“Oh dear, do forgive me, Mr. Zachariel Deville!” Theo cried. “I stood directly on your foot.”
“Really? I hadn’t noticed,” the other man said, wincing.
“Excellent,” Theo said loudly before walking away without another word and leaving her with the Deville family.
Iris followed him with her eyes and saw that one of his hands was clenched in a fist. What path had his life taken since she’d last seen him to bring him to the man he was today?
“Come and chat with us, Lady Challoner. You will have intelligent, lively conversation then.” Lady Raine took her hand and tugged her into the female circle. Iris turned from watching Theo.
“Harsh but true,” her husband said.
Iris was then introduced to the other ladies, and soon they were chatting. They all seemed pleasant, and she felt herself relax.
“I understand you are an old friend of Lord Plunge’s?” Mrs. Mary Deville said, moving to Iris’s side. Blonde, pretty. She was married to Zachariel Deville.
“I was, yes.”
“I should imagine you have seen a change in him, and not just his age?” she said, watching Iris intently.
“We were children when last we met, so yes, he was bound to have changed, as have I.”
“He is… he is a good man for all his silliness,” Mary Deville said slowly. “Were you close?”
She nodded. “He was my best friend,” Iris said softly.
“Well then, perhaps you should pay him a call and see if you can reinstate that friendship,” Mary said. She then turned to answer a question someone asked of her.
Iris would not be in London long enough to make friends again with Theo. In fact, she wondered, considering the man he’d become, if that was even possible.
How could the boy she’d admired and, yes, adored with a girlish fervor change so much? Iris thought that she’d like very much to know the answer but doubted she ever would.
CHAPTERSEVEN
Monty kept his smile in place and walked. He nodded to people who looked his way. Most ignored him, which he did not mind. He had no wish to converse with anyone as his mood, at best, could be termed feral.
Stepping through the open terrace doors, he turned right and went down the stairs into the Raine gardens.
Iris was here.He’d believed she would never enter society. Her husband had told everyone she had a weak constitution, and London, with all its social events, would be too much for her.
And yet here she is a year after his passing.
Seeing her should not have unsettled him, but in truth, he’d already been off-balance since he’d spoken with Geraint.
“Were I really the type to have vapors, now would be the perfect time,” Monty muttered, heading down a path lit with torches. He hoped not many had ventured out here yet. He needed a minute to himself.
Finding a small bench seat at the base of a wall that the Raine family no doubt sat in to bask in their familial love, he thought a few minutes there would clear his head.
Excellent. Not only was he unsettled, but he was also now bitter and jealous. Dropping onto the seat in a very unPlunge-like manner, he inhaled the London air.
The gardens weren’t huge by some standards, but they were big enough to offer him a moment of solitude before he had to start waving his lavender-scented handkerchief about and making a fool of himself.
“You said she’d never enter society.”
The words drifted to Monty from behind the wall he sat against.
“Lady Challoner will not be a problem. My brother controlled her, as will I.”
They were talking about Iris.
