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opportunity to propose to Miss Reynolds, a lady he had decided would make him a good, loyal wife. With luck, by this time next winter they might be expecting the birth of an heir to keep the family title in the hands of true Calvert descendants.
    “I must have misheard you.” Lady Cassandra’s tone dared him to question her mistake. “No doubt you are correct about the weather.”
    Brandon could not allow such an opportunity to pass without taking advantage of it. “Perhaps we should not go on as we have been either. This house is altogether too small to let us each behave as if the other is invisible. What were you thinking just now—that you would rather be snowbound with any man in the world other than me?”
    “I was thinking no such thing!” Like Hamlet’s Ophelia, she protested too much for Brandon to believe.
    He arched one eyebrow and fixed her with a penetrating gaze. “The truth, if you please. The past four years have not made me any more inclined to abide deception.”
    “There is a difference between deception and discretion you know.” Lady Cassandra scowled—an expression that would have looked unattractive on any other woman. Somehow she contrived to make it appear charming.
    “Very well!” she admitted. “It was rather a shock to see you again after all this time and more than a little awkward considering how we parted. I am certain it cannot have been an agreeable experience for you either.”
    How could he deny it after insisting on the truth from her? Perhaps Lady Cassandra had a point about deception and discretion. Brandon did not care to admit that meeting her again dismayed him, for that would suggest feelings of hurt and betrayal he should have put behind him long ago.
    But he would far rather own to such feelings than to the perverse flashes of pleasure their inconvenient reunion provoked in him. “Of course our meeting was a surprise for me as well. And being thrown together like this in such close quarters is, as you say, rather... awkward.”
    The lady’s defensive scowl eased.
    “But it does not need to be,” Brandon ventured. “Whatever else we may think of one another, surely we can agree we are both sensible people.”
    Somehow, he did not feel as sensible as before he’d laid eyes on her again.
    Lady Cassandra gave a cautious nod.
    Heartened, Brandon continued, “Two sensible people should be capable of putting the past behind them and getting on together for a little while, don’t you agree?”
    She did not avoid his gaze now but met it directly, as if it were a challenge. “I can if you can.”
    A chill trickled down Brandon’s spine, unsettling yet strangely stimulating. “I am not proposing a contest, but a truce. For as long as we are forced to remain in this house, let us endeavor to treat each other as brand new acquaintances.”
    Lady Cassandra squared her shoulders and tilted her chin. “Agreed. As you say, we will likely go our separate ways in the morning.”
    Though that was precisely what Brandon hoped, her reminder troubled him. He brushed such feelings aside and swept a glance around the kitchen, with its dark wooden floor, beam and plaster walls and massive cooking hearth. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
    Her plucky assistance to Mrs. Martin made him feel idle by comparison, even though he knew she had only been trying to get away from him. Besides, he needed some excuse for following her to the kitchen, in case anyone noticed.
    “You could take in that plate of cake.” Lady Cassandra nodded toward the table where it sat.
    Without another word, Brandon picked up the well-laden plate and headed back to the parlor. He told himself he might be better off for having to spend time with Cassandra Whitney again. Their encounter might finally allow him to close that chapter of his life and begin a new one with Isabella Reynolds.

Chapter Four
    N O DOUBT S IR Brandon was right. Cassandra gazed after him as he headed back to the parlor bearing the