Returning to her, he handed her the glass. “Drink this.”

She somehow resisted the urge to toss the contents into his face. The tepid liquid eased her dry throat, and she assimilated the fact that she’d swooned-for the first time in her life. He clearly thought her some weak-willed twit. In her eight and twenty years she’d suffered worse things, recovered from worse, without succumbing to such missish nonsense. But dear God, this situation was a disaster.

Lady Sarah had abandoned Lord Greybourne at the altar-certainly a circumstance rife with scandal. But one made all the worse, from Meredith’s point of view, because the wedding in question-the most talked-about, anticipated wedding in years-was one Meredith had arranged. And as much as she might wish it otherwise, every member of Society would remember that snippet of information. Remember it, and revile her because of it. Blame her for arranging such an unacceptable match, just as Lord Ravensly and Lord Hedington had done.

All her grand plans for her future evaporated like a trail of steam escaping a teakettle. Her reputation, her respectability for which she’d fought so hard, worked so tirelessly to establish, teetered on the edge of extinction. And all because of him.

Her gaze wandered around the room, and for the first time she realized that she and Lord Greybourne were alone. Just another facet of this debacle that could result in disaster. “Where are your father and Lord Hedington?”

“They went to announce to the congregation that Lady Sarah had taken ill and therefore the wedding could not take place today.” He exhaled a long breath. “Isn’t it odd how two statements that are both true can still somehow be a he?”

“Not a he,” Meredith said, hastily adjusting her fichu and straightening her dark blue skirts. “I prefer to call it an omission of certain pertinent facts.”

He cocked his head and studied her. “A definition that sounds very much like that for ‘he. ’”