to a stranger she couldn’t even see, she wasn’t sure. Perhaps it was because, with his visage obscured, he was unthreatening. “I find I can best get through them if I take a minute to myself now and again.”
“I see,” he said, and she felt that, more than simply offering platitudes, he actually did understand. “Are you certain you should be alone, unchaperoned?”
“Likely not,” she said, looking down at her hands. “But my mother would not be particularly pleased to accompany me away from the party.”
“You’re to show yourself off – find a husband then?” His voice was deep and rough, as though it had been hindered by disuse.
“Something like that,” she said softly.
“Well, you certainly won’t find one in here,” he said, a slight bit of rueful laughter accompanying his words, and Hannah wondered what it was about him that caused him to discount himself from fulfilling such a role.
“Are you married?” she asked, her curiosity getting the better of her.
“No.”
“You have no wish to be?”
There was a long pause.
“No.”
“Well,” she said, needing to fill the silence suddenly, as the air that had previously carried some comfort in it suddenly became tense at his terse replies. “Not to worry. It seems I have already found myself one.”
“Oh?”
“It’s actually the purpose of this party tonight – to celebrate our betrothal. I don’t know him particularly well. Our parents have arranged it all, you see. It’s odd, isn’t it? That I am to spend the rest of my life with someone I hardly know?”
He was silent for a moment once more, and Hannah longed to walk over and see what this man looked like. It was both disconcerting and yet at the same time freeing to speak to someone practically invisible.
“Are you sure he would make you a good husband?” the stranger finally asked, and Hannah sensed that there was more behind the words than a simple question.
“I don’t know,” she said, for he echoed the very sentiment she worried about. “It doesn’t seem to matter.”
“It should,” he said, surprising her by standing. He walked around the perimeter of the room, never stepping into the dim glow from the fire. The room held no other source of light – the wall sconces, candles, or lanterns were all dark. “Do not give your life away to someone who doesn’t deserve it.”
Hannah stood, taking a few steps toward where he had paused in the corner of two bookshelves. He was tall, she could ascertain from his silhouette, his build lean and seemingly strong. His hair nearly brushed his shoulders, quite opposed to the style of the day. Her fingers itched to paint the scene before her.
“You seem to know more than you are saying,” she said, knowing she should leave the room and not question her marriage, for it was too late. The betrothal had been announced, and there was no going back now. Her parents would never allow it. “Tell me what I should be aware of – please?”
He hesitated, and she could sense that he was trying to decide whether or not to share what she now so desperately needed to know.
“Your soon-to-be husband can be a brute, Lady Hannah,” he said, and she gasped when he said her name, though why wouldn’t he know who she was? He was at her betrothal party, after all, even if he was hiding away in the library. “He will not be true to you, will give you nothing but pain. Why do you think they are marrying him off to a woman like you? Should not a future earl be doing much better for himself? Your parents must be desperate.”
Hannah could not have been more shocked had he slapped her in the face. She couldn’t deny, however, that his words held truth to them, and caused the tingles of unease that had accompanied her the few times she had been with her betrothed to turn into full tremors.
“Pardon me, but who are you to say such things to me?” she finally managed, and his chuckle was low and humorless as he stepped forward, staying just beyond the soft light.
“I am a man who tells the truth, for I have no reason to pretend, like the rest of them out there, cloaked in their fineries and their lies, obscuring their horrible souls beneath. With me, it is as you see it.”
“And yet you hide in the shadows,” she challenged, angry now that he would throw out such accusations without revealing anything about himself.
“You are