said, “but this key would put us ahead of every drinking society in Oxford, so I shudder to imagine the price. What is it going to be? A golden fleece? A head on a platter? My soul?”
He spoke with the same affected lilt as the young lordlings Annabelle knew from the dinner parties at the manor house back in the day, men who loved the sound of their own banter. It took a good ear to hear the undercurrent of alertness in Lord Devereux’s voice. He was no fool, this one.
She gave him a look she hoped was coy. “Your soul is safe from us, Lord Devereux. All we ask is an invitation to your next house party at Claremont.”
He blinked. “A house party,” he repeated. “Just a regular house party?”
“Yes.” She wondered what the irregular kind would be like.
“Now, why would you choose that, when you could have chosen anything else?” He looked genuinely taken aback.
Luckily, she had come prepared. She gave a wistful sigh. “Look at us.” She gestured down the front of her old coat. “We are bluestockings. We have a reputation of being terribly unfashionable; you, however, lead the most fashionable set in Oxfordshire.”
And wasn’t that the truth. She couldn’t afford fashion; Catriona seemed wholly uninterested; and Hattie, well, she had her very own ideas about la mode. Today, she had added a gargantuan turquoise plume to her hat, and it lifted the small headpiece every time the breeze picked up.
It was this bobbing feather that Lord Devereux’s eyes now fixed upon. “Well,” he said. “I see.” His own attire spoke of money and good taste: a rakishly tilted top hat, a fine gray coat and loosely slung scarf, speckless black oxford shoes, all worn with carefully calculated carelessness to suggest that he paid fashion no mind at all.
He dragged his gaze back to Annabelle. “So you wish to become fashionable by association.”
“Yes, my lord.”
He nodded. “Perfectly sensible.”
Still he hesitated.
She pulled the key from her coat pocket. A heavy, medieval-looking thing, it twirled around her finger once, twice, with great effect. Peregrin Devereux was no longer slouching. He focused on the key like his predatory namesake, the falcon.
“As it is,” he said slowly, “there is indeed a house party planned for the week before Christmas. But it will be a more intimate, informal affair, just about a dozen gentlemen. And the duke will not be in residence.” He gave an apologetic shrug.
A tension she hadn’t known she’d held resolved in her chest. If the duke was not home, it might make this harebrained mission considerably easier on her friends.
“His Grace will be away?” she repeated.
Peregrin was still staring at the key. “He will be visiting Mother in France.”
She turned to Hattie and Catriona, pretending to consider. “What do you think? Would this still count as a house party?”
“I believe so,” Hattie squeaked. Catriona managed a hasty nod.
Heavens, both girls looked flushed and nervous. Hopefully, Lord Devereux would attribute that to the overly excitable nature of wallflowers.
“In that case, we will fulfill our end of the bargain,” she said, presenting the key to the nobleman on her palm. “You have two hours to have it replicated.”
“Wait,” Hattie said, stilling Annabelle’s hand. “Your word as a gentleman,” she demanded from Lord Devereux.
A lopsided grin tilted his lips. He placed his right fist over his heart as he sketched a bow. “On my honor, Miss Greenfield. Claremont Palace awaits you.”
Chapter 6
December
They had barely left the train station in Marlborough when Annabelle admitted defeat—translating Thucydides in a rumbling carriage was impossible. She lowered the book.
“There she is,” Hattie cheered from the bench opposite.
Annabelle grimaced. Her stomach was roiling. Next to her, Catriona calmly kept reading while she was bounced around on her seat, and Hattie’s chaperoning great-aunt seemed equally unaffected, already snoring openmouthed in the corner across.
“You look a touch pale, greenish, even,” Hattie observed with her keen artistic eye. “Are you sure it is wise to read in a moving vehicle?”
“I have an essay due.”
“You are on a break now,” Hattie said gently.
Annabelle gave her a grave stare. “That was hardly my choice.”
She was still struggling with the fact that she was en route to a ducal house party. How naïve of her to believe that securing an invitation for the ladies would suffice. Lucie had been adamant that Annabelle, too, go to the party—three wooden horses behind enemy lines were better than two—and since Lucie held the purse strings, here she was, on her way into the lion’s