And the Miss Ran Away With the Rake

chapter 7



Mr. Dishforth, may I be forward? I am going to be, without hearing your answer, because I know what you would tell me: speak from your heart. And I shall.

Do you have a wen?

Found in a letter from Miss Spooner to Mr. Dishforth




“What the devil were you thinking?” Preston asked. No, more like lectured.

No, actually, bellowed.

Henry did his best to stand his ground in the spot of shame that was a well-worn patch in front of the fireplace. They were in the family salon in the back of the house, far from the guests. Which unfortunately gave Preston all the freedom the duke should desire to unleash his displeasure with his uncle.

It was rather an odd position for Henry to be in. Up until a month or so ago it had always been Preston standing uncomfortably at attention, forced to listen to his relations chastise his behavior.

But here he was, and Henry found it nearly impossible to keep from shifting from one foot to another while Preston and Hen took turns chiding him.

“What were you thinking?” Hen wailed.

“Dishforth made me do it,” he muttered.

“Dishforth? Who the devil is he?” Great-Aunt Zillah demanded from her prime location—the large chair by the fireplace.

The Dales had Damaris, and the Seldons had Zillah.

“Well?” the old girl demanded. “Who is this Dishforth?”

Preston and Henry shot accusing glances at Hen, since she’d insisted their only other relative be invited. While the Dales were as prolific as a colony of rabbits, the Seldons had never been overly fruitful.

“He’s no one, dear,” Hen told her.

“No one?” Zillah huffed. “You can’t fool me. There’s a note on the salver for him even now.”

Henry caught himself before his head snapped to attention and he let out an eager “There is?”

Instead, he spared a glance at his nephew and sister and gave a sad shake to his head. Poor old girl. Going at long last.

“Henry! A Seldon does not blame others for his misdeeds,” Zillah admonished, wagging a long, thin finger at him and proving that she wasn’t as infirm as Henry would like the others to believe.

“Yes, precisely,” Hen agreed.

“It started to rain. Nothing more,” Henry told them. For about the tenth time. It was the truth and yet no one wanted to believe him.

Gads! Had it been like this for Preston all these years? Glancing over at the duke’s glower, which held a triumphant air to it, revealed that this turnabout wasn’t all that unpleasant for the notorious Duke of Preston.

Then again in his favor, having listened to Preston “explain” his side of his less-than-respectable conduct over the years had taught Henry a thing or two about confession.

Taking a page from Preston’s example, he used enough of the truth to be believable.

“I got lost.”

Hen and Preston glanced at one another and had to shrug in concession. There was no arguing Henry’s poor sense of direction.

Not that Zillah was about to yield the field. “That gel looked tumbled when you brought her back. Tumbled, I say!”

Yes, we all heard you the first time, Henry thought with a flinch. Slanting a glance over at his great-aunt, an ancient crone if ever there was one, he knew there were volumes of old family stories about Zillah’s flamboyant past. Yet looking at her now, Henry found it impossible to believe she even knew what tumbled would look like, let alone be able to still discern it.

Why, not even Hen knew how old Zillah was. And the lady herself? She wouldn’t have revealed her age to save the king or the whole of England. For all they knew, Queen Elizabeth was most likely reigning when Zillah was born.

Probably been her impudent dog who had caused all the fuss between the Dales and the Seldons to begin with.

“Tumbled,” Zillah repeated, before her head nodded back and she let out a loud snore.

Henry shook his head at the others, even as he knew it was an impossible position to defend.

Daphne had looked tumbled, for she’d very nearly been.

So had he—though not in the same way. Never mind that kiss—well, not that he was ever going to forget it, for it alone had been enough to knock him over—but when she’d stood there before him in that state of enticing dishabille, all wet and disheveled, her hair tumbling . . . yes, tumbling . . . down in wet curls, making her stunning confession, she’d turned his world upside down.

Haven’t you ever wanted to dance where you may?

He’d staggered back as if she’d slapped him. Dishforth’s words. Coming out of her lips.

No, not Dishforth’s, but his words.

How the devil had she known to say that? Pure chance? A mockery by the gods of love?

And before he’d been able to react, before he’d been able to demand an explanation from her, haul her back into his arms and kiss her until she was willing to explain how she knew such a thing, Preston, Hen and Tabitha had driven up, all too clearly witnessing the spectacle of the two of them—drenched to the bones, gaping at each other in wonder.

Then everything had sped forward so quickly that it was as if the thread binding them together with those words had been whisked back onto the spool from which it had come.

In the blink of an eye, Miss Dale had been bundled off in Preston’s carriage and Lord Henry had been left with the pony cart to trot obediently behind, with only Mr. Muggins for company. That, and the one burning question that had Henry at sixes and sevens.

Could that minx be . . . ?

No, he’d told himself over and over. Impossible.

Miss Spooner was a respectable lady. Sensible. Well-bred.

With a tart pen and a passionate nature, Dishforth would have added. Don’t you recall what she wrote to us?

I am a tangle of shivers since I read your last letter. Promise one day we will dance under the stars. Dance where we may, just as you wrote. I would dance with you, sir. Wherever you may.

Henry had glanced up at the carriage before him, where all he’d been able to see had been the back of Miss Dale’s fair head.

No! . . .

And yet . . . what if Miss Dale was his Miss Spooner?

Henry had shaken that thought off just like Mr. Muggins had shaken the rain from his wiry coat—quickly and efficiently.

There was no way the impetuous beauty in the carriage before him was his Miss Spooner.

Would you mind if she was? a voice like Dishforth’s had nudged.

Indeed I would, he’d told himself, ignoring the way his body had thrummed to life as he’d recalled how she’d felt in his arms, her gown clinging to her full breasts, the rounded lines of her hips beneath his hands.

He hadn’t given her his coat out of some duty of chivalry. He’d done it to hide those damnable curves of hers—at least that had been his reasoning the second time around—for the sight of her could have turned even the most sensible of fellows into the most Seldon of rakes.

Even him.

Ah, those curves . . .

“Ahem,” Hen said, clearing her throat and wrenching him back to the present.

Henry glanced around and found all three of them looking at him. “She was not tumbled,” he told his self-appointed tribunal.

“She was wearing your coat,” Preston pointed out. Being a rake of the first order gave him a rather unique familiarity with the subject.

If anyone could spot tumbled, it was Preston.

But Henry wasn’t a proper and sensible gentleman for nothing. “She was soaked,” he told his nephew. “Would you rather have had me leave her shivering? Or worse, catch her death?”

“Whose fault would that have been?” Hen mused.

Preston ignored her and continued on. “How the devil did you get so far afield as it was? Another few miles and you’d been over the boundary.”

The boundary.

Demmit! Henry had hoped to avoid that subject. And to his consternation, his guilt must have shown on his face.

“Henry! No!” Preston exclaimed. “You didn’t.”

He managed a deep breath and knew there was no choice but to confess it all.

The boundary part. Not the kiss. Nor about Miss Spooner. Or his suspicions as to who she might be.

Stealing a glance over at Zillah, he reordered his list. No confessing about the kiss. Especially not the kiss.

“Well, if you must know—” he began.

“No!” Preston groaned.

“Yes, I fear so,” Henry admitted.

Hen, scenting a growing scandal, sat up.

“Whatever are you going on about?” Zillah asked, her head snapping up to attention. Apparently her nap was over. “I will not be left out!”

Ignoring her, Henry lowered his voice. While a set down by Hen and Preston was one thing, Zillah was known to take umbrage for months. Years. Decades.

And while no one would venture a guess as to how long the old girl might have left, knowing Zillah she’d give it her all and last another quarter of a century, if only to make good on a grudge.

“I had a bit of a dustup with the viscount,” he admitted. He didn’t have to say which one.

“You not only crossed the line but you also managed to happen upon him?” Preston said, raking his hand through his hair and beginning to stalk about the room.

“Yes, I fear so,” Henry told him, his gaze following the duke warily.

“What is this?” Zillah demanded, her hand cupped to her ear.

His sister was more than willing to enlighten her, for it hadn’t taken her long to catch up. “Apparently, Henry strayed across the boundary onto Langdale, Auntie.”

Zillah’s eyes widened. And then she let fly. “Lord Henry Arthur George Baldwin Seldon! How could you? There are just three rules we Seldons live by—”

Oh, no, Henry winced. Not the rules.

She held up her bony fingers and ticked them off in order. “A Seldon serves his king. He does his duty by his family. And he never, I mean ever, crosses that line.”

“Yes, right, but it isn’t well marked,” Henry said in his defense, not that any of them were listening.

“What happened?” Preston demanded in a voice that reminded one and all he was the duke.

Henry related Crispin’s demands and Miss Dale’s obstinate refusal to acquiesce.

“I despise that man,” Hen said, shaking her head.

“You made much the same observation about Michaels,” Henry reminded her.

Hen’s nose wrinkled. “At least he wasn’t a Dale.”

“Might as well have been,” Zillah muttered.

They all ignored her, no matter that they agreed.

“What do you think will come of this?” Preston asked.

“Miss Dale believes he will write Damaris Dale.”

All four Seldons shuddered at the mention of that lady’s name.

“How unfortunate burning witches has gone out of fashion,” Zillah said, spitting at the coals in the grate like one would to ward off an evil spirit.

No one argued with her.

Henry weighed his next words carefully. There was still the matter of Mr. Muggins’s indiscretion . . . but perhaps that would be better mentioned after dinner. And after Preston had partaken in a brandy or two.

“Miss Dale believes that once her family is apprised of her whereabouts, someone will be dispatched to bring her home.”

Hen got to her feet. “Are you suggesting her parents are unaware she is here?”

“So it seems.”

His sister sank back down into her chair, white-faced at the very thought of it. “Whyever would she come here against her family’s wishes?”

“Tabitha is her best friend,” Preston said, raising a defense for Miss Dale. For whatever reason, he held a soft spot when it came to this particular Dale, for this wasn’t the first time he’d championed her cause. “I suspect she was willing to set aside tradition to see her best friend married.”

Hen nodded in concession, but Henry held his tongue.

He wasn’t about to voice his own suspicions until he had some concrete proof.

If Daphne Dale was . . . was . . . her . . . his Miss Spooner . . . Henry stilled. No, it couldn’t be true. Even if he’d been all but convinced as much the night of the ball. Yet now he knew that had been a grave mistake, one he didn’t want to repeat.

All he had to do was prove Miss Dale’s uncanny choice of words was mere happenstance.

Like her choice of that blasted red gown.

Or her sudden inexplicable appearance at a Seldon house party.

Henry flinched as the evidence began to mount against him.

Zillah, who’d been nodding again, jerked back awake. “Whyever are we discussing Damaris Dale?”

“Her niece is here,” Hen explained. “Miss Dale. You met her earlier.”

“Dale?” Zillah shook her head. “I thought her name was Hale.” This time she turned her wrath on Preston—a deliverance of sorts for Henry. “Good heavens, young man!” she bleated. “That you have to lower yourself to include Dales just to fill out your house party convinces me you’ve brought this family to the very depths of shame.” She squinted at Preston, then at the others, and then sort of nodded off again.

Much to everyone’s relief.

“How long do we have?” Preston asked quietly, sneaking a glance at their great-aunt to make sure she was still dozing.

“A fortnight at the most, I imagine,” Henry said.

“Unless Crispin Dale decides to come storming over here beforehand, if only to make a scene,” Hen pointed out.

She needn’t sound so pleased with the notion. Then again, there wasn’t anything Hen loved more than a good row.

Hence her disastrous marriage to Lord Michaels.

“Why not just send her packing now?” she continued.

Preston shook his head. “What? And cause more scandal? Besides, Tabitha is over the moon that her ‘dear Daphne’ was allowed to attend. I won’t ruin her happiness.”

“If this disrupts your wedding, you might be of another opinion,” Hen pointed out.

“It won’t,” Henry said, straightening up. Like it or not, until he could prove otherwise, Daphne Dale had become his problem. “I swear I shall see to all this myself.”

“Well, then I suppose there is nothing left to be done,” Hen said, in a way that left her brother and nephew fully advised that she was washing her hands of all of it.

“Nothing to be done?” Zillah exclaimed, waking once more. “The Dales are at our doorstep! Preston, fetch my father’s flintlock. The pistol, not the Brown Bess. I know how to load it.”

And no one doubted that she did.

“Miss Nashe, you’ve made quite the collection of conquests at dinner this evening,” Lady Essex declared. The ladies had all retired to the sitting room to await the gentlemen, who were partaking of their port and cigars.

Dinner had been a lengthy and painful affair as far as Daphne was concerned.

She’d been seated at the far end of the table, wedged between the new vicar, who’d eaten as if he might know something the rest of them were not party to—that this might be the last supper—and Harriet’s brother, Mr. Chaunce Hathaway, who worked doing who-knew-what for the Home Office. It was impossible to determine the particulars because he rarely spoke.

So Daphne had had little to do over the various courses but follow Chaunce’s silent example and study the room.

If anything, it had given her time to clear the peel Lady Essex had rung over her on the dangers and perils of straying so far afield with a gentleman, even if he was a dull stick like Lord Henry Seldon.

Dull stick, indeed, she would have liked to have told the old girl. Try wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Had he truly kissed her like that, or had she imagined it all? It had happened so fast. His lips upon hers, his hands exploring her, leaving a trail of desire that had continued to whisper and tease her every time she’d dared slant a glance in his direction.

How could a kiss from the wrong man—and yes, there were no doubt in her mind that Lord Henry Seldon was entirely the wrong man—have left her feeling so . . . undone? Right down to the soles of her boots.

Thank goodness she’d come to her senses when she had and remembered who and what she was.

Miss Daphne Dale. A proper miss. A sensible lady. In love with another.

Whom you’ve never met. Never kissed . . .

There were more important things than kissing, she’d told herself.

Though, for the life of her, she hadn’t been able to think of one. Not when she looked at Lord Henry.

Which she had done her best not to do. Especially since he’d been seated beside Miss Nashe and making a great show of it—in all his handsome glory, teasing her (and Lord Astbury) for winning the treasure hunt. And when not showering his charms down upon the heiress, he’d been flirting outrageously with Lady Alicia and even sending a few charming sorties out to Lady Clare.

Wretched man! Certainly Mr. Dishforth would never behave in such a rakish manner.

Yet as dinner had progressed, Daphne had realized her search for Mr. Dishforth might not be an easy matter.

However would she discover which of these gentlemen was Dishforth short of standing up and just asking the man to reveal his identity.

Daphne’s fingers had curled around the arms of her chair and she’d been about to push herself to her feet and do just that—demand to know who Mr. Dishforth was—but she’d stopped short when she’d realized Lady Essex had her steady gaze fixed in her direction.

“Bother,” Daphne had muttered as she’d slumped back into her seat, for publicly admitting to such a folly a would be exactly the sort of unladylike display that would have Lady Essex shipping her back to Kempton in irons.

If only she’d been seated beside Lord Astbury. After all, he was, as Tabitha pointed out, the most likely candidate.

He was certainly handsome enough, as Phi avowed the man was. But then again, all around the table were handsome fellows—Captain Bramston and his craggy, rugged features and dark eyes; Lord Rawcliffe, with his aristocratic bearing; Kipps, who was hailed as the most charming and dashing Corinthian who had ever graced a London ballroom; and even Lord Cowley, who was known more for his academic leanings but still had a poet’s bohemian air about him.

All of them fit Phi’s nearsighted description of the elusive Mr. Dishforth. Even worse, Daphne supposed she would also have to include Lord Henry on that list—for he was also handsome.

Too handsome.

Still, it wasn’t as if he could be Dishforth. . . .

But don’t you wish he were, a wry voice had whispered in her ear as she’d recalled that dangerous kiss in the folly.

Thud. Thud Thud. Lady Zillah Seldon pounded her cane to the floor, bringing Daphne’s attentions back to the sitting room. “In my day, I was considered quite the catch, just as you are, Miss Nashe. Best not waste your opportunities. Another Season, gel, and you’ll be on the shelf.”

“My lady, I have no idea what you mean,” Miss Nashe demurred, her fan fluttering delicately even as her eyes narrowed.

Lady Alicia came to her friend’s rescue. “Miss Nashe has a way of stealing the heart of every man in the room. She cannot help it.”

Daphne tamped down the urge to gag. Truly? This is what they taught at the Bath finishing school these two had gone on and on about while at the table?

A Bath school offers a lady a chance to shine above all others, Miss Nashe had said, letting her gaze fall on the ladies who hadn’t had the privilege.

Which had singled out all the guests from Kempton. Save Lady Essex. But then again, Lady Essex had gone to her finishing school in the previous century. And not in Bath, but a perfectly respectable establishment in Tunbridge Wells, not that Daphne would expect Miss Nashe to agree.

“You could hardly miss Lord Henry,” Lady Essex said in her forthright manner. “He was clearly vying for your attentions.”

“Oh, yes, my dear,” Mrs. Nashe enthused. “And the Earl of Kipps couldn’t tear his gaze away from you.”

“You quite held every man’s attention, my dear,” Lady Clare said, a slight pinch to her nose as she said the words.

“They are all such excellent gentlemen,” Miss Nashe preened ever so slightly now that she had the notice of the entire room.

“Most excellent,” Lady Alicia echoed in fervent agreement.

Daphne glanced over to where Harriet and Tabitha stood, and then at the large vase of pink and white roses on the table beside them. Oh, wouldn’t Miss Nashe look so much better with a bit of a soaking?

Harriet glanced at the vase as well and covered her mouth to keep from laughing, while Tabitha gave a slight shake of her head. That would never do, Daphne.

Ever the vicar’s daughter was Tabitha.

But then again, Tabitha had stopped Daphne on more than one occasion from doing much the same thing—dashing something over a lady’s head. Make that most Thursdays, at the Kempton Society meeting, where the horribly well-to-do Miss Anne Fielding was always preening and prancing about Lady Essex’s salon, what with her new hat, or travels to Bath, or the well-appointed carriage her father had promised.

Daphne’s gaze narrowed as she measured this latest incarnation of her old nemesis. Either the room was not lit as well as it should have been, or good heavens, Miss Nashe bore a startling resemblance to Miss Fielding.

It was one of those moments that every lady of modest means and limited connections knew only too well.

When she realizes she is doomed to be surrounded by the Miss Fieldings and Miss Nashes and the rest of their ilk forever.

For there it was. Daphne’s Achilles’ heel. Raised a Dale on stories of her family’s lofty place in society, in England’s history, and yet . . . the Kempton Dales were hardly considered fashionable.

For the most part, they were overlooked and oft-forgotten.

Still, she’d come to London with such grand plans—and a bit of pin money her mother had set aside over the years. With a few new gowns, and the right introductions, she would find her chance to shine bright, to show one and all that she was a Dale worthy of recognition.

But in London she found herself shuttled to one side and then the other as just another girl from the country with no dowry and a lack of good connections.

Nor were her Dale relations much help. Whyever would Great-Aunt Damaris put Daphne forth when there were cousins aplenty with hefty dowries to dangle over Society?

The Daphnes and Phis of the family were left to wrestle for the affections of family leftovers, such as the Right Honorable Mr. Matheus Dale.

And while Daphne had spent most of her years dreaming of a lofty marriage to a man with an equally elevated income, it had taken Tabitha’s engagement to, of all people, the Duke of Preston to make her realize it wasn’t rank or money that made a good marriage.

Just one glance at how Preston looked at Tabitha quite stole one’s breath away.

Then along had come Mr. Dishforth, and Daphne had stopped worrying over her lack of dowry or connections. She could only hope that one day, when they met, he would look at her as if she was his entire world. Never mind that she was only poor Daphne Dale of the Kempton Dales, or that she came with naught but a hundred pounds; he would love her for who she was, who she dreamed of being.

Yet it was nigh on impossible not to feel that familiar stab of jealousy, that niggle of worry that Miss Nashe and her money would steal away the only thing she had left: the pending affections of Mr. Dishforth.

That didn’t seem so much to ask. Just to let her find her Dishforth.

Miss Nashe, now having moved to the very center of the room—for certainly someone in the corner might not be able to see her if she remained sitting on the settee—continued her discussion with Lady Essex on the virtues of the various gentlemen.

“What of Lord Astbury?” Lady Essex asked. “How lucky for you to be paired with him today. And to win so quickly. Why, it was almost as if he couldn’t wait to bring you back.”

Miss Nashe turned slightly and smiled. “The marquess is ever so clever and was most determined to win. For my sake. And of course he was most conscious of my social standing. I believe he could drive to China and back without getting lost.” She shot a speculative glance in Daphne’s direction.

Daphne didn’t rise to the bait.

What was it Harriet always said? Just because someone throws a hook in the water doesn’t mean you have to bite.

Daphne had no intention of paying Miss Nashe any heed, let alone biting at anything she tossed out.

“Such a lovely prize,” Harriet rushed in to say. “A pearl necklace.”

Miss Nashe fingered the strand around her neck. “Yes, quite quaint. Mother insisted I wear it.”

Daphne glanced over at Tabitha, who had chosen the prize. Don’t bite. . .

“Now Lord Astbury can choose whomever he wants for the unmasking ball,” Lady Alicia enthused, having missed the undercurrents around her. She smiled at her friend, confident that Miss Nashe would be that cherished prize.

“But remember, only from the available ladies,” Miss Nashe said with a coy flutter of her fan, implying that she would not be among that group.

And neither will I, Daphne vowed. I’ll find Mr. Dishforth. Tonight if I must. Even if I have to stand up and demand he step forward.

Which she hoped she didn’t have to resort to.

“I find it all so romantic,” Lady Alicia continued. “Especially how Lord Henry and the Earl of Kipps were vying over you at dinner.”

While nearly always the picture of composure, Miss Nashe snapped a dark glance at her dearest bosom friend. One could only assume that Lady Alicia had let spill a confidence: that the heiress had set her cap for one of them.

Lord Henry or the Earl of Kipps.

But like any Bath-educated heiress who hoped to rise quickly in society, Miss Nashe recovered quickly. “I do so prefer a man who is handsome and well turned out.” She paused to make sure everyone was looking at her when she said, “I thought Lord Henry looked quite dashing tonight, while the earl is so . . . so . . . strikingly noble.”

“Most decidedly,” Lady Essex agreed. “If anything, it simply becomes a matter of whether a lady prefers the security of wealth and connections—”

Meaning Lord Henry.

“—or the addition of a coronet to one’s jewel case.”

Which would make the lady the next Countess of Kipps.

Miss Nashe didn’t so much as nod in agreement, but let a sly smile tip at her lips. She had made her decision as to which man she wanted, but she was keeping her choice a closely guarded secret.

Yet given the gleam of avarice in the girl’s eyes, Daphne could make a good guess as to her intentions. To catch the earl’s eye and his hand.

Despite the fact that Kipps had pockets to let—through his own imprudence and recklessness—he was an earl.

Foolish chit. Lord Henry is twice the man Kipps will ever be, Daphne thought, the vehemence of those words resounding through her like the echoes of St. Edwards’s sturdy bell.

Yet what if she does prefer Lord Henry over the Earl of Kipps?

The question prodded at Daphne more than she cared to admit.

And as if to tug at that nagging thread, Harriet and Tabitha joined her on the settee.

“Lord Henry,” Tabitha whispered.

“No, I wager Kipps,” Harriet countered. “As Benedict might say”—referring to her brother in the navy— “half pay will never suit Miss Nashe.”

Meaning a mere second son, with just an honorific title like Lord Henry, was not up to her lofty aspirations.

“What do you think, Daphne?” Tabitha asked, smoothing out her skirt even as the door opened and the gentlemen began to arrive, sending a nervous flutter of fans and whispers through the sitting room.

“I think you should have stricken her from the guest list before the invitations went out,” Daphne said, smiling politely at the heiress across the room.

For the better part of the evening, Henry had done his ingenuous best to discover Miss Spooner’s identity.

And to prove that the lady’s similarities to Miss Dale were a ridiculous coincidence.

However, his search had been for naught.

Lady Alicia had only wanted to discuss Miss Nashe’s charms. Miss Nashe had only wanted to discuss, well, herself. And since he’d known Lady Clare since childhood and knew that she had vowed since her broken engagement several years earlier never to marry, he sincerely doubted she had taken up Miss Spooner’s pen.

He paused for a moment beside the pianoforte and gazed across the room, where Roxley and Miss Hathaway were playing a fierce game of backgammon—something it appeared they had done before, given Roxley’s accusations of “Harry, you always cheat.”

Henry found he rather envied the earl’s easy friendship with the affable, albeit cheating, Miss Hathaway. A far sight more enjoyable than prowling the room in search of a phantom miss.

“I see you’ve settled on your conquest,” came a pert comment from his right.

Henry glanced over and found Miss Dale on the opposite side of the instrument. How had he not seen her standing there before? Yet there she was, in that same red silk gown she’d worn the night of the engagement ball, her blonde hair all piled up atop her head save for a few stray curls that tumbled down.

Tumbled.

He cringed, for suddenly he found himself wary of that word and all its implications. Especially since it carried with it echoing refrains from Zillah’s scold.

That gel looked tumbled when you brought her back. Tumbled, I say!

Looking at Miss Dale now, Henry would argue that the lady always looked slightly undone, from her fluttering lashes to that impossibly tousled hair. She was temptation in all its incarnations.

Worse, everywhere he’d turned this evening, she’d caught his eye, what with the sway of her hip as she walked, the curve of her smile, the rare light in her eyes when she laughed—really laughed, not just the polite noise she’d made for Lord Crowley when he’d recited some nonsense verse he’d written lately.

And now here she was, teasing him from across the pianoforte.

“My what?” he asked.

“Your conquest,” she repeated, then shook her head. “Oh, dear, I forgot who I was talking to. A flirtation. A dalliance, a trifling.” She listed every definition a lady could politely use.

Those words—conquest, flirtation and dalliance—from any other person would have been ridiculous, but from Miss Dale, they seemed to hold a challenge within them. As if she knew of what she spoke.

Which she did. For look how he had behaved earlier. When it had been just the two of them.

Shaking off that memory—one that left his blood thick and throbbing through his body—he instead focused on her accusation.

That he was about to make yet another conquest.

As if he was the only one who’d spent all evening flirting. She ought to look at the wake behind her. Why, she’d dallied with nearly every man in the room, having moved from Kipps to Bramston, then Astbury, and even Crowley. Taking turns around the room with them, laughing at their jokes, fluttering her lashes at them, her gloved hand atop their sleeves, then moving to her next conquest.

And he was about to point out her expertise on the subject, but she was already nattering on.

“—I don’t suppose she is the dallying type, though she rather seems your sort.”

“My sort?” Henry’s gaze followed hers toward the trio of ladies by the window.

Of course, there sat Lady Alicia, Lady Clare and Miss Nashe—the trio he’d spent the night dancing attendance upon.

Henry decided the best course of action was one of innocence. “Whoever do you mean?”

“Why, Miss Nashe, of course,” she said, tipping her head as she took another examining look at the heiress.

“Whatever does that mean? My sort, indeed,” he puffed before he remembered what he’d said about Crispin Dale earlier.

Not that Miss Dale was going to let him forget as she turned his own sword on him, making a perfectly timed thrust into his chest. She leaned closer as she made her move. “Overdressed. Vain. Wealthy.”

He had the feeling she’d left out a few. Given the arch of her fair brow, he had to imagine that “overreaching mushroom” was a possibility.

Henry knew Miss Nashe was exactly the “sort” a second son like himself sought for a bride—wealthy, gracious and lovely, beloved by the society columns—but there was one impossible hurdle that not even her dowry could tempt him to leap.

The girl herself.

Still, he feigned surprise. “Miss Nashe? You think her vain?”

“You don’t?” Miss Dale’s nose wrinkled. “Why, look at her! Even now she is regaling poor Lady Clare and Lady Alicia with tales of her social prowess.”

Given the set of Lady Clare’s jaw, Miss Dale was probably correct, but Henry wasn’t going to admit such a thing. Instead, he asked, “However can you hear what is being said? They are all the way across the room.”

Miss Dale’s chin rose. “I have a talent for these things.”

Of course she did.

“You do?” he asked against his better judgment.

“Yes, watch,” she said, glancing over at the trio. The next time Miss Nashe opened her mouth, Miss Dale supplied the words.

“Oh, the expectations placed on one when one is mentioned daily in the social columns are exhausting.”

Henry coughed on the fit of laughter that nearly choked him. “She would never say such a thing,” he argued as he tried to compose himself.

“No, no,” Miss Dale told him. “She isn’t finished. Listen—”

Then modulating her tones and clipping her words, she matched Miss Nashe’s overly educated enunciation perfectly.

“Yet I endeavor to provide proper and edifying on dits so as to inspire the lesser of my peers to learn from my grace and status. It is my gift to Society.”

And demmed if Miss Nashe didn’t finish and smile at the end of Miss Dale’s lines, as if indeed she was conveying such a condescending speech to her audience.

Henry snorted back another fit of laughter and turned his back to the trio, for it was devilishly hard to look at Miss Nashe and not hear Miss Dale’s recitation.

Meanwhile, his impish companion grinned with wicked delight. “I told you.”

Henry had to admit that the one thing he rather liked about Miss Dale was the fact that she didn’t suffer from a lack of straightforward honesty. And so he replied in kind. “She is rather impressed with herself.”

Miss Dale covered her mouth to keep from laughing aloud. “What a terrible thing to say, Lord Henry.”

“You started it,” he shot back. “But I confess that after listening to her go on for half an hour as to how she’d modernize Owle Park if she were Tabitha—”

Daphne’s eyes widened with outrage. “Change this house? Whatever for?”

Her annoyance echoed his own. He tipped his head closer. “Apparently it is not the first stare of fashion.”

Miss Dale clucked her tongue. “It isn’t supposed to be. It is a family home.” And she didn’t stop there. “Owle Park is delightful. Rather surprising, actually.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it isn’t what I expected,” she said, glancing away, a bit of a blush on her cheeks.

“What did you think you would find, Miss Dale? Remnants of the Hell Fire Club in the dining room? Stray virgins lolling about awaiting pagan sacrifice?” The color on her cheeks confirmed just that. Henry laughed. “You did, didn’t you?”

“It is just that one hears such tales, and then one supposes . . .”

“Disappointed?”

She paused for a moment and then glanced up at him, a twinkle in her eyes. “Slightly.”

They both laughed, and it seemed the entire room stilled and looked over at them.

Henry stepped away from Miss Dale, probably a bit too quickly, for it made him look guilty . . . of something.

Not that he had anything to feel guilty about. And yet there was Zillah, her dark eyes blazing with accusations. Not again, you foolish boy!

He edged a little farther away from Miss Dale before his proximity prompted his great-aunt to come over and give the entire room a recitation of the Seldon family rules.

With nothing of note happening around the pianoforte, the other guests finally went back to their previous pursuits. All too soon, the din of quiet discussions, exclamations from well-played hands, and Roxley’s occasional expletive followed by a “Harry, one of these days I’ll catch you cheating,” left Henry to draw a sigh of relief.

As if he’d lucked out this time. Better than earlier, when he’d gained an earful.

He glanced over at Miss Dale. “You weren’t in too much trouble, earlier that is, were you?” he asked quietly.

“A bit,” she said with a sigh. “And you?”

“Oh, yes.” He had her attention now.

“Rang a peel?”

“Quite.”

She nodded in understanding, then lowered her voice. “They don’t know about—”

She had no need to say the rest . . . the kiss.

“No!” he shot back. “You didn’t mention—”

Miss Dale shook her head slightly. “No.”

“Best forgotten,” he advised, though he knew it would be some time before he could. Forget, that is.

“Yes, precisely,” she agreed, rocking on her heels.

“Terrible mistake.”

“Exactly,” she shot back.

Rather quickly, he noted. Too quickly.

Did she have to agree that fast?

When he looked back at her, he found her studying Miss Nashe once again.

“Are you supplying more lines for the drama over there?” he asked.

“No,” she said with a slight shake of her head. However, the tip of her lips said quite another.

Henry shot her a wry glance.

“Well, perhaps,” she admitted.

“You are a devilish minx, Miss Dale.”

“You disapprove?”

Henry sighed. “Sadly, not in the least.”

Once again, their eyes met, and it wasn’t just their gazes that entangled. It was something altogether more dangerous.

Henry’s blood came rushing through his veins as he remembered how it had felt to take her in his arms, kiss her madly, passionately. For no other reason than she thought him a rake.

And given the light in her eyes, she still thought him one.

Then she bit her bottom lip and tugged her glance away. “We need to stay apart,” she reminded him.

Henry glanced up and around the room, feigning disinterest. “Yes, I suppose we must.”

“Need I remind you, I am nearly engaged elsewhere—”

“Yes, your most excellent gentleman,” Henry mused.

“Yes, him.” She stole a nervous glance around the room, and suddenly an entirely new possibility occurred to Henry.

The answer to the Gordian knot in his life: Why the devil was Miss Dale here at Owle Park?

Actually, he’d never quite believed her declaration of having a betrothed. Or a nearly betrothed, whatever that nonsense meant.

But now . . .

Henry turned to her, a wide grin turning his lips. He had his answer. He’d bet his fortune on it.

“He’s here, isn’t he?”

Daphne’s heart nearly stopped.

Lord Henry had not just asked that question.

“Well, is he or isn’t he here?” the man pressed.

Yes, apparently he had.

Daphne wasn’t a member of the Society for the Temperance and Improvement of Kempton for nothing. For when not gathering baskets for the poor spinsters in the village or planting flowers in the graveyard, they also practiced deportment at Lady Essex’s urging.

Therefore Daphne could give even a Bath-educated lady like Miss Nashe a run for her money when it came to being utterly composed.

Even when one felt like running in a blind panic.

She straightened and collected herself as best she could. If only she could still her hammering heart. “I am not discussing him with you.”

He leaned in, indecently close, like the wolf that he was. “Whyever not?”

The nearer he got, the more Daphne’s resolve and composure began to waver. Bay rum and a hint of port invaded her senses. It was like being surrounded by his coat all over again. Yet this wasn’t just a greatcoat enfolding her but the man himself.

The one who’d kissed her breathless. Touched her until she’d trembled. Ignited a fire in her once temperate heart.

Oh, but she was too close to finding her perfect happiness to let Lord Henry Seldon ruin everything. For that is what Seldons were unsurpassed at: ruin.

“My affairs are none of your business,” she told him as tartly as Lady Essex did when she scolded her nephew, Lord Roxley. Adding to this, she folded her arms over her chest to show him just how firm she was in her resolve.

And not, as one might think, to ward him off from breaching what little control she could still claim.

Unfortunately, her tone had no effect on the man. Her words, on the other hand . . . they seemed to urge him on.

“So it is an affair—” he said, his eyes sparking with mischievous delight.

“Not in the way you would assume,” she told him. “Ours is a coming together of the mind and the heart. Far outside of the realm of your base encounters.”

“Is that what we shared earlier, a ‘base encounter’?” he asked.

Daphne shook with anger. “I told you, I am not discussing that.”

He glanced down at the music rack, absently thumbing through the sheets. “I suppose there really isn’t much to discuss now, is there?”

She sucked in a deep breath, trying to hold back the scathing remark that so wanted to come bursting out.

“So tell me this, Miss Dale,” he continued, edging still ever closer, his hand sliding along the top of the pianoforte until it was nearly around her hip, “why aren’t you at his side right this moment?” He looked around the room as if he was trying to imagine where she rightly belonged, even as he took another step toward her.

“Whatever are you doing?” she asked, for he had her trapped, cornered in every sense of the word.

“Testing a theory.” He took another step, leaving naught but a whisper between them.

In front of the entire party? Good heavens, could he now see how this looked?

“We agreed to keep our distance,” she reminded him.

“Yes, I suppose we did,” he conceded, but that didn’t stop him from leaning in, his hips nearly against hers, the wall of his chest but a sliver away from her breasts.

Daphne tried to breathe, but he was ever so close, ever around her. She couldn’t breathe without drawing him in, couldn’t move without touching him.

Didn’t dare look up at him, for then it would be too much like those reckless, dangerous moments in the folly.

Too close to deny that she desired his kiss. With all her heart.

Whatever was wrong with her? It was Dishforth who should ignite such a fire inside her, not Lord Henry. Never Lord Henry.

Oh, Mr. Dishforth, where are you?

“My lord,” she managed, daring to look up at him, “I hardly think this . . . this . . . is keeping our distance.”

He grinned. “Miss Dale, you have two choices: go and seek your perfect gentleman”—he nodded toward the crowded room—“or better yet, let’s see if he shares your opinion of me and will rescue you from my nefarious attentions.”

And with that, Lord Henry dipped his head down as if he was about to steal a kiss.

Right there. In front of everyone.

His breath teased over her ear, sending a clarion cry through her. He was going to ruin her.

Let him.

Daphne panicked. At least that is what she vowed later to Lady Essex and Harriet and Tabitha.

She put her hands on his chest, an attempt to push the loathsome beast away, but the moment her fingers splayed across his jacket, she found herself entwined by the same magic that had wound around them at the folly.

Indeed, it was a dangerous kind of folly that Daphne and Lord Henry soon found themselves in.

Especially when Lady Zillah Seldon chose that moment to wake up a bit and take stock of what was happening around her.