She shook her head, pinching her forefinger and thumb together, signalling that the guess was close but not correct.
“Someone who will be married soon?” another person called out.
Lady Andrea smiled and shrugged. Then she began to waltz with an invisible partner, acting as though she were whispering in the person’s ears. Her eyes flicked to Dominic, and he felt his growing sense of unease spread.
She mimed pushing the person away, suddenly changed from warm and affectionate to cold and uninterested. Then she glanced over her shoulder, as though someone were looking at her, and suddenly warmth returned.
She acted as though she were throwing her arms around someone, moving close to some imaginary figure. Then she glanced over her shoulder again, mimed removing something from her finger, and sighed in apparent relief.
“Someone pretending to be married?” a voice called, puzzled. “Julia?”
“Julia did not do such a thing; you are thinking of Janice! She is the one who told us all she had a fiancé last year.”
Lady Andrea shook her head, and Dominic felt his chest tighten. He glanced at Charlotte and saw the same realisation spreading across her face.
Perhaps it is just coincidence.And then Lady Andrea began to mime writing letters, reading them, and laughing at them as though they were jokes. Each time she did something, she looked over her shoulder.
One moment, she was cold and distant, the next warm and effusive. In one scene, she was clutching her hands to her heart and acting giddy and delighted, the next moment, she was pushing some invisible person away.
And then she looked at him, and Dominic knew without a shadow of a doubt that Lady Andrea knew the truth. And she was about to reveal it to everyone around them.
Their eyes met, his wide with fear, hers full of a grim satisfaction. Dominic was barely aware of anything else around him; all he could feel was the sweat pouring down the back of his neck.
“Please,” he mouthed, unable to stop himself. “Do not do this.”
Lady Andrea held his gaze, as she acted out searching for something and then covered and uncovered an invisible person’s eyes, laughing each time she covered them.
“My God,” Charlotte whispered, barely loud enough for him to hear. Her face was so pale, it might have been a ghost.
“It is Gemima!” someone yelled triumphantly.
“Who?” another voice called back.
“Gemima, the girl who was eliminated because grandmother found out she was lying to her. Do you remember? She was constantly one way in public and then another in private!” the first voice said, and Dominic heard the excitement in it, the surety.
He looked at Lady Andrea. He knew that it was not Gemima, that it had never been Gemima. Time seemed to freeze as he waited for her to shake her head, to keep the game going a moment longer.
“Yes, it must be Gemima,” a voice was saying.
“It could be Albert,” another voice called. “He was the most two-faced person I ever met. And I believe he also had a fake fiancée.”
“Honestly, it boggles the mind that so many people would feel the need to invent a fiancée! A real one is more than enough, I cannot imagine adding a fake one,” someone grumbled from the back of the drawing room.
There was a yelp of pain and then a smattering of laughter while Lady Andrea continued to act out various things on the stage. People called out guesses, but each time she shook her head.
Dominic felt as though he would be sick. He forced himself to count as he breathed in, to not do anything that might give away the panic that was threatening to worm its way through his chest.
How do I stop her? I need to stop her.
“And that is your time,” the Dowager Duchess called out.
There were frustrated grumblings as Lady Andrea bowed to her audience. Dominic let out a breath that he did not know he had been holding. He heard Charlotte do the same.
We are safe. No one guessed the truth.
“Come on, tell us who it was!” someone called as Lady Andrea prepared to rejoin the crowd.
“I am not sure that is allowed,” she said, glancing at the Dowager Duchess. “And I would not wish to upset our generous hostess.”
