Promises in Moonlight

Part 6

"I didn't tell anyone!" Evie glared. "I have no intention of marrying you. So stop panicking."

"My grandmother thinks I've compromised you and I should do the decent thing. If you didn't tell her, who did?"

"How the hell would I know? I left after our little debacle last week."

"It can't be anyone other than you." Seth all but bellowed. He had been absolutely furious when his grandmother had cornered him and practically ordered him to marry Evie. Furious and resolute. The more she argued with him, the more she berated him over the bedroom farce, the more he dug in his heels. He was sure that his grandmother and Evie had hatched the whole thing.

"Yes, it can." She glared at the man as if he was being deliberately obtuse. What was the matter with men, as soon as their penis got active their one brain cell died.

"Who?"

"Your miss perfect, for one." Evie folded her arms as she watched his reaction. Oh the man was definitely in way over his head. "I understand you two are an item. Been out this week." Amelia had told tell her that she'd seen Seth and Jane on Friday night, at a party.

"For your information we aren't an item. And Jane is hardly likely to tell anyone that she found us together if she wanted me?"

"It depends." Evie snapped waspishly.

"On what?" He grated falling into her trap.

"On how stupid she is!" Evie said with relish.

For a second or two they simply glared at each other.

"Well if that's all," Evie began to close the door.

"Phone my grandmother and tell her she has been misinformed. Nothing happened between us." He slapped a hand against the door to stop it from closing.

Evie folded her arms, "No."

"No?" He boomed. "I haven't compromised you."

"I'm not phoning your grandmother."

"Why the fuck not?" He was about ready to pick her up and shake her. Instead his fingers curled around the door jamb as he leaned in toward her.

Evie did not budge. It was no good him trying to intimidate her, she had held her nerve against many a foe stronger than him. But she stopped attempting to close the door. Instead she folded her arms, stood on the inside of her house and told him bluntly, "Because I have never lied to your grandmother and I am not starting now just to suit you and your spiteful girlfriend."

"I haven't bloody well compromised you!" He bellowed.

"True." She nodded. "But I kissed you and you kissed me back. And your girlfriend found us, with you on top! That doesn't count as nothing happened in my book!"

He ran a hand through his hair, shook his head and blew out a breath before saying, "She isn't my girlfriend, but she's right. You staged the whole thing didn't you?"

"What?" Now it was Evie's turn to shriek loudly. Staged it? Why would she do something so stupid as to stage being caught with him. It would ruin her reputation and given that she had little else to hold onto, she was keen to ensure that her reputation remained unsullied. Life was going to be tough any day now, she thought, and she would need all the help she could get, so staging a fall had not been in her plans. She needed him on side, and she knew he liked Jane, so using Evie's brand of logic, upsetting Jane would put him offside.

"I wasn't doing what you wanted, quickly enough, so you manipulated me. You need me to marry you to cover your debts. " He was repeating what Jane had suggested over dinner last week.

"What?" She whispered as she once again realised that probably the whole town knew of her financial circumstances.

"We have never had a quiet word, on our own in the five years I've known you, and then last week, all of a sudden, you want to talk to me." His left eyebrow rose in disbelief, "In private." He snorted to add weight to his scepticism. "Why?"

"Oh I don't know, but you seem to know everything, so you tell me!"

Seth sneered, "I'd say you needed to up the game. How much do you owe?"

"Will you listen to yourself!" Evie charged, and jabbed him in the shoulder, wishing instead that she had the nerve to punch him, "A, describing your girlfriend as she is does not make me a shrew. B, if I wanted you, you wouldn't be single now. And C, you stupid moron, I told you to tell your grandmother that we weren't an item. Why the hell would I tell her about that farce in the bedroom?" She pushed at his chest, trying to push him out of the doorway, "I wanted to have a private word with you because while I don't want to marry you! I like your grandmother and I don't want to see you make a total arse of yourself. So, fool that I am, I was going to point out a few of your girlfriend's stellar qualities." This time she sneered at him, "But you know what? You and that scheming, malicious, sly, egotistical twit deserve each other. I just feel sorry for your grandmother." She grabbed the door and started to shove it to close it, "Now get out of my house."

"I want your word that you will tell my grandmother that there is nothing going on between us." Once again he planted a hand against the door.

"Oh, I think she's figured that out."

"She happens to have placed an announcement in her local paper." He stated and watched her face.

"What?" Evie stopped trying to shut the door, her eyes puzzled she looked straight at him.

He reached into his rear jean pocket and retrieved a torn newspaper segment. He shoved it at her "Here. Read it for yourself."

There in black and white was an engagement announcement. Evie's mouth practically fell open. According to this press cutting she was engaged to Seth. Evie looked up from the paper, scowled at him then looked back at the paper, trying to decide whether it was a hoax.

"She said the national needed more than two days notice, but it would appear in next weekend's paper." He told her bluntly, not really sure what to make of her reaction.

Evie looked up from the paper again. Her eyes puzzled.

"So you got what you wanted. In so far as you have forced her hand." Seth shook his head, as he continued, "But I'm not so easily led." He looked her up and down, "You know what? You can explain to all and sundry why your prospective bridegroom doesn't show up at parties with you." He feigned contemplation, "Not sure what you'll do when I don't show up at your wedding! If you think I am going to bail you out and rescue that farm of yours, you can just forget it." He took the newspaper clip from her fingers, "I won't be bullied into marrying you."

"I'm pleased to hear it." She said more quietly, knowing that this was going to embarrass her even more. Of course people would think it strange that he was dating Jane when an announcement about an engagement had been made. She also knew they would all assume either she had announced it or was doing it out of spite because she'd been 'dumped.' Just as she knew that all that she had done to get over the last few months would be undone in the space of reading a newspaper column. She reached for the door handle, "Now leave."

"Are you going to tell my grandmother?"

"Yes. I'll talk with her." She sounded quiet. Depression settled.

"You will?" Seth sounded sceptical.

"I said I will." She repeated quietly.

And her tone worried Seth. She sounded broken. He didn't want that. He just wanted her to leave him out of her plans.