He grinned, and she followed the maid inside.
The coolness of the corridor was a relief after the sun. The maid led her along a quiet passage, up a few steps, and into a small chamber prepared with a basin, towels, and a looking glass. Emmeline thanked her and took a few moments to refreshherself, pressing a damp cloth lightly to the back of her neck until the dizziness receded.
When she stepped back into the corridor, the maid was gone.
For a moment, Emmeline stood still, listening. The house was quiet. Somewhere below, a door closed. Somewhere beyond the walls, Aaron’s faint laughter drifted in from the garden.
She turned in the direction she thought they had come and moved carefully, one hand trailing near the wall. The corridor looked different now, longer, dimmer, with paintings spaced along the walls and a carpet that swallowed the sound of her steps.
Then the dizziness returned.
It came sharply this time, a wave of heat and emptiness that rose from her stomach to her head. The floor tilted beneath her. Her breath caught. She reached for the wall, but her fingers met only air.
“Oh,” she whispered.
A pair of arms caught her before she fell.
Emmeline gasped, her body jolting against another’s, her hands clutching instinctively at soft muslin. Whoever held her was slight, warm, breathing too quickly.
“I have you,” a woman’s voice whispered. “Do not move too quickly.”
Emmeline’s heart hammered. Shame and fear flooded her first, then gratitude, then confusion so swift it made her dizzy all over again. She steadied herself slowly and lifted her eyes.
The woman before her was young. A bit pale, perhaps, but unmistakably lovely, with dark brown hair pinned back and gray eyes so much like Rowan’s that Emmeline felt the breath leave her body. She had the same shape, same color, same startling intensity.
The knowledge moved through her like cold water.
“Lady Juliet?” she whispered.
The woman went utterly still.
In that silence, Emmeline knew she was right.
For a suspended second, neither of them moved. Emmeline could hear her own heartbeat, frantic and heavy in her ears. Juliet’s hands remained at her elbows, trembling now, and the fear in her face was so naked that it stole any triumph from the discovery.
Footsteps sounded at the far end of the corridor.
Both women turned.
Frederick appeared, hat in hand, his easy expression vanishing so completely that Emmeline almost did not recognize him. His eyes widened, moved from Juliet to Emmeline, then back again.
“Good God,” he said.
Juliet reacted first. She seized Emmeline’s wrist with surprising strength and pulled her toward the nearest door. “Inside. Both of you.”
“Juliet—” Frederick began.
“Inside, Frederick.”
There was enough panic in her voice that even he obeyed. Juliet drew them into a small parlor and shut the door firmly behind them, then leaned back against it.
Frederick dragged a hand over his face. “What on earth are you doing out of your room?”
Juliet’s chin trembled, but she lifted it. “I heard them arrive.”
“So you decided to stroll through the corridors like a ghost?”
“I only wished to see Aaron,” she said, and her voice cracked on the name. “From a distance. I was not going to speak to him.I know I must not. But then Her Grace came inside, and when she came out she looked as though she might faint. What was I meant to do, allow her to strike her head upon the floor?”
