the walls. Masked women in expensive brocades and velvets twirled past on the dance floor, partnered by elegant men in black. Overhead, the chandelier caught the spark of jewels and diamonds. Brandon already knew the refreshment tables in the other room groaned under the Squire’s largesse, sporting all nature of sweetmeats and cakes and silver.
It was a night of plenty and of possibility. Everyone was masked and no one was paying attention to anything beyond their own pleasure. The Cat would be in her element. Brandon was counting on it.
Tonight, she’d promised to give back his ring. The three one-hundred-pound notes were safely nestled in the breast pocket of his evening jacket. He didn’t intend to turn them over to The Cat. They were simply there to serve as bait. He planned to lure The Cat into a semi-private place under the guise of making payment and then give the pre-arranged signal to alert the four hired undercover guards who mingled undetected in masks around the room. His victory would be swift and decisive. Tonight it was his turn to surprise The Cat.
The Cat had been busy since her last visit to Stockport Hall two weeks ago. He might not have seen her, his forays to uncover where she fenced her stolen goods may have revealed nothing, but he’d heard about her.
She’d struck several times, always limiting her targets to those who had invested in the textile mill and her name was on the lips of every villager. There were tales that painted her as an angel to the poor, bringing medicine to the sick and food to the starving. To hear the citizens of Manchester’s slums talk, The Cat was a veritable paragon.
Brandon had difficulty reconciling this shining example of civic welfare with the brash bandit who taunted the law with her break-ins. None the less, he was intrigued beyond good sense. The dichotomous halves of her personality posed the question, was The Cat sinner or saint?
In an attempt to unravel the riddle, Brandon found himself developing an annoying habit of rising each morning and searching out news of her escapades. He’d begun riding into the village just to overhear conversations in hopes of catching even a snippet of news concerning her latest chicanery.
He was dangerously close to becoming obsessed with her. It was frightening to think of the hold she had taken in his life after only two unorthodox meetings. He was torn between the dread of rising in the morning and hearing she’d been caught and the inexplicable relief he felt upon hearing she was safe one more day. He told himself his relief was because he wanted to be the one to catch her. Not because he needed the reward the investors were offering for her capture, but because he wanted answers.
It was a sad commentary that London’s untouchable Earl could be brought to such depths by a kiss and a caress in the dark from a masked figure. Against his will, he dreamed about her, his imagination conjuring up variations on the theme of their first encounter in his bedroom. When he climbed the stairs to his chambers, he looked for her in the night-shadows of his empty mansion, inexplicably wanting her to be there.
These were not the emotionally detached behaviours he cultivated in his relationships with women. Never had he let himself go, mentally or physically, as he’d let himself go these past two weeks. No situation or woman had ever gotten to him like The Cat.
In a short while, he’d see her. His body was alert on all fronts as he scanned the room. Even if she’d been inclined to break her word to him, she would not be able to resist the lure of such a bold undertaking. Entering the Squire’s house as a masked guest and making free with his unguarded hospitality was a temptation too great to resist for a thief of The Cat’s calibre.
She was among the crowd, somewhere. He’d been watching for her—for midnight hair and cat-green eyes. It unnerved him to think she was in the room and he did not know it. He wanted to find her first before she found him.
Across the ballroom behind the protection of her black-feathered mask, Nora smiled with satisfaction. Stockport was looking for her. Oh, not obviously. No one would guess he was waiting for someone. His gaze gave nothing away, but his other body movements did. There was a certain tension to his posture and his long fingers beat an impatient tattoo against his thigh. It was apparent to her that he wanted to find her first. Not yet. She was having too much fun dancing, wearing a pretty ballgown and being herself for a few hours.
Well, the gown was a heavily remade cast off from a brothel and she wasn’t really being herself. Tonight she posed as Adelaide Cooper, daughter of a potential investor in the new textile mill project. Everyone would assume she was here on someone else’s invitation and no one would expect to see her in the future.
‘Miss Cooper, may I have this dance?’ a voice politely asked beside her.
It was the Squire’s son, Frederick, a kind enough young man with his father’s bluff country looks. Nora favoured him with a smile and accepted. The dance was a hearty polka she loved. After this she’d get to work. Frederick could even help her get started.
‘Who is that man over by the pillar?’ Nora asked as they spun around the floor, pretending ignorance of the masked man’s identity.
‘That’s the Earl of Stockport, but it’s a masked ball so we aren’t supposed to know. Really, who could mistake him for anyone else? The local lads and I all admire his style.’ Frederick supplied, quick to oblige the reportedly rich, pretty daughter of a man who would make his father even richer if the investors could ever enlist the last two people needed to complete their financing.
‘Not many aristocrats would deign to dirty themselves with trade, but this man sees the possibilities, he admits to the future.’ Frederick would have kept going, clearly suffering from a case of hero-worship for the Earl’s wardrobe and his progressive ideas.
Nora cut him off with a coy toss of her head, uninterested in hearing the benefits of a dirty mill extolled in her presence. It was time to confront Stockport. ‘Do you think you could introduce me? I’ve never met an Earl.’ She added a débutante’s silly giggle for good measure.
Within moments the dance ended and Frederick unknowingly escorted her straight to the side of her adversary. He made the introductions and eased the way into conversation with small talk.
Nora noted Stockport was polite, but distracted. He made cursory responses, doing only the minimum required to sustain the conversation without appearing rude. Just as he had politely borne the conversational forays made by the Bradley girls during the carriage ride from Manchester, tonight he was unaffected by Adelaide’s efforts. He was no more interested in young Adelaide than he’d been in the Squire’s daughters.
His indifference prompted the curious question—what kind of woman would interest him? The answer was suddenly obvious. He liked The Cat. Her boldness appealed to him. She did not stand on ceremony and she challenged him. It was the only way to explain why he had not taken the opportunity to apprehend her on the two occasions they’d met.
Of course, being attracted to The Cat’s bold sensuality was no more than a courtesan’s allure. A man of his position would never seek to make such a woman his Countess.
Wife? She had to stop her wool-gathering immediately. It must be the ball that made her so fanciful. Either that or Stockport’s excellent physique. Surely a girl was entitled to a little fantasy now and then as long as she understood that’s all it was. If fairy tales were real, he’d be the living embodiment of the handsome prince. Frederick was still going on inanely about the fashion of men’s clothes, oblivious to Stockport’s neutral apathy on the subject. Nora took the chance to indulge, covertly studying Stockport.
Nora had long thought men’s evening clothes were the epitome of uniformity. The black trousers and tailed dress coat left little room for individuality.
