Page 11 of The Duke’s Wager

Thomas, however, was not done. He turned to her father with a wide grin.

“She truly is the spitting image of Henrietta, my dear friend.”

Lucy froze at this. As much as she loved being compared to her beautiful mother, she was not certain that her father would be so fond of that. She glanced at him furtively, looking for the subtlest hint of a reaction. Without truly being aware of her expression, a brilliant smile broke out over her face.

She looked like her mother.

Henry’s face was blank. He did not respond to the compliment – nor did he give her an opportunity to do so. Instead, he changed the course of the conversation, quickly engaging the Viscount in talk about business.

“I spoke to a friend of mine. He believes that now would be the perfect time for us to buy into the steam engine business,” her father was saying. “We have the capacity to start building them. Should we start now, we could take over the market in a year, perhaps two.”

He paid no mind to Thomas’ compliment of his daughter and the latter, ever the businessman, quickly bought into the idea – his admiration of Lucy forgotten.

“Steam engines? I know they have gained quite a bit of traction lately, especially in the larger cities… Do you believe we have the finances to start building them?”

Henry nodded quickly. Lucy was almost certain that he was relieved at the change of topic.

“It’s not going to be cheap, I must admit that much… It will cost us quite a bit, but the rewards will be incredible. We would be daft to miss this opportunity.”

A wide grin spread over Thomas’ face, and Lucy looked away. She knew her father and his business partners quite well, and knew that the one thing they appreciated even more than a beautiful woman was money.

She stared at the floor quietly. Her father always did this whenever her mother was mentioned. In private, he would scream about it and forcefully change the conversation. In public, he was far more subtle – yet still effective. He was always good at changing the flow of the conversation.

Alfred looked uncomfortable. Lucy figured this was because he feared he’d be expected to engage her in conversation now that their fathers chatted away. She scowled slightly and stared at the floor.

She was not interested in his lighthearted conversation. Not in the slightest. He mumbled an excuse and walked off quickly. Lucy could not help but softly laugh to herself.

It seemed as though her reputation of the Ice Queen was as effective as always. It was not only Alfred who rushed in the opposite direction – the other men who stared at her, quite openly admiring her beauty, walked circles around her, making sure to maintain their distance. Lucy scoffed at this. Were they afraid that she would turn them into stone? What was it about the Ice Queen that terrified them so?

Whenever they noticed her watching them, they quickly averted their eyes as though she could infect them with the plague just by looking at them. She shook her head irritably. It was absurd.

Henry and Thomas were talking animatedly, and Lucy stifled a yawn. The conversation did nothing to alleviate her boredom, and so she subtly removed her arm from her father’s grip and turned around, watching the many dancing couples.

She envied them, albeit she would never admit that.

Her breath hitched in her throat when she caught a pair of bright green eyes, and without fully being aware of her movements, she stepped away from her father.

The man in the corner of the room met her gaze fearlessly. Not that it looked like he feared anything whatsoever, what with him leaning against the wall, exuding nonchalance and confidence. He was certainly handsome, with his ginger hair and tall, muscular frame.

However, that was not what held her attention. It was his eyes… those piercing green eyes. They were about the only thing that had not changed.

While he had grown into an incredibly handsome man, those eyes still belonged to the boy she had comforted at his father’s funeral.

Edward Lockhart.

For some reason, she could not take her eyes off him. It did not seem like he even truly noticed her. He was nursing a glass filled with amber liquid and looked exceptionally bored. Though he had not averted his eyes from hers, he looked quite far off. He might as well be looking right through her.

Though he had no doubt changed a lot, Lucy could still vividly see in him the boy weeping under the tree. He had been so vulnerable, so honest. They had spent the entirety of the service together, and he had opened up to her about how much it had hurt to see his father deteriorate after his mother’s death.

This was something Lucy understood quite well – she too had noticed a change in her father’s demeanor, and for the first time in her life, she felt seen. Less lonesome. Perhaps, she thought, all fathers changed when their wives died.

She had hoped – quite foolishly in hindsight – that this boy would be her friend. That he would become her confidant and that she would no longer be alone.

She went home with hope that day, hope that she’d made her first friend. She was absolutely certain that he would contact her soon – that they would spend more time together.

She had been wrong.

She had waited – for a letter, a note – anything to express his gratitude for the time they had spent together. Day after day she waited. The first few days – no, weeks if she were honest – she made excuses for him. He had just lost his last living parent, of course he would not write yet. He was struggling through grief.