Page 45 of The Perks of Loving a Wallflower

This was yet another reason she tried to avoid her mother’s teas. Her mother’s friends weren’t friendly at all. Currently, they were milling about the sitting room, peering at the portraits and Philippa, as if it were all fodder for tomorrow’s gossip.

“Is this your morning’s correspondence, Mrs. York?” Lady Waddington inquired. “Pity. I would have thought her performance last night would have caused some attention.”

Philippa clenched her teeth. The only reason her mother tolerated these people was because they were bon ton.

A wave of awareness rippled through the parlor, and everyone jerked their gazes to the corridor at once.

Baron Vanderbean paused at the threshold as though the doorway were a life-size frame and he, the stunning portrait.

In formal knee breeches with a gold waistcoat peeking from beneath a coat of sharp black superfine, Tommy looked every inch as though she had an appointment with the Queen. Ballroom perfect, except for the wicker basket dangling from her arm.

“Baron Vanderbean!” Mother squealed, nudging her nearest friends.

Tommy swept into the room with just a hint of swagger, striding not toward Philippa but to her mother. After executing an absolutely breathtaking bow, Tommy presented her with a single yellow rose.

“Is this for our darling Philippa?” Mother asked, giddy.

“No.”Therewas the rakish smile. “I brought it for you.”

Philippa waited for Tommy to add,To thank you for bringing Philippa into the worldor some such, but it never came. She tried not to feel hurt. Tommy wasn’t a suitor. Philippa had to stop thinking of her like one.

Mother blushed and tittered and showed her yellow rose to all her friends as though Tommy had carried in the moon on her shoulders.

“Introductions,” hissed one of the ladies.

“I suppose.” Mother sighed disinterestedly, as though she had not spent the past hour bouncing on her toes in anticipation of exactly this moment.

One by one, she introduced Tommy to each of her guests.

And one by one, Tommy charmed them senseless with her particular mix of flattery and flirtation. However many invitations awaited Baron Vanderbean at the Wynchester home, she’d just managed to double the number.

Philippa waited impatiently as Tommy made her slow, deliberate way about the parlor, murmuring compliments and kissing hands and ignoring Philippa.

She didn’tmind. This was all a lark. She and Tommy were actors on a stage, even if the audience didn’t realize they were seeing a performance. Tommy was doing exactly the right thing to please Mother in every way. Philippa could not have scripted it better if she’d tried.

There was no reason to feel slighted at being ignored by a woman pretending to be a man pretending to be her suitor.

Once all Mother’s friends were starry-eyed and hanging off Tommy’s every word, Tommy turned to Philippa.

“And now,” she said, her eyes never leaving Philippa’s. “At last my gaze can fall upon the reason I breathe.”

Gasps and sighs ricocheted through the sitting room at that completely melodramatic nonsense. No one said such a thing and meant it.

Tommy closed the distance between them in three dramatic strides. She took Philippa’s hand. “I have never known another to match your beauty and never will.”

Were Philippa’s fingerstrembling?Why were they trembling?

Tommy smiled, as though she knew about the tickling sensation spreading throughout Philippa’s entire body. Never dropping her gaze from Philippa’s, slowly…ever so slowly…Tommy lifted Philippa’s fingers to her parted lips. Tommy kept them there against her warm mouth for several heartbeats longer than was necessary or proper.

Philippa could not have removed her hand if she’d wanted to. She was frozen in place.

“My word,” choked Mrs. Jarvis. “I have three unwed daughters I could introduce him to.”

Tommy lowered Philippa’s hand but did not immediately release it. Instead, Tommy brushed the pad of her thumb lightly across the tender skin, as though memorizing its warmth or sealing in the kiss. Only then did she let go.

No one who had witnessed the interaction would ever believe Baron Vanderbean wasn’t actually courting Philippa.

Evenshehad to fight to remember it was all pageantry.