Page 11 of The Sound of Seduction (Miracles on Harley Street #4)

And then there was Prince Stan. Wendy dared a fleeting glance in his direction only to find his expression utterly indecipherable; his brows arched the faintest bit.

The comparison stunned her into a momentary silence, during which Pippa flounced closer, muttering about crushed silk and scandalized men.

But for all the chaos erupting around her, Wendy could think only of him—Prince Stan, still leaning against the doorframe like he had all the time in the world to watch her humiliation unfold.

He hadn’t said a word, hadn’t moved an inch, but the intensity of his gaze sent ribbons of heat lacing up her neck.

If only she could formulate some clever comment or demonstrate even a shred of poise.

But no, there she was, hoisted up like a specimen while two men debated the state of her ankle and a third silently judged her from his elevated perch.

“Perhaps,” Wendy said finally, her voice trembling as she snatched her dress down from Andre’s grasp, “we can leave my ankle’s future to its own devices.

It seems fully capable of surviving without an audience.

So, please stop looking!” she pleaded, her voice strangled with equal parts fury and mortification.

“No one’s looking,” Andre said curtly, though the faint strain in his voice betrayed him.

“I’m not even in the room anymore,” Nick declared from somewhere behind the doorframe, though she could still hear the laughter he failed to suppress.

And Prince Stan was gone.

Pippa, meanwhile, rushed forward, fingers flying as she attempted to re-secure the gown. “Oh, Wendy, honestly ! Why didn’t you call me or a maid to help you tie the gown? A situation like this—this is the sort of clumsy thing that would happen to me, not you!”

“I suppose this is why Bea said women need attendants.” Wendy bit her cheek.

“Yes. We shall fix it, of course, though whether your dignity survives is another matter entirely!”

“Thank you, Pippa,” Wendy muttered through gritted teeth, flattening her lips into a tight line as waves of embarrassment crashed through her. Her cheeks radiated heat, her hands clutching the slippery fabric as if her life depended on it.

But at least her new sister-in-law was by her side, and she didn’t have to endure it alone.

And then there was the prince. Slowly, against all reason, she allowed her gaze to flicker toward the door through which he’d just left.

Wendy revisited the moments in her mind.

Prince Stan hadn’t moved, nor had he looked away.

His expression betrayed no shock or discomfort, only sharp, unwavering attention that made her knees soft like pudding.

There was the faintest lift at the corners of his mouth—enough to suggest either mild amusement or perhaps subtle admiration—though Wendy could hardly fathom which.

“Do you think she’s all right?” Wendy heard the prince’s voice in the hallway.

“She’s usually not this clumsy,” Nick said, Wendy hearing it all.

Pippa, however, seemed to tactfully pretend not to hear.

“…glad she’s unhurt,” the prince’s voice now fading as he was probably downstairs already.

And just like that, the last string of Wendy’s dignity snapped.

If there were a less graceful end to a morning, she could not imagine it.

But the faintest glimmer of humor in his voice left her wondering if maybe—just maybe—she hadn’t entirely lost his favor.

For now, though, she only wanted her floor to swallow her whole.

*

For Stan, the tranquility of Nick and Pippa’s new townhome on a quiet Marylebone street starkly contrasted with the storm inside him.

Breakfast had been served in the drawing room, as the breakfast room had yet to be furnished.

However, since he was a prince, Pippa insisted he be served elegantly in the drawing room.

She was just as kind as Nick and everyone else from Harley Street—all potentially in danger from List because of him.

It’s all my fault.

The soft clink of porcelain and the faint shuffle of servants in the corridor punctuated the otherwise still space, a calm utterly at odds with his thoughts.

Stan should have taken a walk like Andre, who had strolled the short distance from 87 Harley Street to the townhouse on what seemed like a windy day, leaving Andre more disheveled than usual as he deposited his trunk at the door for the servants to load into the waiting carriage.

Meanwhile, Stan had arrived in his own carriage at Pippa’s insistence, drawn into her whirlwind of preparations to accommodate her seemingly infinite collection of trunks and valises.

Between Andre and him, their meager travel necessities scarcely filled a fraction of the allotted space.

He hadn’t minded the task at the time; in truth, he hadn’t given it a thought.

But now, seated amidst the unnerving quiet, it struck him that perhaps agreeing to help had been nothing more than a prelude to some grand cosmic joke, one designed to leave his mind in greater disarray.

Wendy’s mishap upstairs, just as Stan arrived, left him completely unraveled.

Nick and Pippa had excused themselves minutes earlier, providing Stan with a brief reprieve from Pippa’s enterprising tone of giving instructions to the servants.

This left him alone at the table with Andre, who appeared to be in no hurry to speak, allowing Stan’s thoughts to wander unchecked.

Wendy seemed to remain hidden upstairs, but Stan couldn’t help glancing at the door every minute or so.

He stirred the cup of tea in front of him absently. Wendy hadn’t been down for breakfast. Her absence thudded in his chest with a fury he couldn’t explain—not aloud, at least—and between each sip, he found himself wondering when she might emerge from her chambers.

He’d stared.

The memory unraveled him further, a sharp pang of guilt twisting in his chest. Like a besotted idiot, he had been rooted to the spot, his breath a traitor caught between gasps and stillness when she’d fallen. He should have moved—should have shielded her. But he hadn’t.

Worse, he was the humiliation incarnate.

Instead of helping her up, he had been useless, struck dumb, his body locked in a wretched stupor while time seemed to freeze around the soft, silken tangle of her.

The sunlight had caught the sheen of her chemise, its pale ivory clinging to her form like morning dew to petals.

She had been…enchanting. Utterly undone, yet so whole in her unassuming grace, like a flower toppled in the breeze but not yet plucked.

It had been ungentlemanly, shameful, a betrayal of every lesson ingrained into him since boyhood.

A prince does not ogle. A man does not freeze in helpless lust while the object of his folly fumbles in embarrassment.

And yet, for all his remorse, he couldn’t unsee her—not the way her skin had glowed in the filtered sunlight, nor the delicate twist of her ankle as she’d shifted to sit.

She hadn’t looked at him in that moment, but if she had…

he wasn’t sure he’d have been strong enough to meet her eyes without giving his feelings away.

He released a tight breath, one hand dragging over his jaw as if to wipe the heat of the memory away.

Had she noticed his impropriety? Did she remember the humiliating pause, the beat where he had hesitated instead of helping?

His chest tightened painfully at the thought.

If she avoided him now, he couldn’t blame her.

Andre ate with the unbothered ease of a man ignorant of Stan’s torment, slicing into his scrambled eggs with deliberate precision before sweeping them onto his toast. The soft crunch carried through the quiet room.

His own plate sat before him, untouched save for the glisten of butter pooling on a single slice of toast. The bread’s golden edges mocked him with their mundanity.

Instead of eating, Stan’s stomach churned; his appetite, like his etiquette, had entirely abandoned him.

Wendy seemed to have that effect on him.

Her innocence, her quiet strength, her beauty left him pulsating with need. His greatest disgrace wasn’t in staring too long; it was in knowing that, given the chance, he’d likely do it again.

He clenched his jaw, his pulse drumming in his ears.

It was bad enough that he often imagined her with her tidy coiffure undone, her lips parted in breathless surrender, her form pressed against his, bare and unguarded.

Those thoughts were unbidden, uncontrollable—and every time, he forced himself to shove them aside with no success.

But now, the reality of her beauty, even if only accidentally exposed, rendered his fantasies wholly insufficient, cruel by comparison.

“I’m ready,” she said suddenly, stepping into the doorway. “When are we leaving for Kent?”

Wendy’s presence seemed to ripple through the room, a quiet force that never left—even when she wasn’t there. Every thrum of his pulse echoed the same maddening refrain. He was falling. Or perhaps he already had.

She finally arrived, framed in the gleaming arch.

For a moment, she lingered, smoothing her hands nervously over the pale muslin of her gown—a gesture so uncharacteristically hesitant that it froze the air between them.

Stan straightened, his chest tightening as he took her in.

The gown, simple and elegant, caught the light just right, accentuating something she herself didn’t seem to grasp. She looked radiant, effortlessly so.

Andre, of course, filled the silence first, leaping to his feet with a dramatic sweep of his waistcoat. “Wendy,” he exclaimed, a teasing grin lighting his face, “if I didn’t know better, I’d say you raided the wardrobe of a queen for Silvercrest’s grand halls!”