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What other transformations had she undergone today? Had she become a prim and proper young lady, brimming with feminine charm? Or had she decided to be a seductress?

He glanced over his shoulder. He recognized her garment from the chaotic days they’d spent packing the Wainwrights’ personal possessions from Willowhurst. The unfashionable garment was made of rough fabric dyed a somber color appropriate for mourning.

She had not dressed to beguile.

And no one would recognize her as the fourth Viscount Asquith’s granddaughter.

Briefly, he closed his eyes.

Yet another reason for guilt. Although she could hardly hold the laws of primogeniture against him, all his possessions, this roomy stable among them, had come to him because his father stood as her grandfather’s nearest male relation. And nearest male relation hadn’t meant ‘near’ at all. Pinpointing the convergence of their family trees required tracing their ancestry through more ‘begats’ than found in the Old Testament.

If she had been another earl’s granddaughter, they would not have met as awkward children. The first time he saw her might have been across Almack’s crowded assembly rooms.

He most certainly would have noticed, too.

Why?

Was he drawn in by the intelligence in her probing gaze? The lovely, long column of her neck?

Or was he captivated by expressions that shifted as quickly as London’s weather, depending on who she was imitating or what was going through her complex mind?

Something set her apart.

Something that made him long to hold her close and recreate their summer kiss, this time with more passion.

“Lenora,” he spoke roughly, “what do you want from me? What could you possibly hope to gain by meeting in secret?” An uncharacteristically forward query on his part.

Then again, he was uncharacteristically frustrated.

Her bewildered expression increased his irritation. She reminded him of a kitten who’d trapped a mouse and didn’t know what to do next. But in that metaphor, he was the mouse, wasn’t he?

He didn’t want to be a mouse. He wanted to discharge his duty to her and her unmarried sisters like an honorable man. But not all his intentions were honorable.

He also wanted to lead her up the twelve steps of the wooden staircase, draw her into Barker’s snug little chamber, and then firmly close the door. This, despite the hideous thing she doubtlessly called a frock.

“What do I want from you?” she repeated his question. “I’ve been wondering myself. And I’ve concluded that, at present, all I would like from you is your friendship.”

Friendship? While he was spinning carnal dreams in which he swiftly removed her dress?

“Absurd!” he exclaimed. “Everyone knows unmarried ladies cannot be friends with unmarried gentlemen.”

“Can’t they?”

“No, they can’t.”

He detested her habit of responding to exaggeration with a gentle query.

Her queries were never truly gentle. They were lines in the sand.

She knew he’d stretched the truth. Perhaps, she could even read his mind. Though, he hoped, not everything that had just gone through his mind.

“Friends.” He shook his head. “You want us to be friends.”

“You are friends with Millie.”

“That’s different.” But how? He raised his face. “Millie is...” Not Lenora. “Millie is Millie. You are you. You’re different as night and day.”

A shadow of hurt passed over her features.