“But now I really very much want to know,” he whispered. “Don’t tease me so.”
Cassie clamped her mouth shut.
Matlock handed her a glass and took another two for himself and her mother. They reversed direction back to the matrons.
“You’re planning to make use of the mistletoe tonight,” he stated.
“It’s not your concern, now is it?”
He shrugged one shoulder. “It’s your reputation, not mine.”
“I’m not planning to ruin my reputation.”
“Says everyone who has ever been ruined. Those events are never planned well. It’s either poor planning or deuced bad luck.”
Cassie sighed. “The less you know the better. No more questions.”
He chuckled. “I look forward to watching this night unravel, but do be careful. We are friends, as you say.”
“I will.” They reached her mother, and after reminding Cassie of their pending dance, he departed with a wink.
Cassie pretended not to see it, so her mother wouldn’t be curious enough to start asking questions. Now that she’d freed up her time before supper, she needed to devise a plan for getting the note to Sidney. Discreetly. Without triggering any interest from nosy staff and other guests.
Chapter 4
Meet me in the south parlor. Alone. Midnight.
Sidney folded the note and slipped it inside his jacket. He scanned the room, but no woman caught his attention with a sly smile. He wasn’t enthusiastic about a secret tryst, but he needed anything to get Cassie out of his head. Perhaps another woman would distract him just enough to get through the evening without losing his control. Tristan was off with his latest liaison, the widowed Mrs. Hornberry. Sidney could slip away unnoticed if he wished. But did he wish to? He checked his pocket watch. He had thirty minutes to think it over.
He wasn’t in the mood. As strange as that sounded even to him. After Cassie’s odd refusal, he’d been out of sorts, and he didn’t like it. He’d wasted time and money in the card room before leaving Tristan to his own devices and stalking the ballroom for any sort of distraction. The only woman who dared approach him was Lady Delilah. She’d made her interest clear, but she wasn’t one to be involved in trysts. She was the daughter of the Marquess of Fenley, and her mind was set on marriage. He’d avoided her as much as one could without causing insult, but the lady was determined.
Her father was a powerful man, and when they last played a hand of cards together at Whites, Lord Fenley had dropped hints about a match. Sidney had pretended to be oblivious. He didn’t want to have the discussion, period. Lord Fenley had been known to use debts owed to him as leverage. Sidney had none, but friends of his did.
Thankfully, not Tristan. Tristan had a shrewd mind for cards, and he never bet more than he had in his pockets.
Sidney found a quiet hall and leaned against the wall, scrubbing his hands over his face in frustration. He was tired and bored. Not the right mindset to answer a seductive summons, but he couldn’t leave, not when he was a guest of Lord and Lady Summers. He was many things, but rude was not one of them. He prided himself on his manners, even if he did indulge his wilder vices with Tristan. He had a family name and history to be proud of. He had honor and pride.
But he had no direction.
Which was part of the reason he needed to go to Star Frost. To get away from the monotony and spend some time with his cousin, who was only a little older but a lot wiser. Sort of an older brother Sidney had never had. The duke had suffered so much, losing his wife in a fire and one of his daughters horribly injured. But he’d stayed strong, caring for his two girls, removing from the society that would make a spectacle of them and taking them somewhere safe. He’d put his family first, even before his own wounds had fully healed.
Sidney had come to respect him so much. He’d always idolized Calvin, but after the loss of his wife and their ancestral terrace home on the outskirts of London, he’d seen a strength in Calvin that amazed Sidney. Most had turned their backs on Calvin, afraid of his sadness, or how to relate to him, but not Sidney. He’d found new facets to his cousin, and he wanted to be a source of comfort and perhaps normalcy.
And he hoped, just maybe, Sidney could gain a bit of wisdom from Calvin, in regard to his situation with Cassie and how to put these feelings behind him.
He patted his pocket, not that he could feel the note there, but he carried a metaphorical weight. He could stand around pitying himself, or he could live.
His cousin had said those very words to him after salvaging what he could from the rubble of his home.
The right decision didn’t always come easy. But pleasures did. He made up his mind. He’d go and meet this mysterious woman and take the moment one breath at a time.
Heart racing after she arranged a footman to give the note to Sidney, Cassie went to the retiring room to change her mask and remove the fichu she used to conceal the more titillating qualities of her dress. She inspected her appearance, pinning the special piece of beaded black lace she’d secretly bought to add to her bodice. Donning the mask and fixing her hair, she plucked the peacock feathers from her reticule and tucked them in her hair and in the lacy beading on the bodice of her dress. She donned her feathered mask. Her transformation complete, she ignored the nervous flutters in her stomach and stashed her domino and plain mask behind a potted plant.
She could hardly recognize herself in the reflection. What would Sidney think? This was not the appearance of a girl fresh from her first season. This was a woman who had desires of her own, and she wanted one thing. Him.
Taking a deep breath, she left the retiring room. Masked heads turned her way. She could feel their gazes following her as she passed, but she ignored them, her path sure, her destination far from the bustling festivities of the ballroom. She entered the south parlor and paced before the empty hearth, clutching her own sprig of mistletoe.
It was nearly midnight, but the room was dark and cold, not inviting of a once-in-a-lifetime first kiss. Cassie knelt before the hearth and removed her gloves to swiftly build up a small fire. She paused to warm her hands as tiny flames licked the kindling and caught. She put a small log on top and rose.
“Am I disturbing you?”
Cassie froze, all her nerve endings coming awake.
Sidney.
She knew his voice like she knew her own.
“Of course not,” she replied, her voice breathless and meek.
She darted a look over her shoulder.
He closed the door and sauntered toward her. “You built a fire?”
“The room was cold.”
“How very practical of you. But it’s still so dark.” He went to a table and turned up the oil lamp. Light washed over the room. “I want to see you.”
Cassie sucked in a breath afraid for him to see her. Why? She’d planned this. She couldn’t let herself be afraid of the execution. She forced herself to turn to face him.
He took her in with his eyes. “Stunning.”
His voice deepened. The warm appreciation in his gaze bolstered her courage. She strolled toward him, affecting a casual and—hopefully seductive—stride. But halfway to him she realized she’d left her mistletoe by the hearth on the floor. Cassie pivoted and turned back toward the hearth. She bent to pick it up, and when she turned to face him again, her confidence hanging on by a thread, he’d moved closer.