the way her hand tightened around her cup, she noticed. He smirked. "We shared two dances, and then he led me to the carriage."

"Oh?" She put her cup down, raising an eyebrow in intrigue. "So, we may rest assured that you have him in your bag?"

He answered her with a raised brow of his own. "That, I shall leave to your deduction, Mrs. Frazier, as he is to call on us for luncheon." He looked at Lizzie with a conspiratory grin. "Right, Lizzie? Did he not beseech us most vehemently to let us wait on him today?"

His stepsister smiled into her cup. "That he did, brother. Most vehemently."

Lady Frazier hummed. "Then it is the most critical time. We must take all precautions." She looked to her father-in-law. "I shall chaperone them today."

"There is no need for you to inconvenience yourself, Amelia. Wilhelm has been playing this role quite ardently these past few weeks." Old baron grumbled.

Amelia waved him off. "Wilhelm has better things to do." She looked pointedly at her son, who shrugged noncommittedly. "Besides, I wish to make his grace' acquaintance, seeing as I'm the only member of this family he has yet to meet."

"Wonderful, mama." Wilhelm rolled his eyes. "His grace is a delight to be around."

"I'm sure." She smiled.

Alvin sighed. He had no energy in him to argue against her plans.

...

Elizabeth cringed at her potatoes and peas. Luncheon had turned out to be sour, to say the least.

There were too many things wrong with the scene. The most obvious of them all was the seating arrangement. Though courtesy required Alvin to be seated aside the duke, he had been pushed across the table alongside Elizabeth. Instead, in the seat beside his grace sat a straight-backed Wilhelm who tersely picked at his vegetables with a spoon, his face indicative of his unappreciativeness for his mother's ploys.

Wilhelm being seated on the left seat of the guest would not have been so abhorrently displeasing, if only the perpetrator herself was not occupying the right one, chortling and talking in hushed voice to a steadily growing ill at ease Duke Presley.

Alvin wanted to kick her feet beneath the table to quiet her.

Elizabeth looked at her stepbrother with compassion. "I'm sorry about her."

"Don't be." He assured. 'I'll get her back' was left unsaid, but understood.

"The chicken is quite tender today, I must say." The duke smiled conversationally at the table in general. "My compliments to your cook, Lady Frazier."