Page 25

Click.

A moment later, the person on the other side of that panel let himself in, and then came the muttering in a voice thatwasfamiliar, but it decidedly did not belong to the man who’d been a father to her these past years.

Carefully pushing herself up, Marcia peeked over the edge of the sofa and looked at the man who’d invaded her father’s offices.

Several inches past six feet, and possessed of chiseled cheeks devoid of the facial hair favored by dandies, and Viking gold hair that brushed his shoulders, she’d recognize the gentleman anywhere.

Dressed in a midnight-black jacket and a pair of matching black trousers, with the only white on his body his perfectly tied snowy-white cravat, he could have been a nighttime pickpocket.

As he snooped around her father’s desk, moving methodically and determinedly, it occurred to Marcia that she wasn’t entirely off the mark in her assessment of him being a nighttime thief of sorts.

Quitting his spot at the sideboard, Andrew seated himself at the edge of the throne-like leather chair behind her father’s desk.

He proceeded to tug out drawer after drawer, rustling through each and then closing it with a click when his search turned up empty.

And as he did, Marcia observed him unnoticed.

Coming to his feet, Andrew dropped his hands on his narrow hips and did a circular sweep of the space. “Where in blazes is it?”

It was so very reminiscent of a time long ago—when she’d been a girl, and he’d been a young man on a similar hunt—and if she’d still been capable of smiling, this would have been a moment for it.

How much simpler those times had been. Back when she’d believed the lies about her parents and believed her life to be different… than what it was.

“You won’t find any,” she called over, and Andrew turned slowly. Marcia reclaimed her seat upon the floor and looked back towards the dancing flames.

Andrew hesitated. “Hullo.”

She felt in his words, or rather, in that single word, a reluctant greeting.

The notoriously jovial, boisterous Viscount Waters had suddenly gone quiet, without his normal free fall of charming words and jests… or anything at all.

Alas, such was the way all behaved around her now.

“Hullo,” she returned.

There was more of that interminable hesitancy, and Andrew cleared his throat loudly. “Shouldn’t you be at the ball?”

“Shouldn’tyou?” she shot back.

“Fair enough,” he allowed, and she braced… waited and prayed for him to leave.

Though he wasn’t incorrect in his questioning. For Marciashouldbe there. That was, after all, the entire purpose of this evening. Because her family had decided it was best for them to put on a brave show, to show the world that they were unashamed and that her family and their friends were proud of Marcia, and that, for all the words that had been written and truths revealed, they had the support of many.

At least that was what she’d been able to make out of the muffled discourse amongst her parents; her godparents, the Duke and Duchess of Crawford; and the most unlikely of her father’s friends, the menacing figure of the Marquess of Rutland, along with his wife, Lady Phoebe, a couple whose relationship she’d never been able to quite make sense of.

Grimacing at that reminder of all she’d heard discussed between her parents’ most powerful friends, Marcia raised her glass of spirits to her lips and took a sip of the warm, bubbly brew she’d been drinking before her friends had arrived with that silly bauble.

This was the first time she’d ever had the stuff.

At all prior engagements, she’d always been forced to partake in too warm lemonade and ratafia.

What other wonderful things were they keeping from ladies?

The floorboards groaned slightly, indicating Andrew had moved.

She looked up to find him towering over her.

He nudged his chin at the spot beside Marcia. “May I join you?”