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Artemis had been shocked when, instead of refuting her, the other ladies had seemed to come to a tacit agreement to simply forget the whole scene with Penelope. Indeed, Isabel Makepeace had made it a point to link her arm with Artemis’s as they’d walked to the theater box. Although, now that Artemis thought about it, Lady Hero had had a rather determined gleam in her eye.

A determined gleam very like the one in Phoebe’s face. Most of the time the two sisters looked dissimilar. Right now, though, anyone could see that they were related.

“I knew it,” Phoebe exclaimed when Artemis didn’t immediately answer her question. “My brother has seduced you.”

“I shouldn’t be talking about this with you,” Artemis said hastily. “In fact, after tonight, I doubt I’ll ever be allowed to have a private conversation with you.”

“Ridiculous!” Phoebe looked like a small, fierce nuthatch. “You have nothing to be ashamed of. This is entirely Maximus’s fault.”

“Well…,” Artemis began, because truth be told, it had been she who’d gone to Maximus’s bed, not the other way ’round.

Not that she could tell his sister that.

“I could throttle him, I really could,” Phoebe said. “He never even offered for you, did he?”

“No,” Artemis said starkly. “He didn’t. But I didn’t expect him to. I chose this, dear. I really did.”

“Did you?” Phoebe looked up with unfocused eyes, as if trying—and failing—to see Artemis’s expression. “Did you really? So you’d turn down my brother if he offered you marriage, is that what you want me to believe?”

“It’s just such a mess,” Artemis whispered.

“Do you love him?”

“What?” Artemis stared at Phoebe. “Yes, of course. Yes, I love him.”

“Then I really don’t see the problem,” Phoebe said with determination. “For it’s obvious he loves you.”

“I…” Artemis frowned, distracted. “How can you tell?”

Phoebe looked at her as if she were a half-witted schoolgirl. “My brother is the most contained man I know. He keeps the books in his library ranked by language, then age, then author, then alphabetically. He prepares his speeches for Parliament weeks in advance and makes sure to know exactly which lords will be attending and how they will be voting in advance. He’s never, as far as I know, kept a mistress—and before you comment, even a virginal younger sister like myself has ways of finding these things out. He’s fanatical about family and is so worried about my safety that he had bars put on my bedroom windows, presumably so that I wouldn’t, in a fit of absentmindedness, blunder into them and fall out.”

Phoebe took a deep breath and fixed Artemis with a gimlet eye. “And yet he dragged you into the woods in front of his entire country party, loses his tight rein on his temper with you, and has seduced you in his own home—a home he shares with me. Either my brother has a brain fever or he’s fallen hard in love with you.”

Artemis couldn’t help smiling, even though it didn’t matter. Maximus wasn’t marrying for love, after all. He was marrying to please his long-dead father.

She opened her mouth to gently tell Phoebe as much when there was a woman’s scream.

And then she smelled smoke.

A pale wisp innocently curled into the corridor where they stood.

Artemis’s heart started beating fast. The theater was an old one, made of wood and plaster.

“I smell smoke,” Phoebe said.

“Yes.” Artemis took her hand. “We must leave here.” Where was Apollo? Was he even at Harte’s Folly? He’d been so cryptic as to where exactly he’d go. In any case there was no time to search for him. She could only hope that he could make it out of the theater if he were indeed here.

Artemis pulled Phoebe toward the entrance. Of course everyone else had the same idea of escape. People began crowding into the corridor, pushing in their panic. A stout gentleman shoved Artemis hard into the wall as he hurried past.

Her fingers slipped and lost Phoebe’s.

“Phoebe!” Her shout was swallowed by the melee. She fought her way back through the crowd, elbowing people with utter disregard for propriety. “Phoebe!”

She caught sight of the other woman’s face, unseeing eyes wide with panic. Artemis grasped her hand, squeezing tight.

“Artemis!” Phoebe cried. “Please don’t leave me here.”

“I won’t, dear.” There were too many people between them and the main entrance. “Come this way—I thought I saw a side door here.”

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