Alice was no better. She returned from her three days in Kent looking ten years younger. Her eyes glowed. So did her cheeks. So did her whole person.

"Cassie," she said before she had been back in the house ten minutes,

"they are wonderful people, Allan's family. They are a close-knit group and yet they opened the arms of friendship to me. More than friendship, actually. They treated me like one of themselves." /Allan/ now, was he?

"I am so glad," Cassandra said. "You are to see more of Mr. Golding, then?"

"The silly man wants me to marry him," Alice said.

"Silly indeed," Cassandra agreed. "Did you say yes?"

"No," Alice said, setting her cup in the saucer with a slight clatter.

The cup never had made the full distance to her mouth.

"No?"

"No," Alice said firmly. "I asked him to give me time to think about it."

Cassandra set her own cup and saucer down on the table beside her.

"Because of me, I suppose," she said.

Alice pursed her lips but would not deny it.

"Alice," Cassandra said with a severity that was not feigned, "if you and Mary between you force me into marrying Stephen, I will have the greatest difficulty forgiving either of you."

Alice merely looked mulish.

"Of course," Cassandra said, "both of you would deny that you had done any such thing. You are both postponing your futures or even denying them altogether just in case I do /not/ marry him. I will not allow such tyranny. I will give both of you notice – very /short/ notice. I will terminate both your employments."

"What employment?" Alice asked. "I have not been paid in almost a year.

I think that means I am no longer your servant, Cassie. I am only your friend. You cannot give your friends the sack. And if you try to get rid of Mary, she will only give you the length of her tongue and burst into tears and make you feel like a worm. And then she will stay and refuse to let you pay her, and you will feel like a giant worm. And Mr. Belmont will stay with her because, to his credit, he is besotted with her – and with Belinda. And you will be forever tripping over him as he mends everything in this house that needs mending – a never-ending task if ever I saw one. You will end up feeling like a /dragon/."

Cassandra shook her head and picked up her cup and saucer again.

"I am going to buy a cottage with /one bedchamber,/" she said, "and there will be no room in it for anyone but me."

Having had the last word, she drank her tea to the dregs with some satisfaction.

And why were Alice and Mary suddenly on Stephen's side when less than two weeks ago they had both thought him the devil incarnate? But that, of course, had been before they met him. How could /any/ woman resist those angelic looks once she had set eyes upon him? And how could any woman resist his warm charm when it was directed her way? He did not play fair. For every time he came to the house – and he came every day – he had a word and a smile for Mary and a word and a smile for Alice.

Oh, he did /not/ play fair. For of course, /she/ had to look upon all that beauty every day too, and /she/ had to expose herself to all that charm. And /she/ had memories of more than just good looks and charm.

And always at the back of her mind was one needling question: Why could she /not/ marry him when there was not a bone or muscle or blood cell in her body that was not giddy with love for him?

She had not killed Nigel, and Stephen knew it. She was not so foolish that she still believed every man in the world to be rotten to the core.

She had been unfortunate to marry a man with a sad illness that was destructive both of others and of himself. It had not been her fault that he could not be cured of that illness. Neither had all the beatings she had suffered been her fault, though for all the years of her marriage she had blamed herself.

There was no real reason why she should not marry Stephen and reach for a little happiness after all the years of pain. Except that she felt used and sullied and world-weary, and Stephen seemed the opposite. She could not convince herself that she would not somehow be harming him by marrying him. That she would not be stealing some of his light.

And did he really love her? If that kiss had not happened to force him into offering her marriage and to make him gallantly claim to be in love with her, would he ever have freely wanted to do either?

Perhaps eventually, Cassandra thought, she would regain her confidence and self-esteem to such a degree that she would consider marrying again.

But not now. Not yet. And not Stephen.

But how could there ever be anyone else /but/ Stephen?

One thing she no longer doubted – in the privacy of her own heart. She loved him with all her being.


***

Stephen had not been as busy as Cassandra, or at least no busier than he usually was. He had offered his assistance with the planning of the ball, which was to be held at /his/ house to celebrate /his/ betrothal, but his sisters had looked at him collectively with the sort of fond impatience they had sometimes shown him when at the age of ten or so he had arrived home with torn breeches or muddy boots just when they were preparing for a church bazaar.

Men were not needed for /ton/ balls, it seemed, in any capacity but to dance with the ladies and make sure that none of them were wallflowers.

He concentrated most of his energies that week upon persuading Cassandra to marry him during the summer – without actually saying a word on the subject. He concentrated upon making her fall in love with him.

It was no longer a matter of gallantry.

It was a matter of his own lifelong happiness.

He did not tell her that, though. The very last thing he wanted to do was trap her into marrying him by engaging her pity. He had told her once that he loved her, but now actions must convince her that he had spoken the truth.

The ballroom looked quite stunningly gorgeous. It looked like a summer garden, complete with sunshine. Not that there /was/ sunshine, but the yellow and white flowers and the banks of green ferns gave the illusion of light, and the candelabra overhead had been washed and polished and rubbed into such brightness that the three hundred candles seemed almost superfluous.

The ballroom /smelled/ like a garden too. And it seemed filled with fresh air. It would not seem so for much longer, of course. In about an hour's time the guests would begin arriving and even all the open windows would not keep the air cool. Meg had predicted that this ball would be a squeeze to end squeezes, and Stephen tended to agree. Not only were balls at Merton House rare, but this one was to celebrate his betrothal to an axe murderer. That term was still bandied about in clubs and drawing rooms, he gathered, though he doubted anyone believed any longer in the literal truth of it. He wished the truth could be told, but on the whole he thought it might be wiser to allow the whole subject to drop.

He had just hosted a family dinner to precede the ball – something he had arranged. His sisters and their husbands and Con and Wesley Young had attended. Now they were all strolling about the ballroom, relaxing, before the room filled with ball guests.

The musicians had set up their instruments on the dais, Stephen could see, but they had gone belowstairs for their dinner.

"Is it as lovely as you imagined it?" he asked Cassandra, coming up behind her and wrapping an arm about her waist.

"Oh, lovelier," she said, smiling at him.

She was wearing a sunshine yellow gown, as promised. It shimmered when she moved. It was fresher than gold, brighter than lemon. Its short puffed sleeves and deep neckline were scalloped and trimmed with tiny white flowers. So was the deep flounced hem. She wore the heart-shaped necklace her brother had given her, and the almost-matching bracelet of tiny diamonds arranged in the shape of hearts that he had given her as a betrothal gift.

She would return it when she ended the engagement, she had told him when he gave it to her earlier this evening – the only reference either of them had made all week to that potential event in the future.

"It is going to be a perfect evening," he said. "I am going to be the envy of every man present."

"I think it altogether likely," she said, "that all the unmarried young ladies will be wearing deepest mourning. You will be a dreadful loss to all but one of them when you do eventually marry, Stephen."

"This summer?" he said, and grinned at her.

He turned his head toward the doorway. He could hear Paulson's voice, unusually loud, unusually agitated.

"The receiving line has not yet been formed, sir," he was saying. "No one is expected for another hour. Allow me to show you into the visitors' parlor for a while and bring you refreshments there."

Stephen raised his eyebrows. If the early guest had been persistent enough to get this far into the house despite Paulson's vigilance, it was probably futile still to be suggesting the visitors' parlor. He strode toward the doors, and Cassandra followed.

"Receiving lines be damned and balls and expected arrival times and visitors' parlors, you fool," a harsh, impatient voice replied, presumably addressing Paulson. "Where is she? I am determined to see her even if I have to ransack the house. Ah, the ballroom. Is she in there?"

Stephen was aware of all his family turning in some surprise to the ballroom doors as a gentleman appeared there, a black cloak swirling about his legs, a tall hat upon his head, a thunderous frown upon his face.