Crispin looked relieved. Flossie looked disappointed. Uncle Harold looked surprised. He opened his mouth, and then seemed to think better of what he was about to say, and closed it again.
“Miss Florence Schlomsky is one of our neighbors here at the Essex House Mansions,” I told him. “It seems she and St George had an encounter in the lift yesterday evening.”
Flossie giggled. Crispin winced.
“Miss Schlomsky is American,” I added, as if Uncle Harold couldn’t figure that out for himself from the accent. “Her father owns a series of dime-stores in Toledo.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere in America,” I said, before Florence could offer directions. When she’d tried to offer them to me, I had been completely lost, and I had every reason to think the same would be true of Uncle Harold. An eighteen hour drive west of New York, and then north… really?
Uncle Harold nodded, as if the explanation was sufficient. “How long have you known my son?” he asked Flossie. “I hope I’m right in assuming that last night’s encounter wasn’t the first time you met?”
Flossie giggled. “Not at all, Your Highness. Lord St George and I met a couple of months ago. He gave me a lift to a party at Lady Montfort’s.”
She bent an adoring eye on Crispin. His father did the same, less adoringly. “You went to a party at Lady Montfort’s, Crispin?”
I hid a smile. Of course he hadn’t. Flossie had attached herself to him, in the belief that he was Christopher, and he had dropped her off at the staid Lady Montfort’s soiree—after a heavy flirtation, no doubt, since he just didn’t seem able to help himself—before he had gone on to a much less staid get-together at the Jungman Sisters’, one that had featured plenty of alcohol and Bright Young Things.
And the next day he had complained to me about being ‘saddled’ with Flossie, when truly, he could just have kept the charm to a minimum and gone on his way without a lot of pretty words.
“You’re such a charming lad, St George,” I told him, and he looked down at me, startled, “the way you just can’t seem to keep from turning your wiles on every woman you meet.”
The startled look turned into a sneer. “Oh, lovely, Darling. A compliment and a dig in the same sentence. How very typical of you.”
“There was no compliment in that sentence,” I informed him, “although I can see where you might have been confused.”
The sneer intensified, and reached its apex when I added, “I can’t see this dubious charm of yours myself, but there’s no denying its effectiveness. Can’t you just keep it to yourself, St George?”
“I’m afraid I can’t, Darling. Besides, as you so often tell me, it’s not me, it’s?—”
“Your title and fortune. Yes, I know I’ve said that.”Ad nauseam, in fact. Over and over, until I’ve made him believe it. “I’ve changed my mind, St George.”
His eyebrow arched in inquiry, and I added, “Clearly there’s more to it. Your title and fortune doesn’t explain… them.”
I nodded to Gladys and Flossie, who were sizing each other up, rather like two cats in an alley, while His Grace, the Duke, watched in consternation. “They’ve both got fortunes of their own, so they don’t need yours, and yet they look ready to scratch each other’s eyes out. And I heard what Laetitia Marsden said last month, you know.”
“Heard what, Darling?”
“In Christopher’s room,” I said, “the morning after all the excitement. She did her best to persuade you to marry her. She’d take you even knowing that you don’t love her, it seems. And she’s got both a title and a fortune, so all she wanted?—”
Had been him.
His lips curved, in a smirk this time. “Perhaps there’s something you’re missing, Darling.”
“Perhaps there is.” I gave him a dubious up-and-down. “You must have something to recommend you, I suppose, if all these women keep coming back for more.”
“I suppose I must. Any time you’d like me to demonstrate, Darling, you just let me know.”
“Demonstrate what?”
“My dubious charms, as you like to call them… Darling.”
His voice softened on the last word, as if he were using it as an endearment and not simply my name. It was entirely without the sarcastic undertone it usually has, while the smirk turned from self-satisfied to something far more dangerous. Even his eyes changed, from clear, cool gray to something darker and moodier. From one moment to the next, he went from looking like my rather annoying personal nemesis to a handsome young man bent on seduction.
And then he blinked, and it all went away.
My breath seemed to have gotten stuck in my throat during the second-long interlude. I had to clear it away before I could tell him, “Impressive, St George. I didn’t think you had it in you.”
