She looked up from the paper, her smile sharpening.
"How fortunate," she said, "that the rules permit redirection. I believe I shall exercise that privilege."She turned her attention across the circle. "Lord Crewe. What is your greatest temptation?"
The room fell silent.
All eyes turned to Crewe, who examined his glass. His head lifted slowly, and Alice watched his expression shift from surprise, quickly masked to irritation, ruthlessly suppressed, and finally, that cool assessment she recognized as his armor.
The pink-muslin sisters exchanged glances. Mr. Davenant leaned forward in his chair. Even Crispin, who had been dozing near the fireplace, roused himself to attention.
"An interesting tactic," Crewe said, his voice level. "Deflection masquerading as curiosity."
"Curiosity is rarely a mask," Alice replied. "It tends to be straightforward in its intentions."
Someone, perhaps the silver-haired dowager, made a small sound of appreciation at the wordplay, but Alice kept her eyes fixed on Crewe, waiting.
He set down his glass carefully, the crystal making no sound against the polished wood of the table.
"Control," he said after a pause that suggested he had considered lying but rejected the option. "My greatest temptation is control."
A polite ripple of laughter passed through the room. Control seemed a predictable answer from aman who wore propriety like armor, whose every gesture announced his mastery over impulse.
But Alice did not laugh.
Instead, she watched his fingers tense around the arm of his chair, the leather of his gloves pulling taut across his knuckles. A familiar tell she had noted in the carriage. She observed the slight movement in his throat, a suppressed swallow, and the way his gaze did not quite meet hers, sliding instead to a point just past her left shoulder.
Control, he had said. But not the having of it—the temptation of it. The wanting.
So he feared losing it. And in that moment she very much wished to see him lose it.
The game continued. The dowager drew a card, and the dark-haired gentleman's mention of his university days sent a flush through the younger ladies. Alice fell into the rhythm, laughing when laughter was expected, sharing witticisms when wit was required. Yet part of her remained fixed on Crewe, turning his response over like a coin she had never thought to examine.
When the question about regret finally came, she was unprepared.
"What is your greatest regret?" One of the sisters read aloud, her voice laced with innocent cruelty. "Lady Alice?"
Alice opened her mouth to deflect, perhaps with a light, dismissive remark about a poorly chosen gown or a declined dance. The words were ready, familiar responses in an arsenal she had spent years assembling.
But what came out was something entirely different.
"Perhaps the truest regret," she said, "is refusing to forgive, both others and oneself."
The words fell into the room like stones into still water. She felt the ripples of surprise move through the company, sensed Clara's concerned gaze from across the circle, and felt her own sudden exposure like a garment slipping from her shoulder.
Her eyes found Crewe's before she could stop them.
He was watching her, truly watching, not assessing or cataloguing, but looking with an intensity that made her chest constrict. His expression remained carefully composed, yet something in his gaze had shifted. A flicker of recognition suggesting her words had found their mark.
Perhaps they had struck at a wound she had not known he carried.
The moment stretched between them, separate from the murmured responses of the other guests. Someone was saying how wise that was, how true,while another began to share their thoughts on forgiveness and its difficulties. But Alice paid no mind to it.
She focused on Crewe's hands resting on the arms of his chair, noting the tension in his jaw and the rise and fall of his breath. He seemed detached from the conversation around them, as if they were two people in a crowd who had recognized something in each other that no one else could see.
A peculiar warmth surged through her as the game continued. The tone had shifted and when Alice answered the remaining questions, her usual wit came more slowly, her deflections less polished. When she glanced at Crewe again, she found him deliberately looking away, as if he too had sensed a change and was unsure where to find solid ground.
Clara announced the end of the game with the relief of a hostess who had pushed her luck far enough. Guests began to stir, gathering shawls and mentioning early mornings and fresh air. Alice rose from her chair, grateful for the movement and something to occupy her hands and attention.
But she felt Crewe's gaze on her back as she moved toward the door, heavy and inescapable.
