Instead of getting angry, as Bliss would have expected, or waxing sullen, Jamie threw back his head and laughed. “Careful,” he said when he’d gotten control of himself again. “If Peony ’ears you call her that, she’ll scratch out your eyes.”

Bliss flushed with conviction. “Just let her try it,” she warned.

Jamie opened the door of the tearoom for Bliss, a look of speculation on his face. “I think it would be a pretty fair fight, now that you mention it. And you are goin’ to ride in the carriage with ’er—friend.”

Bliss tried to move away, but Jamie’s grasp on her elbow, while painless, was unyielding. “I couldn’t very well refer to you as my husband,” she pointed out.

Jamie’s jawline was a little tight, even though he was smiling. “Are you ashamed of me, Duchess?”

Bliss whirled and glared up at him, her eyes smarting with tears only he could have caused her to shed. “I might ask that same thing of you,” she spat. “How dare you bring that—that strumpet with you?”

“That what?”

“Pansy or Posie or whatever her name is!”

The carriage door flew open with a crash. “Now, just a minute here,” the paramour cried, ascending none too gracefully and storming toward Bliss. “I’m willing to put up with a lot, but I draw the line at being called a strumpet!”

Bliss was about to push up her sleeves and wade into the fray when Jamie stepped between the two women and said, “Enough,” with sufficient sternness to quiet both of them.

“My name is Peony,” said that lady, after several seconds had passed. “Not Pansy, not Posie—Peony! And I swear I’d stalk off in a fit if that weren’t my carriage!”

Jamie sighed. “That would be impractical, wouldn’t it?” he asked.

Bliss was full of anger and pain, unable to believe his cruelty in flaunting this woman under her nose this way. She wondered what he hoped to accomplish. “I’ll take the tram,” she said, gazing toward the stop with longing.

Every inch the gentleman, Jamie squired Peony back to the carriage and helped her inside, while Bliss stood stiffly on the sidewalk, ready to die of the humiliation. He’d made his choice. He meant to leave her standing there....

Bliss turned and started, with forlorn determination, toward the tram stop. Her throat was so thick she couldn’t swallow, and tears were slipping down her cheeks, and she was damned if she’d ever let Jamie McKenna know how he’d hurt her.

Except that he fell into step beside her, settling his hat on his head with a practiced motion of one hand and grinning insufferably. Behind them, the coach containing his mistress rattled away from the curb, traveling in the opposite direction.

Chapter 13

BLISS SAT STIFFLY IN THE TRAM SEAT, REFUSING TO SO MUCH AS glance at the man beside her. If Jamie thought pretending that nothing was wrong could make up for the fact that he’d virtually taunted her with his mistress, he was sadly mistaken.