“Not at all, but when your father told me that you were hesitant too, I thought we might understand one another. I do not want a wife, but a mistress would not be so terrible, and then you would not have to marry me. We would both get what we wanted from such an arrangement. Granted, you are larger than I tend to like, but I can forgive it.”
Cassandra pulled away at that, though the music was not finished. She did not curtsy, nor did she say her goodbyes, but although she knew it was improper to do so she could not stomach the thought of being near him a moment longer.
She needed air. Cassandra began a hurried lap of the room. She felt entirely alone—until she saw him.
It was the man she collided with in Hyde Park, and he was watching her too. She settled on the way he was dressed, his clothing undeniably expensive, and she wondered just who he was.
He wasn’t talking; he wasn’t dancing. He was simplywatching. And the moment their eyes met, the noise of the ballroom--the clinking glass, the idle gossip—fell into a sudden, dead silence.
She wondered why there was a sudden dryness in her throat.
“Good evening, Lady Cassandra.”
Cassandra almost jumped at the hissed tone of it. She turned to see Lady Sylvia Ferrers, watching her curiously. Cassandra did not want anyone to be looking at her at all, but it felt as though everyone in attendance was.
“Lady Sylvia,” she greeted.
“What is a spinster like you doing looking at a duke?”
Her tone was accusatory, and Cassandra understood at once why her cousins disliked her so much. She was a beautiful lady, but there was an undeniable unkindness in her eyes that Cassandra could not ignore. Fortunately, casting another glance in the gentleman’s direction proved a decent enough distraction.
He was no longer watching her, but he did look toward her a few times. It made her heart race unlike anything else ever had, and she deduced that it was because of how they had spoken to one another before.
“I do not know to what you are referring,” she replied at last.
“No, of course not,” Sylvia replied, but she softened. “I do not know if you are aware, but that man you were dancing with is a rake. We ladies must look for each other’s best interests, and I can assure you that he is not what is best for you.”
“I thank you for the warning, but yes, I had already come to such a conclusion.”
“A very intelligent thing you are.”
Suddenly, an ear-piercing sound spluttered through the ballroom. Cassandra did not need to look to know what it was. Her aunt and uncle, well-meaning as they were, had put her cousins on display to show their musical talents; Rose playing the pianoforte, and Sophie playing the harp.
“Unlike them,” Sylvia laughed. “Why did your aunt and uncle ever think that was a good idea?”
“They had twins, I suppose. They wanted them to be even more special, and so they gave them both an instrument. I suppose it is also a way for them to differentiate the two, as they look so alike.”
Except that there was no need for the instruments to do that. They were identical, short and petite with incredible red hair and bright green eyes, their faces covered in freckles, but one only needed a mere thirty seconds to tell them apart. Rose was outspoken, even more so than Cassandra, while Sophie could only stand to be in conversation for those thirty seconds before finding a way to leave it.
They did not need to be paraded around and humiliated to prove that they were different.
“You ought to join them,” Lady Sylvia suggested. “If you wish to avoid finding a husband, it is the best thing to do.”
Cassandra could no longer stand it. She hated the prickly heat of the ballroom, and how the whispers about her sweet cousins were growing. It was all a facade, and one that she did not want to continue to be a part of.
But she did not want to give them of satisfaction. She did not want to leave her cousins to the wolves while she was able to hide away in the corner.
She stepped forward.
Chapter Three
Cassandra took the violin from the stand. The wood felt familiar, a silent ally in a room full of enemies. She didn’t look at the infuriating man with the intense eyes. She didn’t look at Sylvia. She looked at the music in her heart and drew the bow.
The first note was pure; a silver thread that cut through the cacophony of her cousins’ struggling duet. For a moment, a stunned silence washed over the immediate circle of guests.
But thetondid not value talent; they valued conformity.
“Good heavens,” a gentleman’s voice carried over the music, dripping with mockery. “First the red-headed poodles, now the spinster thinks herself a virtuoso.”
