Emmeline read it twice. The disappointment did not vanish entirely, but something softer, warmer, moved through it.
She pressed the note to her lap and looked toward the pale morning window, suppressing a smile.
Margaret arrived later that morning. Emmeline had managed to dress, pin her hair, and arrange her face into something close to composure by the time she knocked.
Margaret took one look at her face and her eyes widened. She understood immediately.
“I knew it,” she said, stopping just inside the drawing room.
Emmeline looked up from the tea tray. “Good morning to you as well.”
“No.” Margaret pointed at her. “Do not good morning me with that face.”
“What face?”
“That one.” Margaret came closer, eyes narrowing with wicked attention. “You left the ball without even saying goodnight, and now you are sitting here looking happier than I’ve ever seen you.”
Heat rushed up Emmeline’s throat. “Margaret.”
“Oh, excellent. That blush answered several questions before I asked them.” Margaret sank onto the sofa beside her, all concern now sharpened into delight. “I was worried half the night. I thought perhaps Lady Amanda had said something dreadful.”
“She did.”
Margaret’s smile faded. “Then I shall hate her properly in a moment. First, tell me why you look as though you’ve forgotten all about her.”
Emmeline lowered her gaze to her teacup, but her fingers betrayed her, tightening once around the porcelain.
Margaret gasped softly. “Emmeline.”
“Nothing happened,” Emmeline said quickly, then felt her own mouth betray her by curving.
Margaret leaned closer. “That is the least convincing lie you have ever told me.”
“It was not… not everything.”
“That sounds very much like something.”
Emmeline closed her eyes, and at once she felt Rowan’s mouth again, the slow heat of it, the way his voice had broken over theword beautiful. Her breath turned shallow before she could hide it.
When she opened her eyes, Margaret was staring at her with open triumph.
“You are going to tell me everything,” Margaret said.
Emmeline lifted her cup at last, though her hand was not entirely steady. “I am going to tell you very little.”
Margaret smiled. “Then I shall listen very carefully.”
“It seems you are having a delightful morning, Duchess.”
Rowan stopped at the threshold of the drawing room with his hat still in one hand and his gloves in the other.
Emmeline sat near the tea table with Margaret Godwin beside her, both of them looking up at him with expressions far too innocent to be trusted. Morning light fell across his wife in a pale spill, softening the sandy gold of her hair and catching on the faint freckles across her cheeks.
She wore a gown of light muslin, modestly cut, perfectly proper, and somehow more dangerous to him than last night’s dark blue silk had been, because now he knew what rested beneath all that propriety. He knew the taste of her on his tongue.
Emmeline’s mouth curved. “Am I?”
“Yes.”
