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Arabella nodded at Mama.
Then Mama nodded at Sculthorpe.
And like that, it was done.
Arabella was engaged.
“You are not pleased?” Sculthorpe still held her hand, a small smile playing around his lips.
“I am excessively pleased.”
“You don’t smile.”
This was true: She did not smile.
His own smile broadened. He really was very handsome. More handsome than Guy. Lucky her: a handsome husband.
“How proud you are,” he murmured, each word slinking from his mouth, and that lewd gleam she recalled—it slithered into his eyes, and he was not handsome, not anymore. Arabella tugged at her hand, but he clasped it tight, slid a fingertip over her palm. If only she had worn gloves, but Roman goddess costumes did not come with gloves. If only her skin did not crawl. If only the silver snake on her arm could come to life and tear out his throat.
No. She was being melodramatic. That was foolish. Arabella was never melodramatic. Or foolish.
But that look did not leave Sculthorpe’s eye, as, at his leisure, he dropped her hand.
“Such a proud…”
Don’t say it.
“Fierce…”
No. Stop.
“Willful…”
Don’t say it.
“Virgin.”
He said it. The same word he had murmured months earlier, during a waltz.
It’s a harmless word, she told herself, but her prickly body ignored her, for the unease came not from his words but from his eyes, from that knowing, possessive leer that crawled over her, as if her bracelet truly had come alive, a real snake coiled around her arm, its cold-blooded scales slithering over her skin and down her spine and into her swirling gut.
Around her, the party grew oppressively loud. Arabella escaped Sculthorpe’s leer by looking into the crowd, where flames rose in hellish columns and an acrobat cartwheeled past, his grinning face a mask of horror. A pair of female rope dancers leaped up—high—so high—too far—they’d fall. Her breath caught, awaiting disaster. No disaster: They landed on the rope, their feet sure.
Arabella breathed. The noise receded. The snake bracelet was just a bracelet, and the crowd was just a crowd, and Sculthorpe was just a man. She had not eaten enough; that would account for the nausea.
If Lord Sculthorpe had noticed her reaction, he gave no sign as Mama joined them.
“Lady Belinda, I do hope that you and my betrothed will not run straight back to the countryside,” he said. “It would be my great pleasure to escort the pair of you to the military review next week. Miss Larke will enjoy watching the soldiers, as she is about to marry one.”
“Of course, my lord,” Mama said.
“I shall send ’round a note.”
With a gallant bow and a “Good evening, ladies,” he left them.
Arabella did not watch him go. Instead, she sipped her wine. The nausea eased. Perhaps she would take up drinking. Something to look forward to.
“That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Mama said.
