Seven Wicked Nights (Turner #1.5)

“Let me introduce you to an old acquaintance,” Lady Cosgrove was saying.

The murmured introduction was too indistinct to reach Elaine’s ears. Instead, she smiled and nodded. “Never mind, Mother. It’s nothing.” And maybe it was nothing. So few of Lady Cosgrove’s compatriots were here. She wouldn’t continue to pursue her game without an appreciative audience, would she?

“Yes,” Lady Cosgrove was saying, “but do look—here’s another old friend. Why, Lady Elaine. How do you do?”

Elaine could not ignore so direct a query. She fixed her smile in place so firmly that her cheeks ached.

“Lady Cosgrove,” she started pleasantly. And then her gaze shifted behind the woman. Her hands grew cold. She stopped, mid-greeting, feeling as if she had just been struck. For just one second, her amiable expression slipped, and Lady Cosgrove’s grin widened to sharklike proportions.

But Elaine couldn’t force herself to beam in placid unconcern. Not through this.

She had fallen into a nightmare: the kind where she entered a ballroom wearing nothing but her drawers. She’d had that dream before. Soon, everyone would start laughing at her. And when they turned to her en masse, the people who pointed and mocked all wore the same face: a thousand incarnations of Evan Carlton—now the Earl of Westfeld.

She always awoke from those dreams in a cold sweat. She would succeed in coaxing herself back to sleep only by repeating to herself that he was gone, he was gone, he was gone, and she wouldn’t ever see him again.

But this horrid dream was real. He was back.

He was older. He was bigger, too, shoulders wider, his jacket unable to hide the ripple of muscles fit for a laborer. Back when he’d tormented her, he’d been almost scrawny. Faint lines gathered at the corner of his eyes, and he was dressed in sober browns. His hair was no longer tamed in the fashionable, sleek look that she remembered. Instead, he’d let the dark gold of his hair fall into tousled curls.

He stood too close to her—three full steps away, true, but even that seemed unconscionably near. Cold gathered in her hands and a knot formed in the pit of her stomach. She wanted to turn on her heel and run.

But she’d realized long ago that running was the worst thing she could do. Deer and rabbits ran, and the sight of their hindquarters usually only spurred the dogs to the hunt.

“Lady Elaine,” he said, giving her a stiff bow.

She had been Lady Equine for as long as she could remember. But now he was calling her by her real name and looking into her eyes, and it was almost as if he respected her.

He had always had deceptively compelling eyes—dark and fathomless. She felt as if she might glimpse hidden secrets if only she peered into those depths. He looked as if he were about to reveal some extraordinary truth, one that would explain everything.

An illusion, that. He was nothing more than a snake who could hold her spellbound in his gaze. As for the fluttering in her belly…that was nothing so mundane as attraction. Instead, Westfeld made her feel the vital, vicious pull of a might-have-been. Even after all these years, some foolish part of her believed that she might one day be respected. One day, she would not have to watch over her shoulder, constantly wary. One day, she could enjoy herself without fear that she would become the object of ridicule. If the Earl of Westfeld would treat her with respect—well, then she’d know she was safe.

She hated that he made her think that the impossible might be attainable.

Right on cue, Lady Cosgrove asked, “Indeed, Lady Elaine. How are your horses?”

Long years of training kept Elaine’s face unruffled. It was a triumph over both of them to curl her lips into a smile, to reach out one hand in polite greeting.

“Very well, and thank you for the gracious inquiry,” she said, ignoring Lady Cosgrove’s delicate smirk. “And do tell—how are yours?”

“Leave off the talk of horses,” Westfeld said shortly. He wasn’t smiling, not even a little.

“True. Westfeld has been all round the world,” Lady Cosgrove put in. “He could talk about more exotic creatures than pigs or ponies.”

Westfeld didn’t glance at his cousin. Still, his lips thinned further. “Don’t.” His voice was steel. “Besides, I spent most of my time in Switzerland. I don’t consider the alpine ground squirrel to be particularly exotic.”

“Don’t tell me you saw nothing exotic.” Elaine let a hint of breathiness invade her tone. “Didn’t Hannibal lead all his elephants into the Alps?”

At Lady Cosgrove’s befuddled look, Elaine felt her smile broaden, and she gave herself a mental point in this match.