Samuel didn’t know what sort of mischief she was engaged in, and he didn’t care. She might visit every brothel and befriend every courtesan in London, with his blessing, as long as she stayed away from Lovell. “I advise you to deploy your charms on someone other than my cousin, Lady Emma.”
“Deploymy charms? I don’t—”
“You’ll get nowhere with Lovell. His affections are already engaged, but I shouldn’t worry,if I were you.”
Her blue eyes wentwide. “Worry?”
She truly did have extraordinary eyes. They were a darker blue than he’d thought at first, nearly cobalt. Not summer skies at all, but a midnight blue. Remarkable, even if she was staring at him as if he’d just escaped from Bedlam. “There are plenty of gentlemen in London who will be thrilled to be on the receiving end of flirtatious glances from your blue eyes.”
She choked back what sounded, amazingly, like a laugh. “It’s, ah, kind of you to say so, Lord Lymington. I’ll endeavor not to despair of my matrimonial prospectsquiteyet, then.”
The music ended, and he released her hand. He expected her to flee, as any other young lady should do after such a disastrous dance, but before she could stir a step, Samuel did something he hadn’tintended to do.
He raised her hand to his mouth and touched his lips to her glove.
“Thank you for the dance, Lord Lymington. I believe I’ll return to my grandmother now.” Lady Emma sank into a perfect curtsey, and without another word she turned and strode away.
Samuel might have chased her, insisted on escorting her back to her grandmother, as was proper, but instead he remained where he was, watching her go,and wondering…
But Lady Emma’s secrets were just that—hers.Lether keep them.
He’d made himself perfectly clearto her tonight.
Lady Emma Crosby wouldn’t dare encourage Lovell’s misguidedattentions now.
* * * *
Emma didn’t return to Lady Crosby, but instead slipped from the ballroom and made her way to the ladies’ retiring room. She plopped down onto a settee, not sure if she should laugh, or fall into a temper, or burst into aflood of tears.
That was, without a doubt, the strangest half hour she’d ever passed. Lord Lymington wasn’t like any other lord she’d ever known, and until tonight, she would have sworn she’dknown them all.
It hadn’t been a spontaneous decision, refusing Lord Lovell in favor of a dance with Lord Lymington. She hadn’t fancied a scene in the middle of Almack’s, but it hadn’t been only that. That glare he’d cast her way when he’d first caught sight of her, then his strange insistence on a dance, had aroused her suspicions.
Very few people in London would recognize her as one of Madame Marchand’s former courtesans. She’d never been one of the ladies who entertained whatever gentlemen happened to stroll through the front door of an evening. No, she’d beenspecial, reserved for a single gentleman who’d paid Madame dearly for the privilege of being the first and only gentleman to enjoy her favors.
Given howthatliaison had ended, Madame Marchand wasn’t likely to tell Emma’s secrets, either, as much as she might wish to. Madame bore her a bitter grudge, but she was as eager to hide Emma’s past as Emma was.
Not many bawds wanted to lay claim to a murderous courtesan.
But when Emma saw Lord Lymington’s baleful glare, she’d thought, in an instant of blind panic, that she’d come face to face with someone who knew who she was.
Or who she’d been.
Whether her suspicions were justified or not remained a mystery. She couldn’t make heads or tails of Lord Lymington, or decide whether she was amused by him, or frightened of him, or if she simply despised him, as she did somany noblemen.
Loathing made the most sense, certainly.
He was grim, arrogant, suspicious, and far too large for a proper lord. He rivaled even Daniel Brixton for sheer muscular immensity.
He was dreadfully high-handed, too. Why, the cheek of the man, to cut his cousin out so shamelessly. No gentleman wanted a cotillion as badly as that. Then again, no gentleman wanted his cousin to dance a cotillion at Almack’s with a courtesan, either.
Former courtesan.
Oh, blast Lord Lymington, anyway. The man had thrown everything into disarray tonight. Poor Lord Lovell, to be cursed with such an overbearing cousin. Emma had no sympathy for rakes, but Lord Lymington was enough to drive any man into rakishness.
Well then, it seemed as if shediddespise him, after all. That should be reason enough to banish him from her mind at once. And so she would, only…
He’d startled her with that droll remark about their being silent for an entire cotillion, though she doubted he’d intended to amuse her. Then there’d been that ludicrous conversation about her matrimonial prospects. Charm seemed to wither and die in Lord Lymington’s presence, but he’d been…honest.
