“Bein’ near ye is nay a wise thing, Charlotte,” he said aloud. She was a true danger. He liked her far more than he should already, when their lives were on quite different paths. They were entirely different people too. What would fine and elegant Charlotte make ofhimfeeling such a softness toward her? A man of a poor background, born into a one-room lodgings, whowalked like an ungainly giant amongst theton, having such an admiration for a woman as fine as her?
This feeling ends now,he told himself firmly, and turned the horse to ride away.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Are you quite well, Charlotte?” Susan asked as she led Charlotte into the assembly at Almack’s.“You do not seem yourself.”
“I’m fine,” Charlotte lied, for she truly was exhausted, and her insides were a quivering mess.
Behind them, her mother and father walked into the rooms, following the pair of them eagerly.
“Why have you two come tonight again?” Charlotte asked them, glancing back their way. She was rather eager to move the conversation to anything but herself.
“We wished for an outing, didn’t we dear?” David said with a smile.
“Did we?” Margaret asked, wrinkling her nose at this suggestion.
“Maggie—” he hissed, elbowing her.
“Oh! Yes, yes, that’s just what we fancied.” She purposefully smiled broadly, though her husband tutted. “You’re always tutting at me.”
“I am not.”
“You are. You think you are perfect, don’t you?”
“Pray, Aunt,” Charlotte turned to Susan. “Take me away from my parents’ bickering please.”
“Of course.” Susan looped their arms together. “You do know that they enjoy arguing with one another, don’t you?”
“I know. Heaven knows why.”
“You mean to say you have never enjoyed an argument with anyone?”
“No.” Charlotte ignored the way the lie felt bitter on her tongue as she hurried with her aunt around the assembly rooms. They circled past the dancers gathered in the middle of the floor, and crept toward the musicians, admiring them as they played the fine music.
“Well, let us turn our attention to tonight,” Susan said, turning her head away with an elegant tilt of her chin as she lookedacross the crowd. “Where are your friends, Dorothy and Frederica?”
“Dorothy is traveling with her husband. As for Frederica… I do not know,” she muttered, having no wish to suggest she had the slightest idea of where Frederica was.
She had felt quite sick at breakfast that morning as she had reached for the scandal sheet from her mother’s place and read it from cover to cover. Fortunately, Frederica’s incident hadn’t yet been mentioned, but Charlotte knew it would not be long. Someday soon, the whole sorry tale would be spread across those papers. The question was for how long her parents could keep quiet the fact she had run away as well.
“Oh, I am sorry,” Susan said with a sigh. “I do not wish you to be lonely at these events. Perhaps I could introduce you to some more gentlemen.”
“Not tonight, Aunt.”
“No?” Susan said in surprise, jerking her head sharply toward Charlotte. “I thought you wished to find a husband, Charlotte.”
“I am not quite in the mood to make merry and eager conversation with strangers, I find. I am sorry for it,” she added quickly when she saw the insult this plainly was to her aunt. “Do you never grow tired sometimes of doing such things, Aunt?”
“Never,” was Susan’s simple answer. “Well, we could take you to old acquaintances. What about Baron Winslow?”
“No, thank you,” Charlotte muttered tightly.
“What about…” Susan went into reeling off a number of gentlemen’s names, but Charlotte didn’t wish to talk with any of them.
The whole idea of summoning something to say to cover up awkward silences with acquaintances bored her. She longed for something more, a chance to talk with someone freely, who could fall into conversation with her as naturally as breathing.
“Charlotte? Charlotte!” another voice called to her.
