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Leaving her brother to charm Miss Whoeverthathadbeen—her exact name had already slipped Evelyn’s mind—she wandered across the ballroom without paying much heed to where she was going.

Which was unfortunate.

“Oi!”

“Watch where you’re going, woman!”

“Careful—ouch!”

Evelyn ignored them, whoever they were, and found herself standing right before the woman whose features were so striking.

Now, she had to approach this carefully. Few people, it had turned out over the last year, appreciated being requested to sit as a model for her. It was most disappointing, for Evelyn considered it one of the highest compliments she could give.

So, what was the best way to go about it?

“Yes?” the woman said archly as Evelyn stood before her in mute silence.

Evelyn tried to smile, the words she was thinking spilling out before she could stop them. “I would greatly like to touch your forehead.”

The woman blinked. “I… I beg your pardon?”

Blast . It was a word Evelyn was forbidden from saying out loud, her father having tired of it after Evelyn had heard her brother use it and decided it was a most excellent word, but he could not stop her from saying it inside her own head.

Blast, blast, blast—

“I said, I would greatly like to sketch your beautiful face,” Evelyn attempted with a smile. “I-I am an artist and—”

“I do not permit strange women to sketch me. I have been painted by the great George Hayter,” the woman said proudly. “I do not sit for amateurs.”

Evelyn’s stomach twisted painfully as her pride was prickled. “I am not an amateur!”

“You are a lady. You cannot be a true artiste,” the woman said dismissively. “Go away.”

“Go away”?

Evelyn knew the precise shade of pink her cheeks were turning. She had examined herself once in a looking glass; she had roped in her brother and sister to offend her in degrees so she could see the different hues her cheeks became.

This was a level three. Someone had deeply offended my character, nearing vermillion red.

Most unacceptable.

“But I—”

The woman walked away, leaving a small crowd of gawking wedding guests.

Ah . Evelyn tried to smile. Yes, she had not been particularly quiet in that conversation. Blast.

Well, in for a penny…

“And what about you, sir?” Evelyn asked brightly, as though the back of her eyes weren’t stinging with the sudden awareness that more and more people were staring, and there was nothing she could do to stop them. “Would you ever consider sitting for me, as a model?”

The broad-shouldered gentleman’s lip curled. “And who are you?”

Her throat was drying. “Lady Evelyn Chance. And you are?”

“Well-bred enough to know we cannot speak without an introduction.” The man’s lip curled even more. “I never would have thought a Chance would need telling that, even with the family’s well-known… eccentricities.”

Evelyn’s throat was now a desert, her tongue attempting to tie itself in a knot. The gentleman stalked away, glancing over his shoulder as though he had been mortally offended. The two ladies who had been with him followed him toward the dining room.

Take a deep, calming breath , Evelyn told herself firmly. It was a slight faux pas. No one had noticed. No one would even think to mention it to her—

“I will have to speak to your father about this, young lady,” came a stern, genteel voice that Evelyn knew well.

Trying to keep her face bright, Evelyn turned. “Lady Romeril.”

Evelyn sank into a low curtsey—far lower than she would offer the Queen of England. Not that she was likely to ever meet Victoria.

“Hmm,” said Lady Romeril.

When Evelyn rose, it was to look in the eyes of one of the most important women in Society. Not particularly wealthy, not particularly well-born, or so the rumors said, but a woman with prodigious power.

A stern look from Lady Romeril was sufficient to end one’s chances at marriage. An approving look from Lady Romeril was to make a genteel person infinitely more acceptable to be included on invitation lists.

And when Lady Romeril made that particular noise at you… Well. Evelyn knew it could go either way.

“I was merely requesting—” Evelyn began meekly.

“I know precisely what you were doing,” interrupted Lady Romeril with an imperious look. “You are starting to get a reputation for asking that particular question, girl. I am not so certain your father would want you getting a reputation of any kind.”

He most certainly would not. Not merely because the Chances were among those of the utmost of importance to Society, but because he had expressly forbidden her from doing the one thing her heart most desired: exhibiting her work.

“No daughter of mine is going to debase herself to the judgment of others!”

Evelyn knew it was foolish but could not help herself. The dancing behind her, the joy of the day, the champagne in her veins… “Better that you remember me at all, Lady Romeril. There are so many young ladies in Society these days, I would like to be at least a little memorable.”

The older woman, gray hair piled up on her head and a feathered fan fluttering before her, remained silent. Her lip twitched.

Pressing home the very little advantage Evelyn had somehow managed to find, she said, “And if you would ever consider gracing my studio, Lady Romeril, I would be honored to paint you.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, girl,” Lady Romeril said sharply. “If I want to be painted, I will find myself a great name to commission and bestow that honor to him.”

Him . Evelyn tried not to let her pique show on her face.

It was always a him. She had tried telling anyone in Society who would listen that a hand of any gender could hold a brush equally well, but no, it had to be a male artist who was respected. God forbid a woman show any scrap of talent.

“Besides,” added Lady Romeril, somehow peering down her nose at Evelyn who was a full inch taller, “it is not very ladylike to ask people to sit for you. Model, I mean.”

“I quite agree, Lady Romeril,” said Evelyn quietly. “But it is very artist-like.”

She had said the wrong thing. That was the trouble with Lady Romeril; you never could tell whether your bold words would be approved or loathed.

The older woman swelled, her disgruntled expression becoming clearer with every passing second, and Evelyn braced herself for the very public lecture she was about to receive, likely at high volume.

“Well! I have never —”

“Ah, there you are, dear—thank you, Lady Romeril, for keeping an eye on her—come on, Evelyn,” her father said in a rush as he suddenly appeared at Evelyn’s side.

“Have to run, such a shame—hello Lady Romeril goodbye Lady Romeril,” said her mother at Evelyn’s other side.

Both of her parents had grabbed a hold of an elbow before Evelyn could stop them, pulling her away from Lady Romeril and the rest of the wedding guests who had clustered round them to witness the lecture.

“Honestly!”

That was her mother. Evelyn tried to keep her face entirely rigid, not revealing exactly how mortifying it was to be carefully moved through Uncle John and Aunt Florence’s home like a duckling, but it was very difficult.

When her parents finally came to a stop in the cavernous hall, Evelyn wrenched herself free and glared.

“Honestly!” The Earl of Lindow was graying around the temples but that did not take away from the power of his presence. “Evelyn Chance, what have we said about asking people to model for you?”

This is most galling , Evelyn thought as she rubbed at where her father’s hands had grasped her.

Here she was, spending almost the entirety of Cousin Lilianna’s wedding attempting to prevent her family from embarrassing themselves—her father with his handkerchiefs, her sister with her prison abolitionist nonsense, her brother’s desperation around anything in the female form that moved, and her mother’s inexplicable desire to calculate the likelihood of Cousin Lilianna’s death…

And she was the one being castigated for being outrageous!

“All I asked,” she began, “was—”

“We know what you asked. It’s what you always ask,” her mother said, cutting across her. “There is a one-hundred percent incidence rate for over two years.”

Both Evelyn and her father stared.

Lady Lindow rolled her eyes. “Honestly, have I taught you two nothing? I mean, since January the first of 1838, there has not been a day gone by that Evelyn has not asked someone to be her model. Most of them not family, too.”

Evelyn’s lips parted in astonishment. “Truly? Every single day?”

It certainly felt that way, but she presumed that her mother was being silly. Perhaps not.

“You must not embarrass us any further,” her father was saying. “Asking people right to their faces to model for you—really!”

A hot, sticky, prickling sensation was curling around Evelyn’s spine, making her want to curl in on herself and never move again.

She was the embarrassment? She was? Her father had made two of her handkerchiefs so soggy, she had abandoned them in the church—and she was the one bringing shame upon the family?

“But—But I am an artist,” she said desperately. “It is vital that I continue to challenge myself, continue to try to draw different people.”

“You can practice on your brother and sister,” the earl said firmly.

“I have drawn them before,” Evelyn said before she could stop herself. “I’ll never improve if I don’t diversify the subjects of my art.”

“And what need you to improve?” shot back her father. “It is not as though you will ever exhibit. I have been most clear on that.”

She should have stopped herself. She could see the flicker of a pulse in her father’s temple, a sure sign he was approaching his limit, but it was just so unfair.

Percy and Lucy—they had hardly wanted to be painted at all, and when they had been a few years younger and none of them had been out in Society, it had been all Evelyn could do to convince them to stay still long enough for her to attempt a painting.

Now she and Lucy were out, as Chances did not believe in waiting for the elder sister to marry before the younger could join her, and Percy was at his club half the time, and besides, she had already drawn them.

She needed a new challenge, a new opportunity to test her skills.

To ensure she continued to learn, and grow, and develop.

To become a better artist.

Evelyn blinked. Somehow, she had left her parents alone in the conversation for five minutes, and now they were bickering.

“I don’t see why I should stop!”

“Because the odds are that—”

“Oh, you and your odds!” Her father threw up his hands.

Evelyn stifled a smile. She could not be sure, not having been born at the time, but her Aunt Alice had once told her that her parents’ courting had been a rather argumentative affair. That, she could certainly believe.

“You are most infuriating, you know that?” shot back Lady Lindow, striding up to her husband and halting about an inch from his nose.

“And you,” her husband said triumphantly, “are delicious.”

“Oh, no,” Evelyn said, far too late.

They were doing it again. Kissing. And in public!

“Honestly,” she said weakly. When this had little to no effect, other than her father’s hands now wrapped around her mother’s waist and slipping lower, Evelyn averted her eyes and said loudly, “We are at Cousin Lilianna’s wedding reception!”

Her parents broke apart. Her mother had a satisfied grin on her face, her lips a dark pink, and her father looked dazed, as though he’d been hit around the head.

Evelyn rolled her eyes. “Remind me again how I am the embarrassment of the family?”

“What?” her father asked, swaying slightly.

“Oh, forget it,” Evelyn mumbled as she turned away and returned to the wedding reception.

It was reaching that stage of the festivities when those who had drunk far too much champagne were showing it, and those who had not drunk enough champagne were starting to make up for it.

Evelyn managed to dodge a confused, elderly gentleman who believed that she was his daughter and avoided the squawks of indignation coming from her sister and her new friends in a corner.

Finding herself a nice corner to stand in, Evelyn looked out at the merriment and sighed.

It was most unfair. Here was everyone enjoying themselves, and she felt… distant from them. Set apart, somehow.

Not better than them. Evelyn had seen enough of the world in her three and twenty years to know she had plenty of her own faults—but wishing to paint and draw new people wasn’t a fault. She was sure.

“You must not embarrass us any further. Asking people right to their faces to model for you—really!”

And a small smile, nervous at first but growing more confident with every passing second, crept across Evelyn’s face.

Well, that is an easy enough order to follow , she thought with a tingling anticipation in her stomach. Asking people to their faces was no longer permitted?

She’d simply stop asking people to their faces.