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It took everything she had not to flinch.

“Well enough to offer unwanted counsel,” Yasmin said. “Oh, don’t look like that. I shan’t infect her with my scandalous ways. Your sister was polite, but no young lady wants advice from a spinster.”

“What?”

He bit the word off, as if the idea of her being a spinster was absurd, but Yasmin wasn’t foolish enough to take it as a compliment. “The distance between seventeen and twenty-four is insurmountable. What’s more, I am not even a female relative. Lady Lydia has taken me in dislike, which should make you happy, shouldn’t it?”

His brows drew together. “It does not make me happy. Why would you say such a thing?”

“Because you don’t like me either,” Yasmin said, impatiently. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, can’t we just be truthful? You and I have both fizzled on occasion. You and I have low opinions of each other. You would be happy if a scandalously dressed and frivolous lady such as myself had little to no contact with your innocent sister, even if I am looking out for her best interests.”

“I do not have a low opinion of you.”

“Poppycock,” Yasmin countered. “You’ve made it clear that I don’t dress or speak in a manner that you consider worthy of your respect.”

The waltz drew to a close before the earl could respond, which was just as well. “Good evening, Lord Lilford.” She dropped a curtsy.

The earl’s eyes were glacier cold, but he wrapped a hand around her arm. “Lady Yasmin.”

“Excuse me?” She narrowed her eyes at him.

“My sister,” he said tautly. “You know something about my sister that you are not saying.”

Behind his shoulder, one of her suitors was bounding toward them like a puppy with overly large paws.

Yasmin wasn’t friends with Lydia. But Giles’s sister, headstrong, unmothered, and unchaperoned, was running headlong toward ruination. It didn’t sit with her conscience to let it happen, not given her past. She sighed. “I suspect you’ll find Lady Lydia in the back garden.”

“Alone?” Giles’s eyes searched her face when she didn’t immediately respond, and his jaw tightened. “You are insinuating that my sister ventured outside with Lord Pepper, unchaperoned. She would never do something so inappropriate.”

“I’m certain you’re right,” Yasmin said. Who was she to destroy his faith in his sister? “If you’ll excuse me, I see my next dance partner—”

His hand tightened on her arm. “No, we are going into the garden for a breath of fresh air. You feel faint.”

“I do not feel faint.”

“We shall prove that you are wrong before you can spread more tittle-tattle about my sister.”

Yasmin drew in a sharp breath, and her stomach tensed into a knot. His characterization hurt. She would never share unkind gossip about a young lady.

No matter how much she enjoyed waltzing with Giles, this had to be their last. She had tried over and over with the Earl of Lilford. She had tried to make him laugh, and tried to make him cross, and generally tried to get him to see her as someone other than frivolous at best and a strumpet at worst.

He never altered his opinion.

That idea she had about a hidden Giles? That was mere foolishness.

“I would never spread rumors about Lady Lydia,” she said, keeping her voice calm, although she’d like to shriek. His rudeness stemmed from concern for a younger sibling. Not from his belief that she, Yasmin, was the sort of woman who would gleefully destroy his sister’s reputation.

Of course, he apparently did believe that she was malicious, but he wasn’t the sort of man who would be rude for the sake of it. Just look at the way he always asked her to dance, even though he disapproved of her. Civility was intrinsic to his character.

Though he never danced with her more than once, making it clear to all and sundry that he did so out of punctilious politeness rather than courtship. God forbid the Earl of Lilford should be suspected of wooing a woman of her reputation.

“I didn’t mean to imply that you would deliberately spread gossip,” Giles said, proving her point about his civility.

“You didn’t imply. You stated just that.” There was no reason to spend any more time with the man. But the absurd fascination she felt toward him prevailed, and she found herself saying, “Very well. I’ll walk into the garden with you.”

By now, Lydia would be heading back inside. In the past few weeks, Yasmin had noticed two important points: the girl invariably left the ballroom while Yasmin waltzed with her brother—and Lydia was always careful to be back in the room when the next dance began.

The Honorable Algernon Dunlap trotted up to them, and Yasmin shook her head. “We’ll have to dance later, mon chèr. The earl has kindly agreed to accompany me into the garden for a brief respite from the heat.”