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“And how is Miss Masters?” Constance asked Kilmartin carefully.

Damn.

Kilmartin looked at Gideon. Gideon looked at Kilmartin. They spoke at once.

“She is—”

“She arrived—”

Kilmartin and Gideon looked at each other again. Gideon lifted a brow. Kilmartin, bless him, understood it meant, “
I’ll
do the talking.”

“That is to say, ladies,” Gideon said smoothly, “Miss Masters’s sister is doing quite well, and no longer has need of her. Miss Masters is just now shaking off the dust of her journey. She will join you momentarily in the solarium.”

“Well,” Constance said predictably, “I’d rather like to shake off the dust, too. Wouldn’t you, ladies, as well?”

Three heads nodded and affirmed in a chorus of girlish voices.

“The rooms are prepared, Mr. Cole.” This came from Mrs. Plunkett, who had, bless her, appeared just in time. “I’ll take the ladies to them.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Plunkett. I shall see all of you in the solarium in a half hour’s time?”

A prettier collection of curtsies could not be seen in all of England as the girls took their leave of Gideon and Kilmartin. He watched them sail up the stairs, trailed by Constance’s aunt, who really seemed more of a servant to her formidable niece.

“How does Lily’s sister fare?” Kilmartin asked in a lowered voice.

“She is doing well, thankfully.”

“You’re fond of her.” Kilmartin was watching Gideon closely.

“Yes,” Gideon answered, after a pause. He didn’t know whether Kilmartin was referring to Lily or Alice, but it was most certainly true in both cases.

Kilmartin opened his mouth to say something more, but Gideon spoke first. “And when can we expect Lady Anne Clapham?”

Kilmartin’s eyes went dewy. “Soon, but not soon enough.”

In the past, Gideon would have rolled his eyes, or teased his friend. But what he felt today was envy so profound it was like an ache, and an understanding that made his past teasing seem reprehensible. “Good,” he replied softly.

Kilmartin looked up, surprised again. He frowned a little, and opened his mouth as if to say something, but Gideon interrupted.

“I’ll meet you in the solarium at half past the hour, Laurie.”

Gideon went up the stairs, two flights up, to visit someone he cared for.

* * *

Lily considered whether she should go downstairs. Perhaps she should plead a headache, or an even more explicit feminine complaint, and refuse to join the ..
.festivities
. Take her meals in her room, wait stoically for the entire party to leave, the way one waited out any ailment. But then she considered how happy that would make Constance, and decided it was not an option at all. She had a
duty
, she decided, to make Lady Constance Clary as uncomfortable as possible. And today, of all days, she would
relish
it.

She sighed and pulled one of her lovely muslin morning gowns over her head, twisting about to do up the tiny buttons. She took her hair in her fist and prepared to pin it up, but a scent arrested her; she lifted her hair to her nose and smelled
him
: a musky male scent, unmistakably Gideon. A rush of memory and primal longing that overrode every practicality, every resentment, came at her; she remembered trailing kisses over Gideon’s sweat-sheened body last night, her hair dragging the length of him. She breathed her hair in deeply and closed her eyes.

Would anyone else notice? And even if they did, would they recognize the scent she wore?
Eau de Gideon Cole
?

She didn’t care. She would sit in that room with Lady Constance Clary, as prim as any of those young ladies, with the scent of lovemaking in her hair.

She twisted her hair and pinned it up in just the way Madame Marceau had showed her, and examined the result in the mirror.

She had expected to see a wan face reflected there, a face that reflected how she felt about everything at the moment, but her cheeks were still rosy from the heat of the bed and her lips were still stung full from a night of passionate kissing. She looked splendid.

Bracing herself, she made her way down the hallway and followed the sound of feminine chatter, a high-pitched incessant chirping that sounded like nothing so much as trees full of birds. The solarium, then, was where they were.

Using all of her will not to drag her feet, Lily took herself toward the room. And when she reached it, she paused in the doorway in astonishment.

Constance and her handmaidens were draped artfully over the furniture. But this wasn’t the astonishing thing.

The astonishing thing was this: they were all wearing long-sleeved, high-necked, richly ruffled gowns, and from the wrists of their gowns dangled…

Tiny books.

At last, Lily beheld her own invention: Reading dresses.

“Well, Miss Alice, it is very good to see you feeling better. What is this you have here?”

Alice was sitting up in bed holding a very large book. “It’s a book about pigs,” she told Gideon happily. “And only pigs. Mrs. Plunkett found it in the library. I cannot read all of the words, but there are a great many pictures.”

“Libraries are wonderful things,” Gideon said solemnly.

“Pigs, too,” Alice said. “You just missed Lily. She is going to a party downstairs. I am sound enough to go, too, but she will not allow me to leave the bed.”

“Lily is very wise, in that regard, I am afraid. I must go to the party, too, Miss Alice.”

“Will you come see me again later?”

“Yes, I will come up to see you again later.” He smiled at her. “Perhaps I’ll read you a story.”

“Something with a battle?”

“I’ll see what I can do,” he promised her solemnly.

* * *

Constance, perhaps predictably, had insisted on archery after their morning repast. And so the entire party was now gathered in front of targets in the park—Jarvis had arrived shortly after Constance and the handmaidens, so their group was now complete—and had made ready to begin the competition, when their attention was suddenly riveted by the approach of two more people.

“She wanted to come out,” Kilmartin whispered to Gideon. “I could not dissuade her.”

They stood together and watched, in a sort of silent fascination, as Aunt Hester, a great bombazine dome in me distance, hobbled toward them, her cane no doubt taking divots out of the lawn on me way. And this was remarkable enough, but the greater miracle was Lord Lindsey strolling solicitously next to her, his pace matching hers. As though he’d taken strolls in me park every day for me past five years instead of lying in a darkened room. A veritable English Lazarus.

Behind them a brace of footmen followed very, very slowly, carrying two chairs, as though ready to catch either one of them if they should begin to topple over.

“Hester and I thought we’d get in a game of lawn tennis,” Lord Lindsey called to Gideon.

The last time his uncle had set foot on his own grounds his two cousins had been alive. And it was Lily, Gideon realized. Lily had somehow rolled back the stone that no one else had been able to budge.

Aunt Hester’s voice floated over to them. “I don’t like that Constance. She’s too big. I rather prefer the little one. Makes a good houseguest, that one.”

“She’s not
big
, Hester. She’s tall. And she’s the daughter of a marquis.” This came from the baron, patiently. Gideon almost smiled at his uncle’s loyalty to him, given that his uncle had described Constance in precisely the same words a few short weeks ago.

“Big,” Aunt Hester corrected adamantly. “She’s too big, too everything.”

“Hear, hear,” Kilmartin whispered.

“Hush, Laurie,” Gideon hissed.

The young ladies were all riveted by Aunt Hester’s approach; fortunately, they’d missed the hissed words. Gideon turned to Lily; she was staring in the direction of Aunt Hester, too, wearing an expression of faintly amused gratitude. Gideon knew her pride must be stinging; he couldn’t blame her for refusing to meet his eyes. And yet, for selfish reasons, he wished she would.

“Hester,” Lord Lindsey was explaining patiently, in as low a voice as he probably thought Hester could still hear, “I know you think you are speaking quietly, but I am afraid that you are
not
.”

Hester turned a truly surprised look on him. “I wasn’t trying to speak quietly.”

Gideon turned to Constance, who was holding a bow and arrow almost speculatively now, as though contemplating Hester as a target.

“Constance, you remind me of nothing so much as Diana, Goddess of the Hunt,” Gideon said, his voice raised as though none of them could hear Aunt Hester at all. “You look as though you were born with a bow and arrow in your hands.”

Lily rolled her eyes. Jarvis looked crestfallen that he had not thought to say something as clever, and turned his head hopefully toward Lily. And the two hot pink spots that had risen in Constance’s cheeks at Hester’s remarks faded. Gideon had restored order to her world with a single compliment.

“Thank you, Gideon,” she said regally. “And what shall be the prize in our little tournament?” She tilted her head coyly.

“I would ask you to name it, Constance, but you are certain to win, and that would hardly be fair to the rest of us, now, would it?” He smiled, to make it clear that he was teasing.

Constance dimpled. “Oh, now, I
shall
be fair. I would suggest that the winner”—she drummed her fingers thoughtfully against her chin for a moment—“shall win a stroll alone with the person of his or her choice.” She touched glances on everyone in the circle, but Gideon and Jarvis were favored with lingering ones.

Jarvis, Gideon decided, needed to work on his game face. He looked as hopeful as a hound seated next to a dinner table.

“That sounds fair, Constance,” Gideon said evenly. “Does anyone object?”

Resounding silence met this question. He glanced at Lily; her expression was inscrutable.

“I do think,” Constance said, as she lifted the bow to her shoulder, “that archery is a fine activity for young ladies. Don’t you agree?”

“Quite!” “A fine activity!” “Certainly fine!” Constance’s handmaidens echoed.

“ ‘A fine activity’?” Aunt Hester pondered. “Certainly— if one requires one’s mate to pull down venison for the evening meal.”

Lily coughed to disguise a laugh, and Gideon watched Constance’s face go stony.

With dramatic precision, Constance slowly drew the bowstring taut and squinted one eye at the target. She
did
look handsome; her form was flawless, and typically her aim was, too; he’d seen her arrow cleanly pierce the red center of a target any number of times in the past.

Constance allowed a moment to beat by so the suspense could build and so that everyone present could thoroughly admire her form.

And just as she was about to release her arrow, Aunt Hester cleared her throat loudly and messily.

Constance’s arrow flew wildly wide of the mark, in the general direction of the footmen. The two footmen threw themselves to the ground, flattening. Everyone else flung their arms frantically over their heads.

“Good God, now she’s trying to impale the footmen,” Aunt Hester complained.

“Missed,” Constance muttered, her cheeks flushed. Gideon wasn’t sure whether she meant the target or Aunt Hester.

After a moment, one of me footmen peered up and, determining no other arrows were heading his way, scurried forth to retrieve the wayward one.

Constance suddenly whirled on Lily, who really
had
done an admirable job of not laughing aloud. “Won’t you demonstrate
your
prowess for us, Miss Masters? It would make the contest ever so much more interesting.”

“How could it possibly get any more interesting?” Kilmartin whispered to Gideon.

Lily’s face was instantly serious again, but Gideon noticed the wicked glint in her eye. He knew a moment of worry.

“Oh, I’m afraid… well, I used to be quite an archer, too, Lady Clary. And then… well, I had to stop.”

“An injury?” The word was sympathetic, but Constance’s eyes gleamed hope; Gideon imagined she would have loved for Miss Masters to be horribly disfigured beneath her lovely muslin gown.

“Oh, no,” Lily assured her. “It’s just that…” She dropped her voice. “Well, haven’t you heard about what happened to those girls in France?”

Like a crooked finger, Lily’s lowered voice brought Constance and the handmaidens nearer; Constance lowered her own voice to match. “Girls in France?” she urged.

“They were all quite adept at archery. They won prizes; they practiced as often as they could; it was the delight of their lives. And then… one day…” Lily paused and bit her lip, as if she could hardly bear to go on.

The girls leaned forward. And so did Kilmartin and Gideon, dying to hear what had happened to the fictitious French girls.

“Well, it seems they developed…” Lily cast her eyes downward and whispered the word, as though it were the vilest profanity. “
Humps
.”

“
Humps
?” It was a soprano chorus of horror. Three feminine arms flew backwards simultaneously to frantically pat at three backs, feeling for bulges.

Lily squeezed her eyes shut and nodded sadly, as if the plight of the French girls moved her profoundly. “Yes.
Large
humps. They woke up one morning… and… well, there they were.
Overnight
. The French doctors determined it was because the… well, the physiques of women are not built for archery, you see, and all that pulling on the bow caused their
own
backs to bow… And now the poor young ladies cannot lie flat in their beds, and it is difficult to sew dresses to fit them, so they now only have one or two dresses to choose from. It’s very, very sad.”

Constance’s grip on the bow grew slack; it fell from her hand to the grass.

Gideon wanted to drop to the ground and roll like a colt. She was extraordinary, really. Even poor Lady Anne Clapham was surreptitiously feeling her back for the start of a hump. Gideon glanced at Kilmartin; he was gazing at Lily in bald admiration.

Lily’s jaw was set with something like grim satisfaction.

“
What
?” Aunt Hester bellowed. “I didn’t hear a word of that.”