Forgetting her usually impeccable posture, she leaned her back against the enormous mock-Grecian pot and shook her head. ‘I really can’t take it in.Youare suddenly a spy, as well as a duke’s son and a poultry farmer?’
‘Hardly suddenly. I’ve been one for several years.’ Seven to be precise. ‘And it was my grandfather who was the poultry farmer. I was recruited straight out of Cambridge because my superior noticed I had a talent for blending in.’
‘Blending in. Here?’ Her eyes travelled the length of him, taking in the fine clothes, the diamond cravat pin, then focused on his face. They both knew the exterior was merely window dressing and that the blood that pumped through his veins was more red than blue. ‘But you professed to beshy.’
There was no point in denying it, not since he had already confessed as much, although he was still horrified that he had also drunkenly enlightened her to the sad truth of his sporadic and dismal love life coupled with his inability to flirt! What a prize-winning, pathetic fool he must have sounded. ‘Normally I work in the background, but with Jake on his honeymoon I’ve been drafted very much into the fore. Against my will, I might add.’ Why Seb felt the need to add that he wasn’t certain, but for some reason his mind kept wandering back to the girl in the multicoloured hair rags and jam stains on her nightdress that he had been happily confessing all to. Perhaps because he found that incarnation less intimidating than the sophisticated society lady in front of him. Or perhaps it was because Gem was the closest thing to a safe harbour he had in the uncharted waters of society and he was grateful he had a friend. Not that he knew shewasa friend yet.
‘Jake Warriner? Brother to my sister’s husband? He’s a spy, too?’ Before he answered she shook her head again. ‘I suppose it makes sense. You were both there that day—and it was his bullet that killed your assailant... Good gracious. It never occurred to me.’ The expression of awe and wonder swiftly changed to a frown as the cogs in her clever mind began to turn. ‘The highest echelons? You suspect someonehereof being part of this dangerous gang? Who?’
Your paramour’s old schoolfriend—not that Seb could tell her that part if he wanted her silence. ‘At this time, I have no certain idea of his identity. As Lord Millcroft, I hope to find out—although I’m hardly lord material. Why my superior sent me on this mission is a mystery. This is not my world...’ What had possessed him to admit to that? And to her? ‘I can never find the right words at the best of times. Here I fear I am doomed.’ Good grief—why did the damning words suddenly keep coming? Yet more seemed to be lining up behind, condemning him to further cloddishness in front of the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. And all apparently without the excuse of bullet wounds and brandy because in his mind was the girl in rags, the one he miraculously felt like himself with. ‘I shall say the wrong thing or, worse,notsay anything at all. As usual. And everyone here will realise I am a fraud just as you do. I should be guarding something or sneaking around somewhere. Listening and watching. Two things I am exceedingly good at. What I am not good at is...this!’ He gestured to his evening clothes and then the whole ballroom. ‘But my purpose here genuinely is a matter of national importance, a mission I was entrusted with and I am single-handedly about to ruin it with my woeful social skills. Months of hard work, the lives of many good men, all wasted while I fail abysmally at being a lord. I have never felt so out of my depth before.’ Seb’s stupid heart was racing again and a cold trickle of sweat was making its way down his spine. Less than one hour in, his plan was shot to pieces and for the first time in his long and successful career with the King’s Elite, failure seemed inevitable.
Her face softened and she touched his arm. Seb felt the affectionate gesture all the way down to his toes. ‘Don’t worry. You didn’t seem out of your depth in the slightest. Truth be told, had I not known you were the shy Mr Leatham from Norfolk, I would have been none the wiser. You seemed supremely confident and added just the right splash of aloofness to give the intriguing Millcroft exciting gravitas. You also look the part. Very debonair and handsome. Dashing even. For a fraud, you play a lord very well.’
Dashing? Handsome? Him? ‘Hardly. Have you not seen the scar?’
‘I have.’ He stiffened as she reached out her hand and traced one finger down its ugly length. ‘It gives you an air of the dangerous. The ladies love a dangerous fellow. Didn’t you see them all watching you? Wondering in what exciting and adventurous circumstances you acquired it?’ Her hand dropped and she smiled. ‘How did you get it, by the way? Seeing as we both know you’ve never set foot in the Antipodes.’
‘An accident.’ Seb had accidentally assumed his half-brother had a heart and a conscience, but like his father before him and all persons of his ilk he considered the low-born disposable. ‘Caused by my own stupidity. Nothing exciting or adventurous in the slightest.’
‘Well, I like it. You wouldn’t be half as handsome without it.’
Lost for an appropriate response which wouldn’t start him blushing, Seb avoided her eyes and, in doing so, in his peripheral vision he saw her Duke skirting the edge of the dance floor, clearly searching for her now that the waltz was done. He tugged her further into the alcove. ‘Westbridge is looking for you.’
‘He is?’ The information seemed to please her, but royally ruined the tender moment they had just shared, cruelly reminding him that for all her compliments she had her eyes on another man. One in possession of a real and grand title, whose blood ran as blue as the Nile. She glanced over Seb’s shoulder with a calculated smile. ‘I can’t see him. How can you be sure?’
‘Because I’m a spy. We all have eyes in the back of our heads.’
She giggled without her usual practised artifice, the intimate and earthy sound doing unmentionable things to his unmentionables. ‘Then I shall let him miss me for a few minutes. I dare say a bit of jealousy will do him good.’ She could now see the Duke and watched his frantic search with amusement for several long moments. She was still smiling smugly when her gaze returned triumphantly to Seb. It grated. ‘Mr Leatham, I have suddenly had a positively brilliant idea...’
