“T, come away,” she whispered, but the music drowned her voice and Teresa wasn’t listening. She and Mr. Eads stared at one another as though there were not four hundred other people in the place. But his gaze was not now suspicious. It was as wondering as Teresa’s. Then with the neatest movement, as though he were indeed a gentleman, he bowed. Teresa swayed forward.
Diantha grabbed her arm and propelled her through clusters of guests into the depths of the crowd.
“What on earth do you mean, ‘It is him’?” She drew her friend to a halt at the edge of the dance floor.
“What?” Teresa blinked ginger lashes.
“You said, ‘It is him,’ Are you acquainted with that man?”
“He bowed to me.” She looked dazed. “He must like my bosom.”
“Don’t be silly. All men like bosoms.”
The sense came back into Teresa’s face. “Now wait just a moment. You said that I would meet a handsome gentleman tonight who admired my bosom.” She craned her neck to look back toward the terrace doors. Mr. Eads was still staring at her. She released a little breath of pleasure.
“A gentleman.” Not an assassin. Diantha twisted her fingers in her skirt. “You see— Oh, good heavens.” Her heart raced. She could not lie again, especially not in these circumstances. Never again. “T, I must warn you—”
“Di, if you seek to turn me away from him, you will fail.” Teresa’s face looked perfectly calm now.
“Turn you away from him? But, you have only just seen him. You’ve looked at him once.”
“Now wait another moment. You go off on an epic adventure to save your mother but I am not permitted to like a gentleman that catches my eye?” Teresa folded her gloved hands before her. “You are a thorough hypocrite, Diantha Lucas.”
“I am.”
“You admit it?”
“Of course I admit it. But, T, you really mustn’t consider that gentleman. You see, I am acquainted with him. Slightly. And I don’t think—”
“Oh!” Teresa’s eyes grew filmy again. “Do introduce me to him!”
“Introduce you to whom, dear gel?” Much like the ceiling and walls, the lady who approached wore cascading yards of tulle. Upon her head perched a turban topped with a gilded ostrich feather and a large bejeweled pin, and between a thumb and forefinger encased in peacock-colored gloves she wielded an Oriental fan painted with a gentleman’s portrait.
“Now, to whom do you wish an introduction, child? That lanky pole over there isn’t worth your shortened breaths—my fourth cousin thrice removed and an inveterate gambler. But any other gentleman present tonight would be worth the adoration of a girl of such ample charms.”
Teresa peered around Lady B. “He is standing by those doors, my lady. A very”—her breath hitched—“tall, large man with long hair.”
Their hostess clucked her tongue. “That, dear gel, is the Earl of Eads and a penniless heathen. He’s barely been in society since he returned from the East Indies some seven years ago. I wonder that he’s here tonight unless it is to scout out husbands for his countless sisters. Half sisters. Must be at least seven of them, the poor man. But he does have remarkably fine legs.”
Teresa and Lady Beaufetheringstone nodded in sober agreement.
“I shan’t introduce you, Miss Finch-Freeworth.” Lady Beaufetheringstone pursed her lips. “You are far too young and innocent to be thrown into the mouth of the lion . . . just yet.” She took Teresa’s arm. “Now come, child. I will make you acquainted with more suitable gentlemen. That addlepated ninny Hortensia Piffle will succeed in finding you a satisfactory husband when pigs fly. Like two peas in a pod, she and your mother . . .”
Diantha watched them move away. She didn’t worry for Teresa. If one of society’s greatest hostesses took her friend under her wing, it could be only to Teresa’s benefit. And her mind and heart were filled with someone else entirely.
What had Wyn known about Mr. Eads—Lord Eads—that he hadn’t told her? It hurt. And she did not want to hurt, not because of a man who had apparently abandoned her to her fate.
Why hadn’t he come?
She turned about and blindly walked toward the French windows. She must speak with Lord Eads. She must make certain Wyn was safe, even if he did not want her. She realized this now rather belatedly. And hopelessly. She would have forgiven him if he had come to London. She would have forgiven him everything. And begged his forgiveness in return.
Her brother stepped in front of her, his smile broad. “There you are, sis. You look very pretty this evening. Musgrove and Halstead here have been begging me all night to make introductions.”
She greeted Tracy’s friends, smiled at their flatteries, and promised them sets, but she barely attended. Weak inside with a strange sort of tragic longing, she allowed her gaze to wander and, through a break in a cluster of guests, met Lady Emily Vale’s stare. She forced her lips into another smile she did not feel.
Emily’s green eyes remained sober as she turned them directly across the dance floor toward the door to the ballroom. Diantha shifted her attention there and the bottom fell out of her heart.
For it was most certainly her heart that Mr. Wyn Yale commanded. And whether he sat on a stool in his shirtsleeves milking a cow or stood in a ballroom dressed in formal attire and so breathtakingly handsome that she could not breathe, she knew whatever he chose to do with that tangled organ, it would be thoroughly at his mercy.
Chapter 25
Beneath hundreds of chandelier candles she sparkled, dressed not in maidenly white but gold like the firelight sparkling in her hair. The layers of her skirts glittered by some seamstress’s skill, fluttering about her toes in the breeze from the dancers passing by. She seemed unaware of the other guests, and that she was staring at him, her berry lips parted and the pink stain on her cheeks flushing down her neck and across the soft mounds of her breasts.
He went to her, regretting that he had not come directly to London, and abruptly understanding the truth of why he hadn’t. Because he could not think when he saw her, and he greatly feared that—not thinking—he might do something precipitous for her. To her.
She moved toward him, her brow pleating. “Lord Eads is here.”
“Good evening, Miss Lucas.” He bowed and could not withhold his smile. Even cloaked in displeasure she dazzled him.
“Did you hear what I said? Lord Eads?”
“Naturally I heard. I am standing right in front of you.” Yet not close enough. Her scent of wild sunshine twined about him, her slender hands that had been so confident upon his body now clenching in her skirts.
“I knew you did. I was simply emphasizing my point to say Lord Eads twice. Now thrice.”
“I understood that.”
“I am emphasizing in this ridiculous manner, you see, because I am endeavoring to employ irritation to distract myself from alarm caused by the fact that he is in the same place as you. What are you doing here?”
“Watching you dazzle those gentlemen you just walked away from without a backward glance. No, don’t look. They may not like you to see them licking their wounds.”
She expelled a hard breath. “And you say I am nonsensical.”
“Who are they, Diantha? Your brother I know, but the others I don’t recognize. Is one of them Mr. H?”
“Tracy only now introduced us.” A spark of intention lit her eyes then. “But I am surrounded by scores of suitors every day, so it is difficult to keep their names straight in any case.” She gestured with an airy hand. “So I simply call them all George.”
“And does this system suffice?”
“Suffice?”
“To put them all in their places as you are attempting to put me in mine?”
“You did hear me say thrice that Lord Eads is here?”