Inside the carriage, she took the place beside her cousin. Aunt Merrick looked her up and down before tapping on the ceiling to order the driver to move on. “I would gladly have sent King to dress your hair, Camellia.”
“Thank you, Aunt. But there was no need.”
“I think it’s quite…” Felicity reached up to tuck a wayward lock into the loose arrangement. “Is it an Irish fashion, Cousin?”
Cami smiled. “You may say so. It is entirely my own invention.” Aunt Merrick huffed in disapproval and turned to look out the window.
Given her own way, Cami would have walked the short distance to Lady Penhurst’s, rather than be confined in the now silent, increasingly stuffy carriage. Though dusk was falling, the sky was still light, the air unseasonably warm—perfect for a meandering stroll through Mayfair. Aunt Merrick would have protested that the weather was changeable and, worse, the behavior was unseemly. But Cami cared little for the consequence conveyed by the crest on the door of the coach or the well-matched team of horses that drew it.
When the carriage slowed just a few moments later, Aunt Merrick remarked on the number of arriving guests. “Lady Penhurst should be pleased. She could not have been sure of a crush after last spring’s scandal about her niece, the one they called the Disappearing Duchess.”
A scandal? That explained Cami’s inclusion in the invitation. Lady Penhurst must have been eager to fill out her guest list. For her own part, Cami could imagine little worse than an evening designed to showcase the dubious musical talents of assorted young ladies. And as for the young men before whom those talents were to be displayed…were there not more important things to discover about a potential wife than her ability to perform on the pianoforte?
A footman opened the carriage door and lowered the step. Cami was the last to descend. The steady trickle of arriving guests suggested that at least some of London society did not share her reservations about the evening’s entertainment. Or perhaps they were just hoping for another scandal. “What of Lord Penhurst?” she asked.
“Lady Penhurst’s son. He was at school with Stephen,” Felicity explained in a whisper. “Rather wild. I doubt we’ll see him tonight.”
He was standing beside his mother in the receiving line, however, offering up words of greeting tinged with boredom. “Will you be favoring us with a song tonight, Lady Felicity?” he asked, clearly uninterested in the answer. Cami wondered if his future bride had the misfortune to be among the performers.
Before Felicity could speak or shake her head, his mother broke in. She was a thin, sharp-eyed woman with such coarse gray curls Cami hoped they were false. “No need. She’s made her match already, as I heard tell,” she said, with a suggestive lift to her brows. The last scandal did not seem to have dulled Lady Penhurst’s appetite for gossip.
Felicity’s cheeks flushed red. Immediately following Lady Montlake’s ball, her name had begun to be paired publicly with Lord Ash’s, and tongues had begun to wag, much to her chagrin.
“Oh?” Lord Penhurst was already looking past them to the next guests. “And who is the fortunate gentleman?”
“If the rumors are true, she’s expecting an offer from Lord Ashborough,” declared Lady Penhurst in a sham whisper that carried along the receiving line. “Though it’s really not done, I invited him tonight. Strictly on your behalf, you know,” she told Felicity. “He arrived not long ago.”
The name returned Penhurst’s gaze to her face as he paled and offered her a stiff bow. “Indeed he did. I wish you the best of luck, ma’am.”
The doors that usually separated the dining room and receiving room had been opened to create one large space, and all the ordinary furniture had been removed in favor of spindly gilt chairs. In neat rows, they faced a slightly raised dais surrounded by plants and upon which sat a pianoforte, two more chairs, and a harp. As yet, no musicians occupied the stage, but the seats for the audience were filling rapidly, making the empty chairs around Lord Ashborough conspicuous.
He rose and stepped toward them, holding out an arm for Lady Merrick and smiling at Felicity. “Good evening. There are seats just here. Please, join me.”
“Mr. Fox does not accompany you this evening, my lord?” Felicity asked. Cami ached at the hopeful note in her voice.
“His sister, Lady Dalrymple, holds a weekly salon, to which he is promised in perpetuity, I’m afraid.” The words were accompanied by a sweeping glance that settled for the merest moment on Cami before he returned his attention to leading Lady Merrick to a chair.
The flash of heat, of hardness, in his eyes made Cami’s knees wobble beneath her skirts. She reached a self-conscious hand to the silk ribbon that wound its way through her hair and circled her throat. What had felt like cleverness half an hour past now felt decidedly dangerous.
Drawing a steadying breath, she looped her arm through Felicity’s elbow and pushed onward. She must do whatever was necessary to keep her cousin safe. Even if it meant throwing herself onto the fire.
* * * *
My God. Was she taunting him?
Loosely curled locks of black hair hung softly about her face and shoulders; no difficulty picturing them spread across his pillow after a tumble. A token effort to contain the mass of dark waves came in the form of a band of coquelicot silk. A collar of the same bright ribbon encircled her slender neck. His ribbon.
A possessive growl rumbled through him.
His.
The last thing he needed was a woman who inspired those sorts of thoughts. His desires were a furnace best not stoked. Carefully, he arranged the seating so as to put as much distance between him and Camellia as possible, to ward off any further temptation. Felicity to his right, her mother beyond that, Camellia at the end. Entirely out of his range of vision—unless he sat up straighter than was comfortable and leaned slightly backward in his chair
