“Hannah, are you well?” her other sister Adele asked, her countenance creased with worry.
No, she was not.
“Yes, of course.” She pinned a false smile to her lips. “I have never been happier, darling.”
“You do not look happy,” Evie observed. “You look rather ill.”
She had agreed to attend this Christmas country house party, being held by Lady Emilia Winter and her new husband, Mr. Devereaux Winter, to chaperone her twin sisters Evie and Addy. They were six years her junior and in desperate need of husbands, their mama feared, lest they ruin themselves as Hannah had done. But when Mama had rushed home to Cornwall to look after her own ailing mother, Hannah had been charged with the most unwanted task of playing escort to Evie and Addy.
Not unwanted because she did not love her sisters, but unwanted because Hannah did not often mix with society. Indeed, had she known Lord Haven would be present, she would not have come at all.
But she was here now.
And so was he.
“Hannah?” Adele prodded.
Her traitorous gaze had stolen across the ballroom to Lord Haven once more.
She jerked her eyes back to her sister. “Lady Emilia seems happy, do you not think, sisters?” she asked, deliberately changing the subject.
Lady Emilia, who had once been betrothed to their cousin. At the remembrance of her dear cousin James, Hannah’s heart gave a pang. For he had been a god among men. Kindhearted, loyal, and true. Gone far too soon.
“She is in love,” Evie observed with a sigh.
“If such a state indeed exists,” Adele added. “I strongly suspect it does not.”
Love, for Hannah, had been nothing but a fiction. A cleverly crafted illusion, which had led to her stunning downfall.
“Some believe so,” Hannah said reluctantly, fanning herself. Truly, it was not her task to disenchant her sisters. She hoped a much better fate awaited them in their marriages than she had found in her own.
The ballroom was quite a crush, and surely that was the reason for the heat in her cheeks. It had nothing at all to do with the Marquess of Haven.
The man she had loved, once upon a time.
The man who had scorned her and made a fool of her.
The man she would never, ever forgive.
“He is a dashing fellow, too, do you not think?” Evie asked.
“He is not at all dashing.” She frowned. “Not unless one finds heartless cads and cruel scoundrels alluring.”
Evie raised a brow. “I was speaking of Mr. Winter, Hannah.”
Oh.
Further agitated, she whipped her fan again. “He seems a most considerate man in relation to Lady Emilia, though we have not had occasion to speak much since her nuptials.”
Lady Emilia’s wedding had been sudden and unexpected. And Hannah had been in the country at the time, where she generally preferred to be, busying herself with Mama. Poking about in Papa’s library. Distracting herself from London. Hiding, in truth.
From her past and everyone in it.
Which made the appearance of Lord Haven, on the other side of the room, all the more disconcerting.
“Hannah, are you certain you are well?” Evie asked, concern threading her voice. “I am promised for the next dance, but I do not wish to leave you in such a state.”
“What state?” She fanned herself, stretching her false smile even wider. “We are here for you, my dearest sisters. Do not concern yourself with me. I shall be fine, just as I have always been.”
As if on cue, Lord Denton and Lord Foy approached. Both were handsome and young, cutting fashionable figures.
The gentlemen bowed.
Denton was first to speak. “Lady Fawkesbury, Lady Evangeline, Lady Adele.”
Evie was still frowning at Hannah, paying little attention to her prospective suitor. Go she mouthed surreptitiously to her sister as she dipped into a curtsy. “Lord Denton. Lord Foy.”
Evie presented a passable curtsy as well. Adele’s was less than elegant. Hannah made a note to discuss her sisters’ forms with them later.
“I believe the next dance is mine,” Denton said to Evie.
“Yes it is,” Evie agreed, giving Hannah one last, lingering look.
“Lady Adele.” Foy extended his arm.
Addy, too, searched Hannah’s gaze, the sadness that had been her younger sister’s accompaniment ever since their departure from London seemingly more pronounced.
This house party was about her sisters, who were just beginning their lives.
Not about her. Not about her feelings. Not about her dreaded past.
To the devil with Lord Haven. She could exist beneath the same roof as he for a few weeks. She would simply ignore him.