Lachlan’s eyebrows shot up, and he fumbled for a response. “Ah, Lord Huntington mentioned it, yes.”
“Hyacinth was always a quiet child. Even before we lost our parents, she was painfully shy, and then the other children teased her because of her stammer, which only made things worse. She’d largely outgrown her difficulty with speech by the time she was fifteen, but after my parents’ sudden deaths she stopped speaking altogether. We feared she’d never…she’d never…”
Lady Huntington choked on her words, then fell into a pained silence, but Lachlan didn’t need to hear any more. He could already see Hyacinth in his mind’s eye—a fair-haired girl with an angel’s face, so devastated by grief she retreated inside herself, lost and silent.
“We’re all very protective of her, Mr. Ramsey—perhaps too much so, but I couldn’t leave without making sure you understand how difficult undertaking a London season is for her. Indeed, I think it’s far, far more difficult than either you or I can possibly imagine.”
“I understand,” he murmured hoarsely. His chest was tight, so tight…
“We’re trusting you to take care of her. Promise me you will.” Lady Huntington reached for his hand, and looked straight into his eyes as she held it between her own.
He was a liar. Some claimed he was a murderer, as well. There were a dozen different reasons why Lady Huntington shouldn’t trust him.
But in this…in this, he would not fail.
No matter what else happened, no one was going to hurt Hyacinth Somerset.
“I will, Lady Huntington. I swear it.”
Chapter Ten
The Second Ball
Her Ladyship, the Countess of Bagshot
Requests Miss Hyacinth Somerset’s presence
At an elegant evening party at Orchards Park
Tuesday, Feb. 3rd, 8:00 o’clock in the evening
S. Audley Street, Mayfair.
Hyacinth had already predicted there’d be a shocking lack of columns in Lady Bagshot’s ballroom. What she hadn’t guessed was there wouldn’t be any columns at all.
Alcoves. That was it, and they were shallow ones, at that. What good were shallow alcoves to her? Paltry, insufficient things—
“You’re anxious. Your hands are trembling.”
Hyacinth shifted her attention from the alcoves to Lachlan Ramsey’s steady hazel eyes. There was no sense in denying it, not when her fingernails were even now tearing a hole in the arm of his coat. “It’s the columns.”
He glanced around the ballroom. “There are no columns.”
“Yes, I know. That’s why I’m anxious.”
His lips quirked. A bolt of pleasure shot through Hyacinth, and for a moment she forgot all about columns and alcoves, and let happiness sweep over her. Lachlan rarely smiled, but when he did, she felt it all the way down to the soles of her slippers.
“There’s nothing to be anxious about. You look...” He waved his hand toward her gown. “Very well,” he finished gruffly.
Very well.
It was a proper, brotherly sentiment, but the way his eyes darkened to that hot, intense green when he looked at her…
It wasn’t brotherly. That is, Hyacinth didn’t think it was. She didn’t have brothers, but she’d never seen any of her acquaintances’ brothers look at their sisters the way Lachlan Ramsey was looking at her right now.
He cleared his throat. “The color suits you.”
Hyacinth let a fold of the pale blue silk drift through her fingers. The gown had lived up to every one of her girlish fantasies. It was divine, and if it was the only good thing that came of an otherwise disastrous evening, at least she’d gotten the chance to wear it.
