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“Where have you been? It’s been three nights since you came to see me.”

He was by her dressing table. She heard the soft clink as he picked up something. “Here and there. Don’t say you missed me.”

She lifted one shoulder, unwilling to admit how much she had missed him. “I was merely curious. Of course it’s no matter to me what you do, or whom you visit at nights.”

“It shouldn’t be.” He put down whatever he had taken from her dressing table. “It couldn’t possibly interest you.”

Mariah’s brow puckered. This was not like Harry, this thread of bitterness. “Well, I did wonder,” she said cautiously. “I thought perhaps you’d forgotten me, or decided you didn’t care for my company.”

His laugh was short and harsh, with no amusement in it. “Did you? I can’t imagine how you would reach that conclusion.”

Her frown deepened, but she didn’t say anything, waiting to see where his odd mood would lead next. This was not the slyly charming fellow she had come to expect.

He was quiet for a moment, and when he spoke again, it was in a more normal tone. “You were lovely last night.”

A surprised smile curled her lips. “Thank you.” Then realization hit her. “You were at the Spencer ball! Why didn’t you speak to me there?”

“You were surrounded by admirers from the moment you arrived until the instant you left. There was no room for one more.”

Mariah rolled her eyes in the darkness. She had been hounded all evening, by gentlemen gazing at her with calf love—or social ambition—in their eyes. Her quest for male acquaintance, undertaken in pursuit of Harry’s identity, had reaped her some tiresome consequences. She had taken to hiding at the side of the room with Joan and other young ladies. “Nonsense. You have proved you weren’t there, for I was most certainly not surrounded at all times.”

“Indeed,” he murmured dryly. “Sir Christopher is completely besotted. He was very disappointed when you refused to dance with him. Lord Whitting worships you, but from afar. Do be kind to him, he’s a gentle fellow. Lord Hartwood fancies himself also in love, but I could see by the way you paid him no attention during the waltz that you don’t return the feeling. Viscount Travers spent more time looking at your bosom than your face, until your father came by. That one’s after your connections and most likely your fortune. And Mr. Crane would have danced every dance with you if you allowed him. He hardly took his eyes off you all evening. Has he made an offer of marriage yet, or merely hinted at it?”

Her lips had parted with shock before he finished his second sentence. Not only had Harry been at the Spencer ball, he must have watched her the entire evening. She had suspected Lord Travers was looking down her bodice, but never managed to catch him at it. She didn’t like him at all, with his small, bright eyes like a weasel and his overloud laugh. Lord Hartwood was pleasant but dull, and Sir Christopher Knightly needed to marry a fortune. But Harry—how could he not have spoken to her and saved her from the lot of them?

“You are a coward,” she managed to say. “To watch me all night without so much as a word of greeting.”

“Perhaps.” He spoke without anger, almost absently, and he continued to move restlessly about her room.

Mariah’s temper heated another degree. “Actually,” she said, “I doubt it. No, I think the reason is far more mundane. I think you must be frightfully ill-favored, to want me never to see you⁠—”

He chuckled.

“—Painfully shy or awkward, since you will not speak to me in company⁠—”

“Of course.”

“—And you cannot dance at all. That is unfortunate, for I love dancing.”

His tall figure leaned back against the writing desk. “I can dance well enough.”

She put up one hand the way her mother did to stop all argument. It made her wild with frustration that he had been near enough to see with whom she danced and what her expression was, yet made no effort to dance with her or speak to her himself... even though it also sent a tingle of delight through her that he had paid enough attention to know. He must have been watching her every move. “Easy enough to say, sir, when you cannot prove it.”

He was quiet for a long moment. “I’m not much given to overstatement, miss.”

“Well, perhaps the next time we attend the same ball, you will ask me to dance,” she retorted. “Merely to prove your prowess, of course.”

He stood up, barely more than a shadow, and put out one hand. “Merely that, of course. Come.”

“Come where?” Suddenly hesitant, wary of his dark mood, she pulled her feet back up onto the side of the mattress.

“Dance with me,” he said. “Or perhaps you are the coward.”

Mariah’s chin set. She slid off the bed. “There’s no music.”

He didn’t move, just remained with his hand outstretched. She took a step toward him. He smelled of... fish. Rotten fish. Who was he? What had he been doing tonight?

He simply stood there, waiting.