“Come with me, if you would, ladies.” Lord Lovell led them into the house and showed them to a pretty little parlor papered in figured yellow silk, then withdrew with another bow. Lady Flora didn’t speak to Emma, but went straight to a looking glass and began totidy her hair.
Emma swallowed the lump in her throat and joined her friend at the glass, brushing Flora’s hands gently aside to remove a few tangled hairpins. “You might have told me, Flora.”
A flush rose to Lady Flora’s cheeks. “I…tell you what?”
Emma smoothed the long, dark curl in her hand before meeting Lady Flora’s gaze in the mirror. “That you’re in love with Lord Lovell.”
Lady Flora’s eyes went as round as tea saucers. “I’m not…I don’t…” she began, then her shoulders drooped and she turned to face Emma, her lower lip trembling. “Is itthat obvious?”
“To me, yes. It’s difficult to say with Lord Lovell. Gentlemen are dense about such things.”
“Are you…don’t you love him, too?” Lady Flora’s dark eyes shimmered with unshed tears, but she appeared resigned, as if she expected to hear Emma say she was deeply, madly in love with Lord Lovell.
Emma couldn’t help but press her palm to Lady Flora’s cheek. “No, Flora, I don’t. I don’t deny flirting with him, but only as a pleasant diversion. Nothing more than that.” That, and because he was her best chance to get to the heart of the mystery that surrounded the Lymington family.
Dear God, what am I doing?
“But how can younotbe in love with him?” Lady Flora’s brow wrinkled in confusion, as if she couldn’t imagine the entire world wasn’t in love with the object of her affection. “He’s so handsome and lively and kind, and…well, he’s Lord Lovely, isn’t he?”
Emma sent up a quick prayer that Lord Lovell was in fact Lord Lovely, and not Lord Lecherous, or worse. “I have no wish to fall in love with anyone. I’m content as I am.”
She attempted a laugh, but to her horror a sad, forlorn little squeak emerged in its place. She’d hoped for love once, like all young girls did, but her girlish fancies of love and romance had been bled out ofher long ago.
But this was hardly the time to indulge in the megrims. “Why didn’t you simply tell me how you feel about him, Flora?” She gave one of Flora’s pretty curls a gentle tug. “There are dozens of gentlemen I might flirt with besides Lord Lovell.”
And not one of them ofany use to me.
“It wouldn’t have been fair of me to do so. It isn’t your fault if Lovell prefers you to me. He never flirts withme,” sheadded morosely.
Emma secured Flora’s curl with a hairpin. “That’s how you know he has true feelings for you, Flora. He doesn’t pretend with you. Flirting means nothing, you know, whereas honesty means everything.”
No one knew better than Emma how hollow flirting was, how meaningless, and how exhausting. Dangerous, as well. There were times when she spent so much effort performing, she couldn’t remember whoshe really was.
Lady Flora’s lower lip was wobbling. “It’s just that…well, it’s all become so complicated.”
“I don’t see how. You’re in love with Lord Lovell, and he appears to me to be well aware of how fortunate he’d be to have you. You’re a delight, Flora.”
“Well, there’s a bit more to it than that.” Lady Flora shot Emma a glance from under her lashes, then looked guiltily away. “I think I’ve made a terrible mistake.”
Emma frowned, puzzled. “I don’t understand.”
“Oh, dear. It’s not known, and I really shouldn’t tell anyone, but…”
“We’re friends, Flora, and friends may tell each other anything.”
Well, nearly anything. Or, in Emma’s case, almost nothing, but whatever Lady Flora’s sins might be, she couldn’t possibly be as wicked as she thought she was.
Certainly not aswicked as Emma.
Lady Flora squirmed under Emma’s gaze. “I, ah…I did something I shouldn’t…well, to be fair, it seemed the right decision at the time, but I broke a promise, and now I can’t help but think I’ve been dreadfullyunfair to him.”
Emma raised an eyebrow. “Unfair to whom? What sort of promise?”
“It didn’t feel as if I had any other choice at the time, but now the season’s begun and Lovell’s here, and despite it all he’s…well, he seems to be very much as he used to be, when we were…” Lady Flora trailed off with a sniffle, but then she seized Emma’s hands, her eyes pleading. “You’ll helpme, won’t you?”
Goodness. This was getting more interestingby the moment.
“Forgive me, Flora, but you haven’t told me what you’ve done yet. Help you withwhat?” Emma felt as she did when she eavesdropped, and could only hear one side of theconversation.
