It could not happen now. And withhim, of all people. They’d been at one another’s throats whenever they had chanced to meet for nigh on twenty years. Familiarity was meant to breed contempt, not—not whateverthiswas.
The back of her head thumped against the door, and still her heart pounded in her chest, a persistent and maddening beat that shuddered throughout her body. A terrible, horrible awakening of nerves, a vexing current of awareness that sizzled along the surface of her skin, prickled in her fingertips, and curled her toes.
She had thought, for a moment, that he might kiss her. And for that moment, she might have…hoped he would. Her lips had tingled in anticipation of it. She had wanted that kiss as she had never wanted anything else before, with a longing that had wrenched at her heart. The sort of longing wrought of impossible dreams. The sort that lived only in the secret shadows of the night and burned away to nothing with the first light of morning.
“It was nothing,” she whispered to herself, though the ragged, fraught sound of her voice did little to reassure her. It hadto be nothing. Ithadto be.
Still her heart tripped through its paces in her chest.Fluttered, like a flight of butterflies.
Her stomach pitched and rolled with dread, with a queer sense of loss for something she had never had. For something that she had come closer to just recently than she had ever imagined possible, and she thought—under different circumstances, perhaps there would have been a chance for them. A sliver of one, at least.
It had hung there in the air between them, in those scant inches that had separated lips which had not yet touched, and now never could. She had surrendered even the tiniest possibility of it with the lies she had told to him, and to Papa. The lies she would continue to tell. The secrets she could neverreveal.
He would not want her if he knew the truth of her. So it had to be nothing. It had to be.
But that kiss, she thought, and let loose the hopeless sigh that had been trapped in her throat these last long minutes. She had the strangest sensation that it would have been everything.
Chapter Fourteen
Dinner probably had not been held over for him, Thomas reflected as he walked in the door at last, well past weary. The butler took his hat and coat, and handed off a stack of correspondence that had been delivered while he had been out. He turned toward the stairs, resigned to a few more hours yet of business, and paused at the ripple of feminine laughter that slid through the drawing room doors.
No engagement tonight, at least—no ball or dinner party for which he would have to hurriedly change his clothing and dash off to. Did that also mean there would be no billiards?
Good God, he hoped not. He’d grown rather fond of that hour or so in which he had secured Mercy’s undivided attention. And with his new spectacles, he might stand a chance of beating her at last.
As if of their own accord, his feet turned about and headed for the drawing room instead. He’d spent the whole of the day fruitlessly searching for a man who seemed to have become a ghost. There was little more he could accomplish—but he might have earned a half an hour or so of respite.
Still that laughter hung in the air as he crossed the threshold to find Marina and Juliet seated together on a couch, Mother with her embroidery spread across her lap, and Mercy—Mercy was draped dramatically across a chair, her legs hanging overone arm and her back braced against the other, smothering her fading snickers with one hand, her sketchbook resting in her lap.
“Thomas!” Juliet leapt to her feet, smiling. “We did not expect you, or we would have held dinner.”
Well, there went the hope, however faint, of anything hot. “No need,” he said. “I heard you laughing as I came in. What has so amused you all?”
“My complete lack of social graces,” Mercy said, abashed, her shoulders sinking as she slumped deeper into her chair. She shaded her eyes with one hand and heaved an exasperated sigh. “Today was our at-home day.”
Oh. “And were there many callers?”
“I have got the calling cards,” Mother said, setting aside her embroidery as she rose to her feet. “If you would like to see them.”
“I would, in fact,” he said, tucking the mail beneath his arm. Just to ensure that they were the sort of men he’d approve of calling upon his sisters. Mother had done an admirable job thus far, but nobody knew a man quite like another man. He’d wager he’d strike more than half of them right off, just on simple experience gained from places where women were not permitted to tread.
Mother dug into her pockets, withdrawing a stack of cards from each. “These called for Marina and Juliet,” she said, handing over the first stack. “And these for Mercy.” The tiny note of hesitation in her voice as she thrust a stack of at least a half dozen cards gave him pause.
“Mercy received callers?” he asked.
“Well, you needn’t soundsosurprised,” Mercy drawled, her voice inflected with annoyance.
“Whyever not?” Marina said around a giddy giggle. “You were.”
“Oh, Lord,” Mercy groaned, ducking her head. “I tell you, Ididn’t know! I didn’tintendto leave the poor man waiting!”
“For nigh on an hour,” Juliet confided to Thomas. “I swear to you, there was a queue forming in the foyer.”
Mercy threw up her hands. “Well, how was I to know? I thought he’d called for one of you, and the butler was off in the kitchen requesting tea cakes when he arrived, so I put him in the drawing room and handed his card over when the butler returned.”
“This would be…” Thomas thumbed through the cards. “Lord Elkridge?”
Mercy shrugged. “I suppose.”
