He looked down at her and she felt a little lightheaded from the tenderness of his gaze. “If I catch you doing something.”
Disappointment dressed her features. So, he wouldn’t let her go, then. He was serious about this work. That didn’t bode well for her friends—or for her.
She pouted and returned to her chair as she spoke. “Then I shan’t let you catch me.” She turned and offered him a sweet, yet challenging smile over her shoulder.
She almost regretted leaving him when she reached her chair and saw that he looked lost amid the guests and the servants moving swiftly about. Where was he truly from? Why had her father lied about him being from Brittany? Why had her father wanted him with the guests rather than watching her? Something was going on.
She looked over the faces and spotted Old John. She would speak to him later. She would find out.
She heard the music of Cara Baxter’s laughter fill her ears. Cara’s sister Sara’s voice blended with it a moment later. She looked to find them flittering around Michael like butterflies around flowers.
Too bad the color of Cara’s gown made her skin look ever paler. And Sara. Ha! Charlotte saw right through her charade of laughing, then patting his arm and keeping her hand there. In a moment, she would slip her arm around his. What would he do?
His gaze found her while the twins spoke softly around his ears, one on either side.
“You are making an impression on him,” Old John muttered as he came to stand behind her. “His eyes search for you while other women vie for his attention.”
Hmm. It meant little. “He gives no one his full attention.”
“Were you out with Preston?”
“John, you will stop this talk immediately,” she warned softly.
“Of course, my lady.”
“And no. I was not with Preston,” she said quickly when everyone began to return to their seats. “I was suffering with a frightful headache and I hate to say, ’tis returning.” She gave him a hard look and he stepped away.
Michael and the twins returned to the table. The girls were smiling. Michael looked as if his tight shoes had finally gotten the better of him. The twins either didn’t realize or didn’t care that he wasn’t enjoying himself and went on giggling until they were seated, away from him.
“’Tis worse than I expected,” Charlotte said for his ears alone.
“My ears are ringing,” he confided.
She muffled her laughter with her fingers over her mouth.
“Most men would be enjoying the attention of giggling women in their ears,” she remarked as she sobered.
“I didn’t say I wasn’t enjoying it.”
Why would she feel the sting of such words from him? But she did, and she struck back. “Oh, then let me lend my aid.” She rose from her seat and hurried around the table to Cara’s chair. When she reached her, she bent to the young lady’s ear and set her triumphant gaze on Michael. “Dear, it seems the detective would like to meet you tomorrow night, here in our garden. Do you agree to such a meeting?”
“Of course,” Cara said breathlessly.
They whispered and Charlotte even giggled with her, though she wanted to be ill, afterwards.
She returned to her chair and Michael’s frosty glare. “She has agreed to meet with you tomorrow night in the garden.”
“Meet with me for what?” he demanded somewhere between a growl and a whisper.
“Knowing her, whatever you like.”
“Charlotte.”
She could hear the effort it took for him not to shout at her.
“Go back and tell her you’re insane, or that I have a week to live.”
“I will not, and I take offense to you calling me insane.”
