Page 120 of A Scot Is Not Enough

The countess’s sherry-colored eyes razored him. “We’ve met before, you and I.”

“We have. When you visited the Duke of Newcastle’s office last spring.”

His hand slid to Cecelia’s elbow. Did he think she would pounce on the woman? In a ball of all places?

“Yes, I do recall.” Lady Denton cocked her head, her pearl-drop earbobs dancing prettily.

Alexander kept a gentle touch on Cecelia’s elbow while he and the countess engaged in topics of politics and commerce. It gave Cecelia a chance to thaw her glacial shock. What was the countess about? The lady walked safely in her world, commanding it, some might say, and she’d ordered her man, Mr.Wortley, to warn her off. Yet this little ballroom meeting smacked of a cat batting a mouse before sinking its claws in deep.

Lady Denton pointed her closed fan like a scepter at Cecelia’s hem.

“Are you wearing a clan tartan?”

Cecelia looked down. Her apron flapped over itself, revealing her petticoat. Dancing must’ve disturbed her costume.

She shook the apron back into place. “No. A tartan is wool, my lady. My costume is silk. An important difference.”

The lady’s suspicious gaze climbed up and down her. “What exactly is your costume?”

Alexander’s grip firmed on her elbow.Play nice with the greedy countesswas his message. He was cautious to the bone.

She was not.

“I am Betty Burke.”

Seconds dripped, measured by Lady Denton’s face, sharp and still as a viper before it strikes. Cecelia could’ve said she was a chambermaid but... temptation.

“Well,” she said brightly. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m off to find more curiosities.”

She curtseyed. The countess snapped open her fan, her gaze on the black ribbon around Cecelia’s neck.

Cecelia pushed through the ballroom’s crush to find more crowds in the cavernous entry. The floor and walls were blinding white, the chandeliers a squint-worthy brightness. Tables of manuscripts and books had been set here. Swynford House was crammed to the gills and a clock above a man costumed in foreign robes said the time was quarter to ten.

Heat pricked under her arms. Fifteen minutes to snatch thesgian-dubh.

The always punctual Mary would already be waiting for her at the ladies’ retiring room window.

Head high, she swept into the pink library. The sign outside the door saidRelics of Magic and War. Twenty to thirty merrymakers milled about the room, footmen bearing champagne trays among them. She took a glass and sipped. Champagne burned her dry throat. Her feet sunk into plush gray carpet as she walked. The end of the room was quieter. Books lined circular shelves, their gold-embossed spines glinting wealth.

The paunchy pirate, his glass eye ring pressed close, bent over the last table.

“One man,” she said under her breath.

She’d drop her glass, create a diversion, and slip thesgian-dubhinto her petticoat pocket. Before the footman came to clean up the mess, she’d ask the gentleman pirate about the Roman gladius which supposedly had been cursed by a druid.

Ancient iron, glass, and stone pieces rested on vermillion tablecloths. The starched red clashed with the marquess’s gentle pink walls. She checked a clock on the wall behind the paunchy pirate. Ten minutes to steal thesgian-dubh.

She swallowed sandy dryness in her mouth, careful not to look too interested in the table.

“We meet again, sir,” she said cheerfully.

The pirate blinked, his one eye owlish behind the eyeglass ring.

“Yes, yes. We spoke at the Guinea butterfly.” Helowered the eyeglass ring. “Capital event, wouldn’t you say?”

“Indeed, it is. The dancing, the curiosities... all wonderful and quite fascinating.”

He smiled, displaying a gap between his front teeth. “Is this your first time in the Relic Room?”