An Inconvenient Arrangement (Inconvenient Matches Book #2)

Prologue

'The sun is not a star, Sylvie. You're just being silly. The sun is the sun.' Raphael St. Alexander, Viscount Carlisle, puffed his chest out and replied with all the masculine pride his eight year old body could muster while lying down on the grass with a sprained ankle. After all, he was a boy and the son of a Marquess to boot! He had a great deal of authority, throbbing ankle or no!

'It is, too! And you mustn't move too much, or else you can make your injury worse!'

'I am only injured because I was trying to get your kite out of the tree! And the sun is not a star. My tutor would have told me otherwise.'

Obviously, he would know better; not only was he older than his companion by a massive three years and four months, Sylvie was just a girl, and what did girls know about astronomy? The only thing her governess ever taught her was all the boring girl stuff like how to curtsy and which spoon to eat soup with. Rafe, many years her senior, had a tutor who taught him science and geography and Latin, along with all the other interesting boy things. And he had never once heard this poppycock about the sun being a star!

Girls were so silly. Sylvie ought to stick to playing tea time with her dolls instead of insisting on playing with him and her brother, Thomas. Thomas was Rafe's best friend in the whole world. The only boy who was not rude to him because his parents were divorced. The only boy who ever sought him out to play with. Rafe's only friend, besides Sylvie, in all of England.

'It is so. Papa told me, and you know that Papa is the smartest man on earth.' Sylvie looked at him with irritation and fire in her eyes- one green and one brown, her spectacles slipping down her nose. Rafe made a noise of exasperation and rightened the glasses. Really, Sylvie couldn't tell a rock from a horse without them, she really ought to take better care. 'And I am sorry you fell. I hope Thomas comes back with help before it starts to rain.'

Well fiddlesticks, she had him there. Mr. Heartwood had been a lecturer at Oxford, he really was the smartest man on earth.

'Well, I'll believe you in that case.' Rafe huffed as the sky gave a dangerous rumble. 'But only because your papa said so. Now, stop chattering like a magpie. You could talk my ear off!'

'I wouldn't have to chatter if you just believed me! Girls can know astronomy too, you know! Papa gave me a teselcope on my birthday.'

'No, Sylvie, I have never met a girl who knew astronomy. Or geography, or chemistry. You are just a strange specimen. Maybe you aren't a girl at all. And it's telescope.'

'I am so a girl!' Sylvie hissed at him in indignation. 'As if I would ever want to be a smelly boy!'

'Being a boy is sooooo much better than being a girl, Sylvie. Maybe if you were a boy, you could have gotten your own kite down the tree!' Rafe deadpanned, getting up on his shoulders as a drop of rain fell down on his nose from the sky, accompanied by another rumble that promised a summer storm. 'Fiddlesticks, Sylvie. We have to go or else we'll get drenched. There is a cottage nearby on my property that the groundskeeper uses. Help me up.'

Sylvie grabbed his outstretched hand and tugged him so that he was standing at his feet (well, foot really) and then went to his side to support his limping side. They somehow managed to amble all the way to the cottage before the downpour really started, but he could feel the tremble of her little body beneath his arms as she helped him down onto the carpet. They did not know how to start a fire so they huddled in front of the empty fireplace as if it might offer them some phantom warmth. As a fearsome strike of lightning illuminated the sky, Sylvie yelped and huddled closer to him. He put his arm around her and drew her close.

'Are you scared, Sylvie?' He asked, hoping that if she would talk he may take her mind off of the storm.

'O-of course not!' She sniffled, her voice thick with the sound of her tears barely held back by her pride to not seem like a ninny in front of Rafe. 'It is only a n-natural phenomenon. P-papa exp-explained it to me quite well a few w-weeks ago!'

Looking back, that was perhaps the first time Raphael realized he loved Sylvie. Not in a romantic way, naturally, for he was hardly eight years old himself, but in the innocent way a little boy loves his friend who, despite all her chattering, was a rather decent playmate.

'It's okay to be scared, Sylvie. But you don't need to be, not while I'm here. I will protect you.'

'D-do you promise?' She whimpered.

'Always, Sylvie.'

The splash of freezing water on his nearly nude body startled Raphael out of his dream. Or had it been a memory? He was never sure these days, what was real and what wasn't. Half the time, he wasn't even sure if he was asleep or awake. The pain usually alerted him. They never really liked it when he lost consciousness during his whippings. Or whatever other form of interrogation they fancied on that particular day.

He didn't want to be awake. He didn't want to know what they had planned for him today.

Rafe closed his eyes once again, trying to lose himself in the memory, except this time it was a little different. The same eyes, one brown and one green, stared at him through tears. Though now he had better words for them; emerald and chestnut. Her face was different too, the face of a woman instead of a child. Her cheekbones more prominent, her mouth far lusher. So lovely, so damn lovely.

'I am not going to come back alive, Sylvie. I won't come back, not this time. And....I am afraid.' He sobbed, the soft grass staining his evening attire. 'I am so afraid Sylvie, some days it feels easier if I would just die.'

'Don't say that! Don't you dare say that!' She shook him with trembling hands and then pulled his quivering body into her embrace. 'It's okay t-to be scared. But you will not die. I won't allow it. I will protect you. Always.'

Ah, poor Sylvie. You poor, sweet, girl.

What a pretty little liar you were.

What a naïve little fool.