“Do you know who?” she asked, calming his sudden worry.
“He hasn’t said. Most likely keeping the matter under his hat until he’s certain. Your brother is a dark horse. Ah, there’s Fergus.” Thomas nodded to Lord Fergus sitting with his rather plain-faced wife. Behind them sat their two daughters, also, alas, plain-faced. “He’s in the naval department,” he murmured sotto voce as he pulled the bays alongside the Fergus carriage.
And then he was proud, for Lady Hero graciously nodded at the introduction of the ladies and then complimented Lady Fergus on her bonnet, prompting the lady’s sallow complexion to turn pink. The two girls leaned slightly forward, and all four were soon in animated discussion.
“A good match, Mandeville,” Fergus rumbled after they’d discussed the latest Lords scandal. “You’re a lucky man.”
“Indeed, indeed,” Thomas murmured.
His recent ridiculous doubts fled. Lady Hero was above all a calm and demure creature, not given to the type of awful drama Anne often acted out.
Fergus nattered on for another ten minutes—the man was prone to be didactic—and then they made their farewells.
Thomas took up the reins again. “I hope you didn’t find talking to Lady Fergus and her daughters too boring.”
“Not at all,” Lady Hero replied. “They were quite nice. Besides, I know how important these kinds of little meetings are for you and your career, Mandeville. I want to do everything I can to aid you.”
He smiled. “I keep forgetting that your perception rivals your beauty, my lady. I am indeed a lucky man.”
“You flatter me.”
“Don’t all ladies wish to be flattered?”
She didn’t answer and he glanced her way. Lady Hero’s face was in profile as she looked fixedly to the side. He followed her gaze and felt as if he’d been struck in the belly.
Lavinia Tate was two carriages over, laughing up into the face of that Samuel fellow who’d escorted her to Harte’s Folly. She wore a quilted jacket the color of spring poppies, and the sunlight glinted off her damnably bright red hair. If any man in Hyde Park hadn’t noticed her yet, it was because he was dead.
Or a fool.
“Who is she to you?” Lady Hero asked quietly.
“No one,” Thomas said through stiff lips.
“Yet you stare at her as if she’s someone very important indeed.”
“What?” He tore his eyes from the sight of Lavinia and looked at his fiancée, her face too pale, her hair merely a tasteful, natural shade of light copper. She was a watercolor next to Lavinia’s vivid oil. “She’s… someone I once knew.”
“You no longer know her?” Lady Hero tilted her head in gentle inquiry.
Lavinia’s laugh floated on the autumn breeze.
Thomas wanted suddenly to shout at Lady Hero, to make that gentle expression fall from her face, to shake her until she quit her questions and her perceptive looks, and then he wanted to jump from the carriage and plant a facer in that stupid young buck with Lavinia.
But he did none of that, of course. Gentlemen of his rank never acted in such a way. Instead, he merely urged the horses on, waiting interminably to pass Lavinia’s carriage.
“She’s in my past,” he said through cold lips. “I met her when I was rather down, I’m afraid.”
He remembered when he was the man who she laughed up at, the way it had made his chest swell. And he remembered the sight of her in the morning light, so carnal, so wise. He’d been able to see every single line in her face, the slight sag to her breasts, and strangely it hadn’t made a whit of difference. She’d been the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.
Would ever see.
He cleared his throat. “That’s in the past now. We’ll not talk of it.”
She sighed beside him, the sound sad and somehow lonely. “Perhaps you’re right. It’s best to put aside what might have come before. Our future together should be what we focus on.”
She laid a gloved hand on his elbow, slim and comfortable. “We’ll make an admirable pair, you and I, Thomas.”
He was able to summon a smile to give her. “Yes. Yes, we will.”
And then they were finally past Lavinia Tate.
WESLEY WAS PUTTING the finishing touches on Hero’s toilet the next morning when Phoebe burst in the room.
“You’ll never guess!”
Hero started to open her mouth to ask what she’d never guess, but Phoebe continued in a rush. “Lord Griffin and Lady Margaret have called and asked to take us shopping!”
For a split second, Hero’s heart leaped at the thought of him. But then her practical side asserted itself.
“Oh, my dear.” Hero winced at the excited look on Phoebe’s face. Her entire countenance seemed to glow. “You know that Bathilda doesn’t want me to be seen with Reading. And after bringing him back to luncheon the other day…”
The light went out in Phoebe’s face. “But I cannot go alone with them.”
No, she certainly couldn’t, and Reading was well aware of the fact, Hero thought grimly.
“Please, Hero?”
Hero closed her eyes.
But that didn’t shut out Phoebe’s voice. “Pleeease?”
Hero’s eyes snapped open. “Fine. But only for an hour or so, no more.”
She needn’t have bothered with caveats—Phoebe was already hopping up and down with excitement.
Hero sighed, knowing already that this was a very bad idea. Still, she had to struggle to contain a smile as she descended the stairs after Phoebe.
Reading waited below, looking quite respectable in a dark blue coat and breeches. He smiled as Phoebe bounced up to him, but his eyes were on Hero.
She fought not to blush.
“I’m glad you could join us, Lady Hero,” he said as he escorted them out the door.
She shot him a sharp glance, watching for irony, but he seemed perfectly serious. “Where is your sister?”
His eyes widened mockingly at her. “In the carriage.”
And indeed when they entered the carriage, there was Lady Margaret already waiting.
“Oh, I’m so glad you could come on such short notice!” she exclaimed as they settled on the cushions. “I feel we ought to get to know one another since you’re marrying my brother.”
“Of course,” Hero murmured. “We’ll soon be sisters, won’t we?”
Reading’s face went blank as he turned to the window.