She didn’t begrudge Emma her happiness, certainly. But shewasjealous. Despite her sneaking out to act in the theatre, despite her continuing attendance to parties and balls, her life was predictable. Her past wouldn’t allow her the future Emma now stepped into.
She would likely live and die alone. She had accepted that fact as best she could. Her escapes were the way she lived with it.
“Adelaide,” Emma began, but before she could continue, there were sounds of male voices from the hall.
Adelaide took the distraction, backing from the room as she said, “It sounds as though Abernathe has arrived.”
Emma examined her closely but then nodded. “Indeed, it does. Come, let’s greet him.”
Adelaide followed her friend down to the foyer, gathering her breath and her senses with every step. She was fine. This was fine. Everything would be fi—
Her mind cut off the soothing thought as she reached the bottom of the stairs and saw that Abernathe was not alone. There, standing beside him as Emma stepped up to greet him, was Northfield.
Graham recognized that Emma was speaking and James was answering, but he had no idea what they were talking about. He was too busy staring at Lady Adelaide. She remained three steps up on the stairs, her hand clenched in a white-knuckled grip on the railing. And she was staring straight at him through those spectacles that made her eyes so frustratingly hard to read. Hard to see at all. All he knew was that they were focused on him.
And he was not sorry about that fact.
“And you know Adelaide, I think, don’t you, Graham?”
Graham jolted as Emma placed a warm hand on his forearm and drew his attention back to proper and practical things, like introductions.
“Y-Yes,” he croaked, stepping forward to extend a hand. “Lady Adelaide, how nice to see you again.”
She swallowed, that slender throat working with the action, and then she came down the last few steps. She stared at his extended hand a beat too long before she took it and allowed him to bow over it briefly.
“I did not know you would be here, Your Grace,” she said. Her cheeks brightened to pink the moment she said the words. “I-I mean, good evening.”
Emma glanced back and forth between them and then motioned to the room off the foyer. “Gracious, let’s not stand in the drafty hall all night. Come, we’ll go to the parlor.”
She and James led the way and Adelaide fell into step beside Graham as they followed. The moment they entered, she left his side and moved to the opposite end of the chamber, almost as physically far as she could get from him without breaking the glass and hurdling herself out the window and into the street for an escape.
He watched her. She was uncomfortable because of his presence. And of course she would be. Their parting last night had been abrupt, brought on by his compliment of her and her sharp reaction to it.
He hadn’t pursued her after that, finding other ways to avoid Simon and Meg before he slipped from the ball with what he hoped was little fanfare. But he’d been thinking of Adelaide ever since, images of her merging and colliding with those of Lydia Ford.
He shook his head when James said, “We’ll be right back.”
He blinked as Emma and James stepped from the room, leaving him as alone with Adelaide as he had been on the terrace. He shifted his weight. “Where were they going?” he asked. “I’m afraid I wasn’t paying attention.”
Adelaide speared him with a glance. “Theyclaimedto be going to inform the staff that there would be two extra guests for supper. But since either of them could have performed that duty alone or asked a servant to do it, I think they were actually going to talk about the fact that each of them invited one of us without the other knowing.”
He tilted his head. “Is that a problem, Adelaide?”
She stiffened at his less formal address of her and turned her face to look out at the dark street below. “It isn’t for me, Your Grace.”
“Good,” he said, and then he did the thing he’d been wanting to do since they entered the room. He took a step toward her.
She wasn’t looking at him, but he knew she marked the movement by the way her breath caught and her hand slowly clenched into a fist at her side. Things that only urged him on.
“Last night at the ball, I said something to you that clearly offended you,” he said, glancing back at the door to ensure they were not about to be interrupted.
“Of course you didn’t,” she said softly, refusing to look at him.
“Of course Idid,” he corrected her. “Else you would not have walked away from me on the terrace. I’m not exactly certain how I offended you, but I apologize regardless.”
She caught her breath, and now it was she who took a long step toward him. The distance between them was rapidly shrinking, and he found he wasn’t sorry for that.
“You aren’tcertain?” she said, keeping her voice low even though the anger in it was clear. “You were toying with me, Your Grace. You were playing a game.”
