Page 45 of Lady Arabella’s Reluctant Hero

"Is she?" John's voice sounded unnatural even to him.

Lucy gave him a funny look.

Is she? What a foolish thing to say. Of course she is. Anyone with eyes would wholeheartedly agree that she was stunning.

He cleared his throat and looked away from Lucy and from Arabella gliding toward them with graceful steps.

"Come," he said, ushering Lucy toward the door. "Mrs. Lennox says there is cake."

15

Arabella had not expected the country to be so…lively.

And she certainly hadn't expected the music.

Kit was at the pianoforte. Apparently this was a thing he did, and did well. And Lucy was beside him on the bench, calling out requests with the breezy authority of a small tyrant who knew she would not be refused.

Thea had disappeared to investigate the library. And Clarissa was curled on the settee with her shoes off, laughing at something Kit had said between songs. Even the ever-scowling Mrs. Lennox, stationed in the far corner with her embroidery, had not managed to dampen the mood. Though Arabella suspected she'd like to try.

And John⁠—

She couldn't seem to stop herself from thinking of him as John ever since he'd kissed her, even though she knew she should not.

John was in the armchair by the fire, one ankle crossed over the other, watching his daughter with an expression Arabella had never seen on him in London. It was not the careful composure he wore in drawing rooms or the quiet vigilance he brought to crowded events. It was something looser. Warmer. There was a curve to his lips that seemed so natural, she suspected he didn't even know it was there.

He looked like a man who had come home.

Arabella couldn't say why this thought made her chest feel tight. But lately, her body had been reacting in an odd manner whenever John was near. She blamed it on that unadvised moment of passion. That embrace had done something to her equilibrium, and Arabella wasn't quite certain how to undo it.

Arabella stood near the doorway and watched. It was a pleasant scene. The sort of scene she had read about in novels and had assumed was an exaggeration, because surely no actual family spent their evenings like this—laughing, teasing, draped across furniture in companionable disarray.

Her own evenings at Marchmont House had involved her father's study door being closed, her mother's sickroom being quiet, and the long corridor between the two being very, very empty.

This was different. And while it was pleasant enough to witness, she understood with full certainty that she did not belong in the middle of it.

But there was a particular pleasure in observing warmth, even from a distance, and she had learned long ago to take her pleasures where she found them.

Kit launched into something lively and Lucy clapped her hands. Clarissa said, "Oh, not that one, darling, you know I cannot resist dancing to that one."

Kit grinned and played it faster. And then Clarissa was on her feet, and Lucy was giggling, and it was impossible not to smile as she watched their antics. She was still smiling to herself when Lucy caught her by surprise, appearing beside her from the hallway.

Arabella hadn't even seen her leave the room.

"You are not dancing," the girl pointed out.

"No," Arabella agreed. "I am not."

Arabella looked down. The girl was not moving on. She was just…standing there. Looking up at Arabella as if she was waiting for something.

Arabella shifted under the girl's watchful stare. Meanwhile, Lucy seemed content to stand beside Arabella, almost as if…she was settling in for a nice chat.

Oh dear.

Arabella caught a grimace just in time. She knew from John that Lucy was ten. But really, she wasn't entirely certain what that meant. Of course, she herself had once been that age, but she couldn't recall what it had felt like to be ten.

She hadn't had many child acquaintances when she actually was a child, and she'd had very few interactions with them since.

"Why not?" Lucy asked. Or rather, she demanded.