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Something told him he had never done this in his life—served a crowd of people, donned borrowed livery in a rich man’s house.

He vowed he’d never do it again, when one too many of the self-important gentleman ignored him as if he were furniture, simply a man-shaped sideboard holding his beverage, and one too many of the women managed to run a gloved hand along his arse or thigh.

He clenched his teeth and looked unaffected.

But he swore, deep down, that when he went back to his former life, he would never again treat someone in his employ like a furnishing.

He would never demean a man for honest labor, even if it were shoveling shit.

And he would never, under any circumstances, lay hands on a woman unless she had unambiguously specified he might do so.

“Aren’t you tired yet?” he asked Gwen when he found her in the servery as he went to refresh his platter of glasses.

The evening was well-advanced, the revelry growing louder as the guests imbibed.

They were a free-spirited group to begin with, most of them military men and their wives, friends of Sir Mark and his daughter’s bridegroom.

Major James Blackwell had served in India and recently married Miss Maria, daughter to Sir Mark by a local woman who had been his Indian wife during his time with the Bengal engineers in Calcutta, and the union was new enough to still provide grounds for celebration.

Pen sensed that in certain English circles, high sticklers would look down on a match with a wife who was not British, not legitimate, and only half-white, but this group regarded the new Mrs. Blackwell with admiration for her beauty and her established situation, for it was said her father had settled three thousand pounds on her at her marriage.

The musicians carried on, but Gwen had been instructed to fetch refreshments, for the others, a viol and a cello player, were men, and she was expected to serve them.

Pen gauged by the shadows under her eyes and the red marks on her fingers that she was weary and her hands growing sore, but her sweet smile at him, her eyes heavy-lidded, brought the memory of their kiss in the bluebells leaping to life.

“It’s a pleasant group. Sir Mark intends to pay well, and I like the house.”

Pen set aside the platter he held and the one she’d taken up. The music continued, and he held out his arm in the form a country dance. He remembered how to dance, at least.

“You should be mistress of a house of your own, one as grand as this,” he said. “With a husband who adores you, as Mrs. Blackwell’s husband dotes on her.”

She paused a moment, watching him with wide, wary eyes that color of a forest’s heart.

Some inner struggle took place, and he held his breath, hoping that he would win.

That this pull between them, this cautious new trust—and, yes, the heavy current of desire—would draw her to him more than whatever cautions held her back.

Then she laughed and lifted her hand to his, and the tight fear in his chest broke and fell free.

She moved with him, beginning the simple figure, turning one way while he turned the other, his bow to her curtsey.

They turned again, hands touching, and her hip brushed his leg.

The confines of the servery pressed them close, and her heat, her scent, her intoxicating touch wrapped around him as they went through the familiar steps.

“I, too, thought I would have those things once,” she said, and her voice held an odd, strained note. Her eyes moved over his face. “But I am certain you will. Have a grand house, that is, and an adoring wife.”

He hadn’t wanted a wife before. But he did now. He knew that with an utter, profound clarity. It stilled him mid-figure.

She paused, too, following his lead. He stared into her eyes, caught by how perfectly in tune she was with him.

Against his will, against all wisdom, his head lowered.

He oughtn’t kiss her here. It was too easy to be surprised.

It was already enough that they should be dancing; a kiss would end whatever reputation she had, were they caught by someone who wouldn’t turn a blind eye.

He feared the Pen of before had never been the kind to consider a woman’s reputation; he did so now.

But he could no more resist trying to kiss her than he could keep the sun from rising in the east.

She was wiser. She stepped away, her eyes dark with desire—he was gratified to see it—but something else. Her expression looked as if she were torn in two.

“Gwen,” he said, his voice rasping from a dry throat. “Would you ever consider if?—”

“I cannot,” she said. She caught up a tray of glasses as if she were an embattled knight and he the dragon on the attack. “I must—they’ll be looking for me.”

And she was gone, leaving the imprint of her on his hand, and his heart.

She knew what he’d meant to say. Something he had never offered any woman, never thought he would want to offer a woman. What he wanted to spread before her like the lavish courses set upon that glittering table, his heart laid out and ready for carving.

And she didn’t want him in return.