Page 7

Secrets, yes. He was in some sort of trouble, or perhaps on the cusp of being so. She had divined that much from his conversation with the man he had addressed as ‘Vice Admiral.’

“Who is Miss Penney partnered with?” Sophie pressed. He wasn’t terribly tall, but his legs were long, dominating his frame.

“Mr. Balfour.” There was a sour twist to Lady Penney’s pronunciation. She flashed Sophie a hard glance. “I own, I am surprised you don’t know of him. His father’s residence is in Berkeley Square.”

“Oh?” The prickling feeling spread to her ears. If her parents kept to even a minimum of decorum, then she would know him, as well as all their other neighbors in the square. Their skittishness seemed to place her at a disadvantage, again and again.

“That’s correct. He is of the Balfours who own the st—rather, who procure silks for Queen Charlotte.”

Mr. Balfour. The quality of his evening clothes aside, there was something reminiscent of grace in his form and movements. Sharp shoulders filled the breadth of his coat. The straightness of his spine promised pridefulness. He had spoken plainly, disdainfully. It all made exquisite sense. “Balfours, the store? On Pall Mall?”

Lady Penney gave an Mm that was pitched in such a way as to not be enthusiastically affirmative. “We are encouraging the match, not because his family name is held in any particular estimation, but for the benefits of his … connections.”

Wealth. It was at the center of the Penneys’ hopes for their daughter’s match, as much as esteem was at the forefront of her own parents’ concern. “Miss Penney has not mentioned him, I do not think.”

“She is not—” Lady Penney cleared her throat and grew taller. “She will warm to the idea in time.”

Sophie had observed the couple long enough to issue a silent doubt. Despite the fluidity of their movements as dance partners, their manner toward one another was frigid. Miss Penney’s chin was pushed up and to the left, Mr. Balfour’s to the right. Every figure they stepped was done in correctness, but there was a certain stiffness, if one stared long enough. Like wax dolls, they moved.

He had not looked like that, in the study. He had believed himself to be alone and acted accordingly, leaning his weight back on one leg and staring out the window as though he could see something amid the darkness.

Their eyes locked in the split second he passed near the dance floor’s edge, and a chill traced the back of her neck. I doubt this lot would think it advisable for me to remain. With you. As though he, Mr. Balfour, had seen no trouble in their seclusion at all. A peculiar and embarrassing encounter; it shouldn’t intrigue her.

“His father appears to be a more amiable man than he.” Lady Penney opened her fan and began beating it in a time that did nothing to coincide with the orchestra’s rhythm. “Lord Penney has been quite satisfied with the man. It is the son who we have only just been introduced to.”

A footman bearing a silver tray passed by, but Sophie refused the drinks. The stolen swallows of Lord Milton’s brandy were working their way from her stomach out to the rest of her, loosening the tenseness of her shoulders and making it easier to ignore the hollowness that lived in her chest. She checked her dance card. There had been no one for the minuet, but one turn about the room was sure to fill the few empty places that remained. Better to do that, than to risk another assignation with the supposedly virile lieutenant her hostess had planned to encourage. Sophie swallowed. She had control of herself now, but if she had to place her hands on the shoulders of one of those coats …

“Do you think Lord Penney would mind it terribly if I asked him to take me for a turn about the room?” Sophie asked. The minuet was nearing its end. She saw the pink flash of Miss Penney’s dress and a shock of coppery hair in her periphery. She did not indulge the curiosity that made her want to look. “I should be most appreciative if he introduced me to some of his acquaintances.”

Lady Penney’s mouth twisted before she pulled her eyes from the dancers, and settled them on Sophie’s hem. It was already drying, evidence of the misadventure evaporating to leave little more than a shadow. “Very well.”

When Sophie took the old earl’s arm a minute later, radiating smiles and politeness to every gentleman he introduced her to, she had no fear that Mr. Balfour could be one of them. The Penneys had marked him for their own conquest, but if that wasn’t enough—

His seeking out a dark room and reaching for brandy did not make them the same. And his leaving her there without disrupting her peace did not make him a gentleman. There was no one more opposite to her needs.

By the time the Penneys’ carriage put Sophie out in Berkeley Square, she was delighted to have done with them. They were moaning in turns—when one complained about the catch in their back, the next presented a digestive complaint, and the third spoke over their predecessors claiming to ‘have never been more tired in all their life.’

As she mounted the steps of No. 34, Sophie ceded a sliver of merit to the last complaint. The sun had been up long enough to burn off the dew. Her brain was not functioning well enough to calculate the hours, but the whole night and half the morning had been spent at the Miltons’ ball.

A footman took Sophie’s outer garments and she eased her feet from their slippers, for really, she could not wait another instant. The white satin was tinged with blood, and even the brush of her skirts against the backs of her heels seemed to inflame the wounds. She wanted nothing more than to lie, stripped naked and in peaceful silence, for the remainder of today, but she heard the faint scrape of cutlery coming from the dining room.

“Good morning.” She smiled in on her parents. They were sitting in their usual places, her mother idly stirring her tea and her father hunched over his newspapers. She was tempted to lean against the wall, to fist up her skirts so that they might quit agitating her curst heels—but to do so would appear ungrateful.

“I do not see why we should tell her. It seems to me it would only cause upset.” Her mother spoke quietly, but her words, directed into her teacup, were plain.

“What’s happened?” Sophie’s incisive strides had taken her halfway to the table before Lord and Lady St. Quinton lifted their heads, wide-eyed. Papa dropped his knife and began folding the newspaper into thirds.

“Where in heaven have you been?” He spread his hand over the paper, rendering the finely printed text unintelligible. His hair, what little of it remained, stood on end, and his green-and-yellow dressing robe draped over his shoulders in a thin swag. His eyes pinioned her in place.

“Me?” She closed her mouth when she realized it was gaping, and looked at her mother. “Why, the Miltons’ ball.”

“He knows”—Lady St. Quinton’s voice pitched high, and she looked brightly across the table at her husband—“don’t you, dear? It’s only you keep such a full calendar since your come-out, Sophie. Tell us, how was it? Do sit. Have some breakfast; you must be famished.”

The look of abject horror receded from her father’s face, and he summoned a footman from the sideboard with a tick of his chin. Sophie approached the table slowly, taking the back of her usual chair in her hands. She didn’t know what was more concerning—that her absence could be so easily missed, or that the contents of that newspaper were being spirited away. The footman who now held it left the dining room.

“It was … wonderful. A great gathering of guests, to be sure. Lord Milton was kind enough to introduce me to a good number of prospects.”

Papa picked up his coffee cup, which looked quite empty from this vantage, and tipped his head back, slurping down whatever remained. He returned his attention to his plate.