a small area cleared of furniture, there was even a couple doing some sort of jig. The room buzzed with noise; people were talking in at least two or three different conversations, and one man was trying to sing along with the music. Cigar smoke made the room hazy, and glasses with varying amounts of brown liquid were scattered across every available table.
But what attracted Julia’s attention the most, after her first hasty glance, was the fact that in a chair close to the window sat a man with a woman perched on his lap. The woman’s dress was sheer enough that one could see through it, and when she turned toward the new arrivals, Julia could plainly see the dark brown circles of her nipples. After a brief, disinterested glance, the woman turned back to her companion, and they resumed the long kiss in which they had been engaged when Julia and Stonehaven entered. Julia was sure that her own cheeks were flame red. She glanced hastily away, only to see that in another part of the room another woman sat on another man’s lap. These two were not kissing, as they were both engaged in a boisterous conversation with a man standing beside their chair. However, the man on whose lap the woman sat had one arm looped around her waist, and as Julia watched, he casually slid his hand up the woman’s body and inside the bodice of her low-cut dress, cupping her breast.
Julia swallowed, feeling acutely embarrassed. Was this how she was supposed to act? Her own dress seemed almost prim compared to the attire of the other ladies, whose bosoms seemed ready to pop out of the low necks of their dresses. All of the women were rouged and powdered, and Julia was relatively sure that the guinea gold ringlets of one of them were definitely not her own. Julia realized that her own vision of what a bird of paradise wore was far more conservative than the actuality. She could not look away from the scene, which held a certain bizarre fascination.
One of the women was running her fingers up and down the arm of her companion, who had removed his jacket and was clad only in a shirt. Now and then her fingers strayed to the front of his shirt and even inside the opening at the top to his chest underneath. He seemed to have no objection to this action at all, only paused every now and then to give her a lingering pat on her derriere. The woman whose male companion had cupped her breast showed no inclination to move his hand. Rather, she wiggled on his lap, giggling.
“Stoney!” A man hopped up from a seat near the piano, his face wreathed in smiles. “I say, old man, didn’t expect to see you here tonight. Callie, look! Here’s Stonehaven, come to pay us a call.”
His last words were directed toward the cigar-smoking woman beside the piano, who turned at his words, smiling. When she saw Julia, her eyebrows went up a trifle, and she gave her a quick, assessing look up and down. “Hallo, Dev,” she called across the room and the noise. “It’s about time you thought of your friends. And who is your guest?”
“Allow me to introduce you.” Stonehaven guided Julia across the room to the man and woman. “Miss Nunnelly, I’d like you to meet my good friends. This is the Honorable Alfred Brooks. And Miss Callandra Cooper.” He turned toward Julia. “Miss Jessica Nunnelly.”
The honorable Alfred bowed to Julia, murmuring, “Ravishing. How do you always manage to find the most beautiful females in the city, Dev?”
“Not all the most beautiful ones.” Stonehaven made a polite demurral, bowing toward Alfred’s companion. “You have captured one of the loveliest yourself.”
Callandra simpered at the compliment. Stonehaven chatted for a moment with his friend, then moved with Julia toward the edge of the room. Julia’s gaze kept returning to the woman and man on the chair by the window. They were still kissing, and now his hand was sliding up her leg, shoving aside the flimsy skirt. She looked hastily away, her heart hammering inside her chest. Was this what Stonehaven would expect of her? Doubts assailed her. She looked down at her hands, unable to meet Stonehaven’s eyes.
“Gad, it’s noisy in here,” Stonehaven said. He bent down to Julia’s ear and said softly, “Shall we go outside? There is a nice garden in the rear, and a bench where we can sit and talk.”
“Oh, yes,” Julia agreed quickly, smiling up at him. “That sounds most agreeable.”
Stonehaven took her by the hand and led her down the hallway and out a door. They entered a small side garden that smelled richly of herbs and followed a path around the house to where the garden widened out into a large array of flowers. A tinkling fountain stood in the center of the small yard, and in front of it was a stone bench.
Julia strolled with Lord Stonehaven along the path to the bench. The soft summer breeze caressed her skin, and the scent of roses hung thickly in the air. It was blessedly quiet. They sat down on the bench, and Julia noticed that Stonehaven had not let go of her hand. She tried to pull her scattered thoughts together, to recall herself to her duty and to the plans she had made. She could not let her brother down, she reminded herself, just because her sensibilities had been shocked by the scene inside. It might not be easy, but she had dedicated herself to worming the truth out of Lord Stonehaven, and she could not hesitate now. She had to go forward with her plan.
“Your friend seemed most happy to see you,” she began tentatively.
Stonehaven smiled faintly. “Alfred is a good fellow. Openhanded to a fault. It sometimes gets him in trouble, I’m afraid.”
“Oh?” she asked encouragingly, thinking that friends in trouble was a good path to be following.
He shrugged. “Just the usual. He is often taken advantage of.” He shook his head and smiled at her. “Please, let us not talk of Alfred. A dull subject, I’m afraid.”
“How unkind!” Julia’s eyes sparkled at him. “Then let us talk of something more interesting. You, for instance.”
“Me! No, I am afraid that you have hit upon another dull topic.”
“I doubt that.” In her somewhat limited experience, Julia had found that most men’s favorite topic of discourse was themselves, so she did not take him at his word. “At least, I do not find it dull. I know nothing about you.”
“There is little to tell. What would you like to know?”
What you did with that money, she thought—and how you made it look as if my brother had taken it. But those were scarcely things she could say, so Julia merely smiled and said, “Why, everything. I hardly know where to begin.” She paused. “Are cards your passion? Is that how you spend your days?”
“I usually reserve it for the nights. But, no, I would not say that gambling is a passion with me.” The look in his eyes gave her little doubt as to what he did regard as a passion. “’Tis merely a pastime.”
“I see. And what do you do the rest of the time?” She hoped that he might mention the trust in his activities; she was beginning to see that it was not so easy as she had thought to direct their conversation along the path she wished.
He shrugged. “The sorts of things one does. I go to my club when I’m in London. Pay calls. I’ve been known to race my curricle or to spar a few rounds at Jackson’s. Even attend to some business affairs.” He grinned. “You see? I told you it was deadly dull.” He lifted her hand, idly stroking down the back of her hand and each finger to the tip. “I am sure it would be much more fun to talk about you. Where are you from? London?”
“No, Kent,” she replied automatically, then worried that she had been too truthful. But then, she reminded herself, thousands of people lived in Kent; he wouldn’t necessarily think of Thomas St. Leger or his nearby neighbors, the Armigers.
“Indeed? I come into Kent now and then.”
