It would make Harry feel so uncomfortable.

Sebastian drank his tea and watched Edward read the newspaper. If he leaned forward, he might be able to read the page facing him. His eyesight had always been freakishly sharp.

But not, apparently, sharp enough. TheLondon Times used ridiculously small print. Still, he tried. The headlines were legible, at least.

Edward set down the paper and gave him a look. “How boredare you?”

Seb drank the last of his tea. “Oh, terribly. And you?”

“Quite a lot, since I can’t read the newspaper with you staring at me.”

“I’m that distracting?” Seb smiled. “Excellent.”

Edward shook his head and held out the paper. “Do you want it for yourself?”

“Gad no. I was trapped into a conversation with Lord Worth last night, all about the new excise tax. Reading about it would be only slightly more pleasant than plucking out my toenails.”

Edward stared at him. “Your imagination borders on the macabre.”

“Only borders?” Seb murmured.

“I was trying to be polite.”

“Oh, you should never do that on my account.”

“Clearly.”

Seb paused for just long enough for Edward to think that he’d let go of the conversation, then said, “You’re getting quite dull in your old age, whelp.”

Edward quirked a brow. “Which makes you…”

“Ancient but interesting,” Sebastian answered with a grin. Whether it was the tea or the fun of baiting his young cousin, he was starting to feel better. His head still hurt but at least he didn’t think he was going to ruin the carpet. “Do you plan to attend Lady Trowbridge’s affair tonight?”

“Up in Hampstead?” Edward asked.

Seb nodded, pouring himself another tea.

“I think so. I haven’t anything better. And you?”

“I do believe I have an appointment with the lovely Lady Cellars on the heath.”

“On theheath ?”

“I’ve always enjoyed the wilderness,” Sebastian murmured. “I just have to figure out a way to get a blanket into the party without anyone noticing.”

“Apparently you don’t enjoy the wilderness in all of its glory.”

“Just the bits about the fresh air and adventure. The twigs and grass burns I can do without.”

Edward stood. “Well, if anyone can manage it, it’s you.”

Seb looked up, surprised and perhaps a little bit disappointed. “Where are you going?”

“I have an appointment with Hoby.”

“Ah.” He couldn’t keep him, then. One did not disappoint Mr. Hoby, and one most certainly did not get between a gentleman and his boots.

“Will you be here when I return?” Edward asked from the doorway. “Or do you plan to go home?”

“I’ll probably still be here,” Sebastian replied, taking one last sip of his tea before lying back down on the sofa. It was barely noon, and he wouldn’t need to head home to get ready for the Ladies Trowbridge and Cellars for hours yet.

Edward gave a nod and departed. Sebastian closed his eyes and tried to sleep, but after ten minutes he gave up and grabbed the newspaper.

It was too damned hard to sleep when he was alone.

Chapter Three

Later that night

She couldn’t marry him. Oh dear God, she couldn’t.

Annabel dashed through the darkened corridor, not caring where she was going. She had tried to do her duty. She had tried to behave as she ought. But now she felt sick, her stomach churning, and above all she needed air.

Her grandmother had insisted they attend Lady Trowbridge’s annual affair, and after Louisa had explained that it was a bit out of town, all the way in Hampstead, Annabel had been looking forward to it. Lady Trowbridge kept a splendid garden, opening right up onto Hampstead’s famous heath, and if the weather was fine, she’d likely put out torches and decorations, allowing the party to move out of doors.

But before Annabel could explore beyond the ballroom, Lord Newbury had found her. She had curtsied and smiled, acting for all the world as if she were honored by his attentions. She had danced with him—twice—making no comment when he stepped on her foot.

Nor when his hand had moved to her bottom.

She had drunk lemonade with him in the corner, trying to engage him in conversation, hoping and praying that something—anything—might prove to be of more interest than her breasts.

But then he had somehow maneuvered her into the corridor. Annabel didn’t quite know how he had done so. Something about a friend, and a message that needed to be relayed, and then before she knew it, he had her in a darkened corner, pressed up against the wall.

“Good Lord,” he groaned, grabbing one of her breasts with his beefy hand, “I can’t even fit my fingers around it.”

“Lord Newbury,” Annabel cried, trying to twist out of his grasp. “Stop, please—”

“Wrap your legs around me,” he ordered, slamming his lips against hers.

“What?” She tried to say it, tried to scream, but she could barely even move her mouth against the pressure.

He grunted and shoved against her, his arousal hard and angry against her belly. One of his hands grabbed at her bottom, trying to move her leg the way he wanted it to go. “Lift up your skirt if you have to. I want to see how wide you can go.”

“No,” she gasped. “Please. I can’t.”

“The morals of a lady and the body of a harlot.” He chuckled and squeezed her nipple through the thin fabric of her dress. “The perfect combination.”

Panic was rising in Annabel’s chest. She’d dealt with unwelcome advances before, but never from a peer of the realm. And never from a man she was expected to marry.

Did that mean he expected liberties from her? Before he even asked for her hand?

No, he couldn’t possibly. He might be an earl, used to having his every command obeyed, but surely that did not mean he thought he could compromise a respectable young lady.

“Lord Newbury,” she said, trying to sound stern. “Release me. Immediately.”

But he only smiled and tried to kiss her again.

He smelled like fish, and his hands were big flabby things, and she just could not bear it. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. She hadn’t been expecting romance, or true love, or—Dear God, she didn’t know what she had been expecting. But not this. Not this awful man up against a wall in a strange house.

This couldn’t be her life. It simply could not be her life.

She didn’t know where she got the strength; he must have weighed nearly twenty stone. But she managed to wedge both of her hands between them, and then she shoved, hard.

He staggered backward, cursing as he hit a table and nearly lost his balance completely. Annabel had just enough time to yank her skirts up over her ankles and run. She had no idea if Lord Newbury gave chase; she didn’t pause to look behind her until she’d made it through a set of French doors and found herself in what had to be a side garden.

She leaned against the exterior stone wall and tried to catch her breath. Her heart was pounding, and her skin was now covered with a thin sheen of perspiration, which was making her shiver in the cooler air.

She felt dirty. Not inside. Lord Newbury could not make her doubt her own values and conscience. But on the outside, on her skin, where he’d touched her…

She wanted to bathe. She wanted to take a cloth and a fat bar of soap and erase every last memory of him. Even now, her right breast felt funny where he’d grabbed her. It wasn’t pain. It just felt wrong. Her whole body felt like that. Nothing hurt. There was an indescribable sense of wrongness.

In the distance she could see the light from the torches in the back garden, but here it was nearly dark. Clearly this part of the property had not been meant for partygoers. She shouldn’t be here, that much was obvious, but she could not bring herself to return to the party. Not yet.

There was a stone bench halfway across the lawn, so she walked over and plopped herself down, allowing herself an audible, “Ooof!” when she landed. It was the sort of unfeminine noise, accompanying the sort of inelegant motion, that she could not permit herself in London.

The sort of thing she did all the time when romping about with her brothers and sisters in Gloucestershire.

She missed home. She missed her bed, and her dog, and Cook’s plum tarts.

She missed her mother, and she really missed her father, and most of all she missed the solid earth

beneath her feet. She knew herself in Gloucestershire. She knew what was expected of her. She knew what to expect from other people.

Was it so much to want to feel like she knew what she was doing? Surely that wasn’t an unreasonable wish.

She looked up, trying to make out the constellations. There was too much light coming from the party to find clarity in the night sky, but the stars were still twinkling here and there.

They had to fight through the pollution, Annabel thought, in order to shine. It was a pollution of light, of brightness.

Somehow that just seemed wrong.

“Five minutes,” she said aloud. In five minutes she would return to the party. In five minutes she would have regained her equilibrium. In five minutes she would be able to affix her smile back to her face and curtsy to the man who had just mauled her.

In five minutes she would tell herself that she could marry him.

And with luck, in ten minutes she might actually believe it.

But in the meantime, she had four more minutes to herself.