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“Has he written to you again?” Benedict asked.
I shook my head. “Not since the last letter, and I never asked your mother to write to him either.” I swallowed. “I did not think it wise when I would prefer the acquaintance to end. I have no desire to further it, at least. I would not wish to give the man false hope.”
Benedict paused, his gaze roaming my face. A softness fell over his blue eyes that poured heat into my chest. When he spoke, his voice was muted, delicate. “Keep an eye out for your friend, and I will do the same.”
We rose and greeted the couple who was speaking to James. Henry hung back, content to wait for his brothers to finish socializing. I slipped closer to Felicity, looking around James as he spoke to the couple and scanning the room for Peter. I knew seeing him in Town was an eventuality, but I had intended to avoid him as long as I could. He’d had a first-hand view of my parents’ infidelity and the unfavorable reputation they were garnering. It had been even worse that my father worked for England, that he was representing our country.
“I do not see him,” I said quietly, and Benedict nodded.
The woman who was speaking to James turned her attention on me. Her eyes were dark, a slant to them that looked exotic, and she was breathtakingly beautiful.
“Forgive me,” James said at once. “I’ve been rude. Mr. and Mrs. Rossi, allow me to introduce Miss Dorothea Northcott. We are taking her to London for the Season.”
Mrs. Rossi swept her gaze over me and clung tightly to the man on her arm, his dark, coarse hair in disarray.
“Mrs. Rossi is an incredible singer,” James said. “I had the opportunity to hear her a few years ago in London.”
“What do you sing?” I asked.
“Opera.”
“And your husband, does he sing as well?”
She squeezed the man’s arm she held onto and laughed. “No. He is a conductor.”
I could see how they would have an advantageous marriage. “I hope to hear you sing someday.”
“You must come to my show in London. We are to put on a new opera very soon. The chorus has been practicing for months.”
I looked at Felicity and hoped she would not reveal my dislike of this particular type of music, but aside from her amused smile, she did nothing to give me away. “I am at the mercy of my hosts.”
Mr. Rossi narrowed his eyes at me. “Northcott. I knew a man by the name, though it was years ago.”
“Charles Northcott?” I asked. “He was the ambassador in Sweden most recently and traveled in the Continent a great deal. Though he died six years ago.”
His eyes lit up. “Yes. It is the same. Your mother, she was very beautiful. You look like her.”
I waited, my shoulders tense, for him to dismiss me out of hand for being a child of two people with so little regard to fidelity or their reputations, but he did not. He merely looked away, bored already by the conversation.
Mrs. Rossi cooed. “I remember your parents, too. They came to the opera in Vienna. Now you reallymustcome hear me sing.” She dropped her husband’s arm and leaned closer to Benedict, wrapping her long, slender fingers around his sleeve and slipping up next to him in an entirely too familiar way.
My stomach sank clear to my slippers, and I watched him, waiting for him to disengage the woman’s claws.
“Mr. Bradwell would never miss my show,” she said with every confidence, her voice like a paring knife to my soul.
He smiled widely at her. “When I am in Town, you know I will never miss it.”
I wanted to run away, but that was a childish response, so I looked away from them, unable to stomach the way her hand stroked his arm or the half lidded way her eyelashes fluttered.
My gaze caught Henry speaking to a man not far behind us, and then it landed on the familiar fair-headed love of my younger years: Peter Seymour. He had seen me, and it was too late to look away, so I whispered in Felicity’s ear. “I’ve seen an old friend, but I will remain within sight.”
She nodded, then continued listening politely to the sloppy opera singer and her bored husband.
“Heaven be praised,” Peter said when he approached me.
I dropped into a curtsy and smiled up at him. I did not want to pursue an acquaintanceship with him, but I could not very well ignore the man either. “It has been a few years, Mr. Seymour. How are you?”
“I assume you have not received my letter, then?” he asked in a quiet voice.
