She inclined her head to the side. “What if it had been personal?”
“Was it?”
“It was not,” she admitted. “But you could not have known that until you read it.”
He grinned. “A man who waits for certainty is forever at a disadvantage.”
She reached for the letter and pulled it back to her side of the table. “Then I suppose I must watch my secrets more closely.”
His eyes did not leave her face. “I hope you will, Eliza.”
His use of her name sent a thrilling shiver down her back and she took in a deep and slow breath. The next words arrived almost at the same moment, like guests pushing through a narrow doorway.
“I believe,” she said, “that you are trying to make me angry.”
“I am trying to make you honest,” he replied.
They regarded one another, both recognizing the other as a worthy opponent. The clock ticked. The sun rose a fraction higher.
It was Eliza who finally broke. “Then let us be honest: neither of us wishes to attend this ball, but both of us will because that is what is required.”
He smiled, as if she had offered a gift. “Exactly.”
She picked up her toast. “Then we are agreed.”
“We are.”
She stood, smoothed her skirt, and paused at the threshold. “I am still not accustomed to being managed.”
He smiled, genuine this time. “Good. I should be bored if you were.”
She left the room, the door clicking gently behind her.
August watched her go then reread the invitation, May’s words echoing in his head. He wondered if he had ever met a woman so determined not to be handled.
He wondered, too, if he had ever wanted to handle anything more.
“Remember our arrangement,” August said, low enough that only Eliza could hear as he steadied her with a hand at her elbow and guided her down from the carriage.
She managed a smile for the footman, but the look she threw August would have curdled milk.Arrangements. Always his arrangements. The past several days had been a parade of them. She was not to go walking unescorted, she was to send word ifshe left the house, she was to “avail herself of the best modiste in London, for the sake of appearances.” She had, by some effort, not yet resorted to violence.
“Have I failed to honor our arrangement, My Lord?” she murmured as the portico lamps bathed the gravel in yellow pools.
He gave a dry smile. “Not yet. But the evening is young.”
They mounted the steps. A liveried servant announced their arrival which was met by a chorus of startled glances. Eliza caught the calculation in more than one face:There she is. The new Marchioness. The one who netted the Golden Rake.
August inclined his head, and in the time it took to draw breath, he became the man everyone in London adored. His posture softened, his eyes glinted with warmth, and he summoned a smile so sincere, it nearly made her dizzy.
He offered his arm. Eliza took it, schooling her features into pleasant blankness.
The ballroom was awash with glitter, every surface reflecting the chandeliers a dozen times over. The effect was a kind of organized blindness. Eliza let August lead her into the crowd, careful to keep her steps even and her chin high.
They were not three paces into the throng before May materialized, flanked by two of her favorite confidantes. She wasdressed in the pale green she favored, her spectacles perched on her nose, her expression positively luminous.
“You came!” May seized Eliza’s hands, squeezing with real affection. “I was afraid you would cry off or that August would make some excuse about estate business and keep you to himself.”
August snorted. “She would have dragged me here by the collar, had I tried.”