balls. Frankly, Juliana would have preferred spending the evening curled up with a book or playing games with the Thralls’ younger—and far more likeable—daughter, Fiona. It was no pleasure to sit, as plainly dressed as a wren among peacocks, against the wall with the mothers and wallflowers, watching people dance and enjoy themselves.
Mrs. Thrall would be highly displeased if Juliana were to plead a headache or other illness and wish to leave the party, and she certainly had no desire to listen to her employer complain that she was attempting to ruin the grandest ball of her daughter’s career. Moreover, she had little hope that Mrs. Thrall would send her home, even with a lecture. She was far more likely to tell Juliana to simply bear up like a proper British gentlewoman…and then send her off to fetch a cup of punch.
The best course, she thought, would be to simply keep her eyes glued on Clementine. That way her gaze could not happen to meet Nicholas’s, and she would be able to avoid seeing the expression that would come over his face. It was unlikely that Lord Barre would look over at the duennas watching their charges, and even if he did, if she was not watching, at least she would not know if he then turned away without speaking.
“Juliana?” A deep masculine voice cut through the air, filled with surprise and—surely she could not be mistaken—delight, as well.
Juliana’s head snapped up. Despite the years between them, she knew the voice immediately. Nicholas Barre was walking rapidly toward her, a smile lighting his handsome face.
“Nicholas!” The word came out breathlessly, and without realizing it, Juliana rose to her feet.
“Juliana! It is you!” He stopped in front of her, so tall she had to tilt her head back to look up at him, his dark eyes alight, a smile curving his full, firm lips. “I can scarcely believe it! When I think of all the time that I have looked for you…” He reached out his hand and, somewhat shakily, she gave hers to him.
“I—I’m sorry. I should say Lord Barre,” she went on hastily.
“I beg you will not,” he replied. “I would think you no longer counted yourself my friend.”
Juliana blushed, unsure what to say. She felt unaccustomedly shy. Nicholas was at once so familiar and so different, the traces of the boy still evident in the man, yet far removed from what he had once been.
“I am surprised you recognized me,” she told him. “It has been so long.”
He shrugged. “You have grown up.” His eyes swept briefly, almost involuntarily, down her form. “Still, your face is much the same. I could scarcely forget it.”
There was a loud, admonitory clearing of a throat from the chair beside Juliana, and she started. “Oh, I am so sorry. Lord Barre, please allow me to introduce you to Mrs. Thrall.”
Juliana half turned toward her employer. “Mrs. Thrall, Lord Barre.”
The middle-aged woman simpered, extending her hand to Nicholas. “Lord Barre, what a pleasure. No doubt you wish to meet Clementine, but I am afraid she is out on the dance floor. Her dance card is always full, you know.”
“Mrs. Thrall.” Nicholas gave the woman a polite bow, his dark eyes summing her up quickly before he turned back to Juliana. “I hope that you will give me the honor of a waltz, Juliana.”
Juliana knew that her employer would doubtless frown on her shirking her duty in that way, but she wanted quite badly to accept his invitation. She never got to dance at any of the parties they attended; she could not count the number of times she had sat, toes tapping, heart aching, watching the other couples swirl merrily around the floor.
“I would love to,” she said recklessly, then turned toward her employer. “If you will excuse me, Mrs. Thrall.”
She expected at best a scowl from the other woman, with a deferred lecture about the impropriety of her taking to the floor with young bachelors when she should be overseeing Clementine. But she hoped that Mrs. Thrall would not have the gall to flatly refuse, right in front of one of the peers of the land.
To her surprise, the older woman smiled benignly at her and said, “Yes, of course. That sounds like an excellent idea. No doubt Clementine will be back when you return.”
Nicholas bowed toward Mrs. Thrall and extended his hand to Juliana. She took it, letting him lead her out onto the dance floor, struggling to control the happy excitement fizzing within her.
“Who the devil is Clementine?” he murmured, bending his head closer to hers.
Juliana could not suppress a giggle. “She is Mrs. Thrall’s daughter. She is making her debut this year.”
“Good Gad, another one,” he commented darkly.
Juliana, more accustomed to listening to the gushings of the besotted suitors of Clementine Thrall, could not help but feel a small spurt of amusement.
Nicholas turned to her, putting his hand lightly on her waist and taking her other hand in his. She felt a little breathless, her nerves jumping with excitement, as the music began and they swept out onto the floor. There had been few times when Juliana had waltzed—there had been no Season in London for her, and paid companions were rarely asked to dance—and she was eager, yet scared that she would make a mistake.
For the first few moments she was too aware of following the steps to pay much attention to anything else, but gradually she gave herself up to the rhythm of the music and found herself swirling about the room quite easily. She cast a glance up at her companion. It seemed like a dream, she thought, to be here with Nicholas after all these years.
As if he had read her thoughts, Nicholas said to her, “You know, I’ve had the very devil of a time trying to find you.”
“I’m sorry,” Juliana replied. “I did not realize you were looking for me.”
“Of course I was. Why would I not?”
“It has been a long time,” she replied. “I was only a child when you left.”
“You were my only friend,” he told her simply. “That is difficult to forget.”
His words were true, of course. When she had met him, she had thought that he was the most alone person she knew. At twelve years of age, his reputation as a rebel and troublemaker was firmly established, and even then, there had been a certain hardness in his face that closed out others. But Juliana, herself feeling cast adrift in the world after the death of her beloved father, had felt an affinity with the dark, brooding boy. She had glimpsed in his onyx eyes a lurking loneliness, a vulnerability, that had spoken to her.
“We were the outcasts of Lychwood Hall,” she agreed now, keeping her voice light.
“I told you I would come back, you know,” he reminded her.
“So you did.” And she had lived on it for years, she thought, until she had grown old enough to be wiser. “But I did not hear from you.”
“I was not a very good correspondent,” Nicholas admitted wryly.
Juliana chuckled. “That, sir, is an understatement of the grossest sort.”
“I did not want them to know where I was,” he said, shrugging.
“I
