But so, too, was the library a cozy room, a place where the family could enjoy a comfortable evening. If one sought conversation, a large central group of sofas and chairs invited convivial repartee beside the carved marble fireplace. If one sought solitude, a snug nook or two beckoned one to settle in and read silently in the far corners of the room. If music was what one was after, the pianoforte and the free-standing harp awaited one’s musical fingers. If one wanted to sample the room’s intellectual offerings, a long rectangular table with bench seating ran along the wall of books, encouraging one to spread out several volumes and dig in to their contents.
It was the latter pursuit that was currently occupying the Misses Bretagne and Radclyffe. Instead of books, they appeared to be consulting no fewer than three maps in muted tones not meant for the rest of the library’s occupants.
The Duke, Lord Exeter, and Lord Avendon weren’t quite so circumspect as they discussed politics in the warm tones that implied more disagreement than accord. In truth, Lord Avendon didn’t appear fully committed to the conversation between his father and grandfather as he kept half an eye on the girls at the opposite end of the room.
It was clear the girls were devising a plan. Isabel had a feeling that Miss Bretagne—she didn’t feel she had leave to call the girl Lucy—was ever in the midst of hatching a plan.
She called to mind the girl Eva had once been. An ache of guilt and grief passed through Isabel, as it always did when she thought about the Eva who had returned to her after her dealings with Montfort.
Miss Radclyffe, however, was an altogether different girl from Miss Bretagne, and it wasn’t simply because of her good sense and interest in science. With her prominent cheekbones and pearl gray eyes that spoke of a mixed Asian ancestry, Miss Radclyffe was a girl most English would not merely call different, but would dismiss as exotic, that narrow sobriquet that so irked Isabel. She sensed a complex story behind Miss Radclyffe’s parentage—after all, she was the daughter of a viscount—but it was one Isabel likely would never know.
So here Isabel sat quietly in the chair furthest from the fire Lady Bertrand had insisted upon this mid-summer night. She did her stitch work as the Duchess and Lady Bertrand gossiped about this—“That Lady Conyngham.” A shake of the head. “Prinny is ever so dependent on her”—and that scandal—“Surely, you heard the name the gossip rags gave him?” A furtive left-to-right glance to ensure no youthful ears listened, then a whisper. “Mr. Long Pole.”
Lady Exeter had excused herself half an hour ago on the pretext of visiting her sons in the nursery.
It was with a mild sense of relief that Isabel worked the dusty old sampler that she’d discovered in her bedroom in Rosebud Cottage. The other women viewed her as quiet and retiring and, that word again, exotic, therefore slightly unknowable. As such, very little was required of her, so she was free to stitch and observe Lady Bertrand in her full flighty glory as she proceeded to expound on every topic that popped into her head. It must be exhausting, being the vessel of so many firm opinions and so much umbrage. Isabel understood why Lady Exeter had gone.
Still, one of their number had avoided the library entirely after the evening meal. Lord Percival. He was at the stables, she knew it, but she couldn’t quite summon the nerve to seek him out.
Today’s boldness seemed to have abandoned her after, well, the moment. A moment that refused to remain tethered to the far reaches of her mind.
And she knew why.
It was her lack of resistance.
When he’d tugged her forward, she’d melted into the movement.
Why?
She could make the argument that she’d only been pursuing her directive from Montfort, that her action had been calculated.
While a morsel of truth could be located in that idea, another truth couldn’t be denied.
She’d swayed forward because she’d wanted to.
Because he was too magnetic to resist.
Because she knew the smell of him—crisp sandalwood—and now she wanted to know the taste of him, too.
Because his long fingers curling about her waist felt right, like they anchored her to something real and steady.
Because the intense light in his eyes burned for . . .
Her.
She had so many becauses to consider for why she’d swayed forward, and not a single one of them had anything to do with Lord Bertrand Montfort.
And when Lord Percival had stepped away and broken their contact, she’d wanted to cry out in frustration like a thwarted child. Then her logical side had come to her rescue and asked a necessary question.
What was she to him anyway?
A nothing. Well, a something. A pawn in a game.
She was failing at the second chance Montfort had given her, just as she’d failed at the first.
Tonight, at dinner, she had noticed one thing: Lord Percival ate like a Catholic monk. Proclivity toward self-denial. Those had been Montfort’s words, and they appeared to be true.
The man ate vegetables, yes, but no sauce. No meat. No desserts. He didn’t butter his roll. In fact, he didn’t eat his roll. Never once had she observed him take a sip of his wine. Strangely, however, he gave the appearance of partaking. He stirred the creamy soups. He cut the slices of beef, even brought the rich fare to his mouth, but not into his mouth.
And no one noticed. Save her.
Lord Percival was a different sort of man, one who might be immune to all the pleasures in life. Except, today, when he’d tugged her forward, the look in his eye . . .
Well, ravenous might be the word for it.
And every time she thought it, an ache pooled deep in her belly, and even lower, a feeling new and wondrous and frightening and irresistible.
A sharp gasp, followed by a startled Oh! pierced the air. Puffy halo of white hair quivering about her head in distress, Lady Bertrand sat staring wide-eyed at the far end of the room. Isabel followed her gaze and couldn’t help gasping, too.
Framed by the open doorway stood Eva with a sleeping Ariel in her arms, clad in the simple black dress she wore when they worked in the shop. At least it wasn’t her night-rail.
The Misses Bretagne and Radclyffe hardly lifted their eyes from their maps at the minor fuss, and the men extended little more than a cursory glance. Lord Michael did give Eva a second look, and a third—Eva elicited that response from men with an eye for her fiery sort of beauty—but sank back into conversation with the Duke and his son, clearly having decided the mysterious woman at the door was the province of the ladies.