She spared a glance for the sapphire ring on the fourth finger of her left hand. This ring had been created to be worn in such a room.
As she lowered into her seat, she noticed Clare all the way at the other end of the table. Aristocratic couples didn’t sit near each other to dine. She remembered this from times she’d been a servant at such suppers. From what she could tell, aristocratic couples had as little to do with one another as humanly possible. For all the wealth displayed in this room, she couldn’t help thinking their lives rather uneventful and small. This was splendor in its most elevated form, but she couldn’t see where the appeal lay.
“My dear marchioness,” began the duke. “Are you acquainted with the supper partner to your right?”
Hortense turned to greet the man, who had taken his seat late, and her smile slipped.Rothesbury.Up close, his wig looked even more ridiculous. Further, he had the look of a predator. In her years as a spy, she’d encountered no small number of such men. Lascivious gaze. Oily smile. She tried not to shudder when he took her hand and pressed it to his mouth.
“Lady Clare,” said Wellington, “may I introduce the Duke of Rothesbury to you?”
“Enchanté,” Rothesbury murmured against her skin.
This was the man she would be wooing with her feminine wiles. This time she did shudder.
“’Tis no wonder Society hasn’t seen Clare in months,” said Rothesbury, leaning around Hortense to speak directly to Wellington. “He had all the sweetmeat he needed for the winter.”
Hortense fought back nausea and smiled blithely as if his double entendre had passed over her head.
Wellington’s eyebrows gave the waggle of an agingroué. “If you don’t mind me saying, Lady Clare, your husband never could resist involving himself in the odd bit of scandal.”
Rothesbury slung back a large gulp of red wine. “A branch off the old tree. The Asquiths always did possess a wildness of the blood.” He leaned in. “So, you’re French, eh?”
“In a manner of speaking,” she began, trying—and failing—not to inhale his breath of rotten garlic. “I was born in England, actually.”
He must not have heard or cared, for he next addressed Wellington. “I always did particularly enjoy the French tongue.” He paused for effect. “Those chits always seem to know what to do with it.”
Here it was again—revulsion. Which she instantly tamped down, for the mark had all but landed in her lap. She must be charming and pleasing and the best liar in the room.
“Always preferred the Spanish ones myself,” said Wellington, eliciting a few manly snorts from nearby gentlemen and a roll of the eyes from their ladies.
“Like father, like son,” continued Rothesbury. “The late marquess always did like himself a French bit.”
For the next several minutes, Hortense sat between the two lechers, smiling, eating, drinking, nodding, giggling, and generally pretending to enjoy herself. Still, every once in a while, she found her gaze straying toward the opposite end of the table, sneaking a glance at her husband.
Her husband?
Somehow, it was true, although she suspected it never wouldn’t defy belief. She had a marquess for a husband. For now, at least.
It might have been the fourth coupe of champagne she’d imbibed but, really, all she could think about when she looked at him was how very, very, very handsome he was in his evening black and whites. Objectively speaking, he was the most handsome man in the room. And the ladies to either side of him knew it, as each vied for his attention. His evident boredom only seemed to attract, rather than repulse, them.
She experienced the flare of a novel feeling, a feeling that sat hot and testy inside her. It made her want to spring up from her chair and…and—what?
Could this feeling be—oh—could it be jealousy?
She shoved the notion away.Impossible.What should she be jealous of? The man was her husband, yes, but not truly. Yet…
She felt the overwhelming urge to walk to their end of the table and clack those ladies’ heads together.
Which wouldn’t do.
“So,” came a voice in her ear, “where did Clare findyou?”
Hortense willed steel into her resolve. She was attracting Rothesbury. She should feel relief. “Well, you see I have a very naughty little dog,” she began, her smile bright. “One morning, on our daily walk, the scamp slipped his lead and led me on a merry chase. It was the marquess who caught him for me. The rest, as you English say, is history.”
“Have you been in London very long?”
“Oh, no. That was my very first day. I am not familiar with London at all. And a supper party like this—” She gave her head a little shake and bit her bottom lip.
His pupils flared with desire.
