Lady Bedford nodded slowly, but her expression had grown thoughtful — a particular quality of attention that Christina recognized from childhood. It was the look her mother wore when she was about to say something that had been sitting in her mind for some time, waiting for the right moment to emerge.
“There is something I should tell you, Christina.” Lady Bedford folded her hands in her lap with deliberate care. “It may be nothing — indeed, I hope it is nothing — but it has troubled me.”
Christina exchanged a glance with Bedford, who raised an eyebrow but said nothing.
“Lord Pennington called upon me two weeks ago,” her mother continued. “He was very civil — exceedingly so, in fact, which ought to have been my first signal that something was amiss. He asked after you, Christina, but not in the way a cousin might. His questions were... particular.” She hesitated, choosing her words. “He wanted to know about your father’s will. He asked — in the most roundabout way, you understand — whether there were any provisions made for you beyond your father’s estate. He couched it all in concern, of course. Saidhe wanted to be sure that his cousin’s daughter was properly settled.”
The carriage seemed suddenly cold. Christina’s fingers went still in her lap.
“What did you tell him?” Bedford asked, his voice sharper now.
“Very little.” Lady Bedford’s chin lifted with a quiet dignity. “I told him that our family’s financial arrangements were our own and that he need not concern himself. He was... displeased, though he hid it well enough.” She paused. “But I have thought about it since. It was not a casual question, Christina. He was seeking specific information. And I recall now that his letters in the country — those many, many letters — asked after such things almost as often as they inquired after our health. I attributed it to the awkward kindness of a man who does not quite know how to write to bereaved relations. I am less certain of that reading now.”
Christina felt the blood drain from her cheeks. Lord Pennington, asking after her inheritance, pointed, specific questions wrapped in the trappings of familial concern. It was another thread in a pattern she was only beginning to see.
“I never liked his persistent attention to you,” Bedford added, his voice dropping. “Even before father passed, there was something... watchful about the man. As if he were calculating something. And during these last two years, while you and Mama were in the country, he sought me out more than once here in town. Always with some errand or other — a club introduction, a question about an investment, the loan of a pamphlet he swore I must read. I took it for the usual efforts of a distant cousin attempting to be useful. But looking back, each visit ended with a question about you — how you were, when you might return to London, whether there was any gentleman in thecountry whose attentions you received. I thought him tedious. I did not think him deliberate.”
A silence held the carriage. Bedford’s words —I did not think him deliberate— settled over them with a weight none of them wished to carry across the threshold of a ball.
“Then we must be deliberate ourselves,” Bedford said at last, his voice low. “I will make quiet inquiries tomorrow. I know one or two gentlemen at White’s who will speak plainly about Pennington’s affairs if they are pressed. In the meantime — Mama, Christina — I would ask that neither of you give him any opening. Dance with him if you must, be civil if he calls, but volunteer nothing. Let him work for what he wishes to know.”
“Nothing shall pass my lips,” Lady Bedford said, with feeling.
Christina nodded, though she scarcely trusted her voice. She had set out this evening to think only of Coventry — of the possibility of him, of what might be said before the night was through — and now the whole shape of the Season seemed to have shifted beneath her. She drew a breath and made herself speak.
“Let us not bring Lord Pennington into the ballroom with us tonight,” she said. “We shall be watchful, as Bedford says. But I should like — for a little while — to think of other things.”
Lady Bedford reached for her hand and pressed it, her eyes soft in the carriage lamplight. “Of course, my dear. And Lord Coventry — let us hope that he is there this evening.”
Christina smiled, and this time it came more easily. Both her mother and her brother seemed genuinely contented with Lord Coventry’s consideration of her, and for that, at least, she was grateful.
“It brings my heart joy to dance with you, Christina.”
The music swirled around them both like a warm summer breeze, the sweet music lifting the air and Christina’s heart with it. Lord Coventry had not made an immediate step towards heras she had come into the room, but instead, had taken some time back from her so he would not appear too eager. When he had asked for her dance card, she had not expected him to take the waltz, given that it was such an obvious consideration, but, upon returning it, his steady gaze had locked with hers in silent reassurance and obvious determination.
He was not about to be set apart from her again.
“I did not think that we would ever dance like this again,” she responded, her body flooding with heat as his hand clasped her a little more tightly about the waist. Gazing up at him, her eyes searched the deep pools of grey and blue, seeing the softness that was so familiar to her. His face had not altered greatly in their years apart but there were whispered lines of tension across his forehead and a hint of sorrow in the tug of his lips. Would that she could smooth one hand across his skin and feather away those lines! But their fragile hope remained just that: brittle and unsteady.
“I did not mean to injure you, Christina. I know that I must have broken your heart and then caused you more pain with my coldness and disinclination.” His voice was low, words hidden almost completely by the music from the orchestra. “I wish that there was more I could do than apologize, but I have only words to offer you.”
Christina’s breath swirled in her chest and then climbed up her throat to settle an ache there. The vulnerable confession seared her, and she closed her eyes for a moment, wishing she could throw her arms about him and hold him close. “You need not apologize, Coventry. We were both deceived.”
“I could have done more.”
“As could I.”
There were so many things she wanted to say to him, eager to pull away this guilt he shouldered and fling it far from him. The past, full of bitterness and accusation, dissolved completely inthe quiet intimacy of their dance together. Instead, she lingered on the joy-filled memories of the moments they had shared; the tender embrace, the scent of sandalwood burning her senses when he had lowered his head to kiss her. The moments when her world had spun around her, leaving her breathless and unsteady but overcome with happiness.
“Have you spoken to anyone?”
Still holding his gaze, Christina smiled gently. “I told my mother and my brother that I have noticed you, yes. They both seem to be content with the connection, should there be one. You will have to come to take tea, however. My mother expects it.”
“Gladly.” The fervor in his voice made her pulse quicken, the longing now flaming in his eyes sending a heat down into her core. Her breath hitched as he lowered his head a fraction, forcing her eyes to close briefly as he continued to lead her in the dance. Nothing more was said for a few moments, their awareness of one another and the unmet cry of love in each heart.
“I have talked with Lord Wickton and with Lord Kinsley. I have told them both the truth, including our present realization that the notes were forged. I must still share with my sister, but I have no intention of holding back from her. I presume you will speak with your sister also?”
With a nod, Christina let out a quiet breath as the music began to slow. Fear began to tingle up her spine, reminding her that whilst she might be glad to know of his ongoing affection for her, there was no promise of happiness. Even this first step might lead them towards difficulty.
