Page 55 of The Earl She Once Saved

“You are the only face in this house I never have to arm myself against.”

Something moved in Win’s expression.

“I know,” she said.

That was all. And it was enough.

***

Rafe was waiting at the foot of the stairs. He had returned before dusk, though Verity had not heard him come in. He wore black, the severity of his evening coat relieved only by the white of his linen and the silver at his waistcoat. The day had left some shadow upon him. She saw it in the set of his mouth.

Then he looked up. Whatever he had been carrying vanished from his face. He simply stared.

Verity’s hand tightened upon the banister. Open admiration was more difficult to meet than insolence. Insolence could be cut down. Admiration asked nothing and somehow took more.

Rafe came forward.

“You look …” He stopped.

Verity descended the last step. “You need not sound so astonished.”

“I am not astonished.”

“No?”

“No.” His eyes moved over her face and returned to hers. “Only unequal to the task of saying it properly.”

Heat touched her cheeks.

She looked past him. “My aunt will be waiting.”

“Yes.”

Rafe offered his arm. She pretended not to notice the care with which he held the injured shoulder. At the carriage, he opened the door and gave her his hand. Verity placed her fingers in his. The contact lasted no more than a moment, but it followed her all the way to Marchmont House.

There, the ballroom glittered. Wax candles burned in three great chandeliers, their flames multiplied in tall mirrors until the room appeared without end. Music rose above the press of conversation. Silk whispered. Jewels flashed at white throats. The air smelled of hot wax, perfume, and too many bodies confined beneath one painted ceiling.

Verity stood beside Cordelia and became stone. The whispers began even before she had crossed half the room.

“Lady Edgeworth …”

“Alone all these years …”

“Neither wife nor widow …”

“… living under the new Earl’s roof …”

“How very awkward …”

She heard only fragments, but fragments were enough. Words did not need to be spoken directly to wound. They required only the certainty that one was meant to hear them.

Verity inclined her head when required. She answered when addressed. She gave no one the satisfaction of haste, anger or retreat.

Across the room, Celestine took possession of Rafe with the confidence of a woman claiming what the county had already awarded her. She secured his hand for the first dance. Then she carried him from one acquaintance to the next, with her pale glove resting upon his sleeve. Wherever Rafe turned, Celestine appeared beside him, smiling up as though they shared an understanding too intimate to explain … perhaps they did.

Verity told herself she did not care.

The orchestra began a country dance. Rafe stepped onto the floor with Celestine.