Esme crouched on the floor of the balcony perched high above the ballroom, peering through the slats at the crowd bobbing below. The gathering had been nothing but a success, just as she had expected it would be when she’d first stumbled upon this magical room days prior and seen the hard work being put into the decoration. Despite her purpose in coming here, sneaking into the house, forcing her way past a lock to this hiding spot, she hadn’t been able to keep herself from being lost in the ball, at least for a while.
It had been years since she had gone to such an event. She’d always enjoyed a ball and had danced and laughed and flirted without a care in the world. She could scarcely recall that carefree girl she’d been in those days, the one who hadn’t truly known loss or fear or desperation.
She blinked at stinging tears and focused her attention on Finn. He looked dashing in his formal clothes and certainly the ladies in attendance noticed. He’d been the center of attention all night, smiling at the attendees, talking with the chaperones. If he wished, he could pluck any flower from the garden of debutantes and make her his bride. Society would celebrate ashe went forth into his expected future. Once he did, he would probably never look back at her at all.
That shouldn’t have stung, but it did as she watched him talk to his sister for a moment. Marianne had been glowing since she’d entered on the arm of her fiancé, the devastatingly handsome Earl of Ramsbury. If the way they looked at each other was any indication, they were truly a love match. What a thing.
Finn stepped onto the dancefloor with Marianne and they took an elegant turn around amongst the crowd. She smiled at how lovingly Marianne looked at Finn. It was good he had that. He deserved it. He was a decent man, at the heart of it. His refusal to accept that she would come here to observe the ball wasn’t about being cruel, she knew that. It was to protect her.
Even if it wasn’t his place.
The song finally ended and the siblings made their way to the edge of the floor where they continued to talk for a moment. Esme noted the way Finn tilted his head, the way he stood with his shoulders pushed back—she noticed every detail about him. It was impossible not to when she knew that body so very well and wanted it even more. What would it feel like to dance with him, to go back in time and meet him when she wasn’t touched by loss and fear? Would he have held her close, splayed his fingers across her back? Flirted shamelessly and made her toes curl in her slippers with things she hadn’t even begun to understand then?
She blinked to clear those thoughts away and heard the butler’s voice at the ballroom doors. “The Marquess of Chilton.”
She pivoted so fast she nearly deposited herself on her arse from the squatted position she was in. For a moment she searched for her father and when she saw her cousin her chest hurt. But Francis was here! He had come at Finn’s request.
She hadn’t seen him since she ran, and she flinched. He was wearing her father’s diamond pin in his cravat. She recognized the glint of it in the lights of the ballroom and she gripped her hands into fists at her sides. Her mother had given her father that piece—it was not part of the inheritance of title.
She stared as he moved into the crowd, being greeted by those around him as if he weren’t a monster. How could they not see that he was a monster? Why did they shake his hand and bow their heads toward him with the same respect that had been afforded her wonderful father? It was so desperately unfair.
She glanced at Finn and found that he was now alone and also staring at Francis. Even from a distance, she could see the difference in his stance. He looked like a fighter now. Good. She needed him to be a fighter as he slowly crossed the room and found her hateful cousin.
The two men greeted each other and she watched them speak. It all looked very normal and even friendly except that Finn had tucked a tightly clenched fist behind his back. Her cousin laughed at something Finn had said, slapped his arm like they were old friends. She wanted to vomit.
Oh, how she wished she could hear their words. To listen in so she could parse out if Francis said anything of importance that Finn might not catch. Even if he claimed he didn’t, he had to need help. And she needed to be part of this plan. Needed to be the one to see her cousin’s downfall if they could prove he was the villain she believed him to be.
Finn leaned in almost conspiratorially and then motioned to the ballroom doors. Her cousin nodded and together they exited the glittering hall, leaving behind Finn’s guests and the safety of the eyes around them.
Her heart was pounding as she got up and hurried for the stairs that led away from the balcony. She burst into the hallway behind them and drew in a few long breaths. She had no ideawhere the two men might go for whatever private conversation Finn was arranging. She just knew she had to find them.
She rushed down a servant stairway to the same floor as the ballroom and the other parlors and chambers there. Most doors were closed as she rushed through, keeping half an eye out for servants or partygoers she would be forced to hide from. At last she turned down a side hall and saw a light flickering from one of the rooms. From her earlier self-guided tour, she remembered it being Finn’s study. Of course he would take her cousin there. It was his domain and private. The perfect place to press him.
She edged closer to the door and leaned in toward the crack. The two men were sitting by the fire already, drinks in hand and a bottle on the table between them. She pushed the door just a fraction so she could hear better and held her breath as she waited for some explosive piece of evidence to be revealed that would prove her fears and perhaps change the course of her life.
Ever since he and Marianne redecorated it after his father’s death, Finn had loved his study. It felt likehis, a full reflection of himself. But now, sitting in his favorite chair by the fire, he was only uncomfortable because he was seated across from Esme’s cousin and all he wanted to do was slam the man through a wall.
He was so very small, the new marquess. Since they’d left the ball together for this private discussion, he’d hardly drawn breath, talking endlessly about vulgar topics like money and the attributes of the ladies in the hall not thirty paces away.
He was nothing like his uncle, certainly. And Finn despised him for that and for everything he’d done to steal Esme’s choices and make her feel she had to run to save her life.
“I must say, this is a fine whisky,” Chilton said, chugging another big gulp.
Finn leaned forward. He knew the man had already had two glasses of wine in the ballroom and now nearly an entire tumbler of whisky. Esme had said he’d edge around the topic of her father’s death when he was in his cups, so perhaps that was the path to Finn’s discovery, as well.
He topped off Chilton’s glass. “It is,” he agreed. “Your uncle agreed, it was his favorite when he’d come to call.”
Chilton had been smiling, but now that fell and his gaze narrowed. “Did he? I had no idea.” He took another long sip, taking half of the refilled glass rather than savoring it.
“He also liked his billiards on those nights,” Finn pressed. “We were fairly evenly matched, though I was driven to best him. Perhaps you and I could play some time and determine if you also inherited his skill at the game.”
Chilton emptied his glass in a gulp and refilled it himself this time. “I’ve never been much for billiards. And I don’t like comparisons between my uncle and I.”
Finn nodded. And there it was. The animus he’d sensed when they’d discussed the late Chilton earlier was back in the edge to the new marquess’s tone. Good. That meant he was getting under the man’s skin a fraction.
“I can understand that,” Finn pressed carefully. “He would be a hard man to live up to.”
Chilton’s grip tightened on his glass. “Not as hard as some might think.”
