surface, already wilting in the heat of the ballroom. The scent of dying roses and lilies mingled with that of burning wax, sweating bodies, and perfume, the whole both nauseating and heady.
“I intend to return this gown to you after tonight,” Temperance said, taking up the argument that had begun in the carriage ride here.
“And I’ve already told you I’ll simply have it burned if you do,” he replied smoothly, baring his teeth to a gentleman staring at her bosom. None of them would have ever noticed her in her usual drab black gowns. He was a fool for taking her out of her obscurity and bringing her into contact with these overdressed wolves. “I must confess my disappointment in your waste, Mrs. Dews.”
“You are an impossible man,” she hissed under her breath while smiling at a passing matron.
“I may be impossible, but I’ve gained you entry into the most fashionable ball of the season.”
There was a short silence as he guided her around a pack of elderly ladies in far too much rouge.
Then she said softly, “So you have and I thank you.”
He glanced swiftly sideways at her. Her cheeks were pink, but the color was not from any rouge pot. “You have no need to thank me. I’m merely fulfilling the bargain we made.”
She looked at him, her gilded eyes mysterious and far too wise. “You’ve done more than that for me. You’ve given me this beautiful gown, the hairpins, slippers, and stays. Why shouldn’t I thank you for all that?”
“Because I’ve brought you into this den of wolves.”
He felt more than saw her startled glance. “You make a ball sound overly dangerous, even for one as inexperienced as I.”
He snorted. “In many ways, this company is as dangerous as the people we’ve met on the streets of St. Giles.”
She looked at him skeptically.
“Over there”—he tilted his chin discreetly—“is a gentleman—I use the word in only its social sense—who has killed two men in duels in the last year. Beside him is a decorated general. He lost most of his men in a vain and stupid charge. It’s rumored that our hostess once beat a maid so badly she had to pay the woman over a thousand pounds to hush up the matter.”
He glanced down at Mrs. Dews, expecting shock, but she stared back, her expression open and frank and a little sad. “You’re merely proving that money and privilege do not go hand in hand with good sense or virtue. That, I think, I already knew.”
He bowed, feeling heat stealing up his cheeks. “Forgive me for boring you.”
“You never bore me as well you know, my lord,” she replied. “I only wish to point out that while money can’t buy those things, it can buy food for the stomach and clothes for the body.”
“So you think the people here are happier than those in St. Giles?”
“They should be.” She shrugged. “Being hungry or cold does terrible things for the temperament.”
“And yet,” he mused, “are the wealthy here any happier than a poor beggar on the street?”
She looked at him with disbelief.
He smiled down at her. “Truly. I think a man may find happiness—or discontent—no matter if he has a full belly or not.”
“If that is true, it is very sad,” she said. “They should be happier with all their needs fulfilled.”
He shook his head. “Man is a fickle, ungrateful creature, I fear.”
She smiled at that—finally! “I don’t think I can understand the people from your class.”
“Best not to,” he said lightly.
“You, for instance,” she murmured. “I’m not sure you have any more need of me in St. Giles, but you take me with you still. Why?”
He looked ahead of them, examining the crowd, watching the other men watching her. “Why do you think?”
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t you?”
She hesitated, and though he didn’t look at her, he was aware of her every movement. Of her restless fingers tracing the neckline of her bodice, of her pulse fluttering at her throat, of the moment she parted her lips again.
He leaned closer to her and repeated low, “Don’t you?”
She inhaled. “At Mrs. Whiteside’s house, you made me watch…”
“Yes?” They were in a damnably crowded room, the press of bodies almost suffocating. Yet at the same time he felt as if they existed in a closed glass sphere of their own.
“Why?” she asked urgently. “Why did you make me watch? Why me?”
“Because,” he murmured, “you draw me. Because you are kind but not soft. Because when you touch me, the pain is