Chapter 17 #2
Adrian drained the last of his wine and stood, a little unsteady. “We must do this again. Next time, at my house. I will show you how to really enjoy yourself, Scarfield. Maybe you’ll even smile.”
“I doubt it,” Oscar replied, but he did, in fact, almost smile.
Adrian bowed, then swept out with the grace of a man who had practiced making exits his entire life.
Nancy and Oscar were left alone at the table, a brief and unfamiliar quiet stretching between them.
She cleared her throat. “He is a menace.”
Oscar said, “He is your friend now, apparently.”
Nancy looked up, startled by the note in his voice. Was that jealousy? She dismissed it; surely she imagined it.
“He is entertaining,” she said. “But you are… more interesting.”
Oscar arched a brow. “Is that so?”
She met his gaze. “Yes.”
They sat in silence, the sounds of the house settling around them.
Nancy felt her heart thud, strong and sure. Whatever the arrangement, whatever the contract or performance, there was something here. Something neither of them could ignore.
She wondered how long they could pretend otherwise.
After dinner, they all moved to the drawing room, and it was a different country altogether—warmer, slightly unmoored, and ringed with the faint scent of citrus.
Adrian immediately made himself comfortable on a sofa, one arm flung over the back as if he owned not just the furniture but the very concept of leisure itself.
Nancy perched at the piano bench, her skirts arranged just so, watching Oscar pour a measure of brandy for himself and for Adrian.
“So, Scarfield,” Adrian said, swirling the amber liquid. “What is the latest opus? I’ve heard you are composing again.”
Oscar’s hand stilled. “I don’t know who told you that.”
Adrian grinned. “A little hedgehog. Or perhaps it was the Duchess?”
Nancy blinked. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”
Oscar shot Adrian a look, then admitted, “It is nothing. I dabble, sometimes.”
“‘Dabble,’” Adrian repeated, savoring the word. “He says ‘dabble’ as if he isn’t the only peer in the House of Lords to have written a symphony by the age of fifteen.”
Nancy felt her mouth drop open. “You never mentioned you played.”
Oscar shrugged. “It is not of interest to most people.”
Adrian snorted. “Not true. Most people are fascinated. They just don’t believe it when they hear it. Scarfield is a prodigy. Absolute fiend at the keys.”
Oscar glowered, but Nancy’s curiosity ignited. “Will you play something?” She said it quickly, before she could be embarrassed by the request. “I should like to hear.”
Oscar eyed her, then the piano, as if weighing whether the instrument would detonate upon contact. “I do not perform. Not for an audience.”
Adrian’s grin grew. “But you will for your wife, surely.”
Oscar looked at Nancy. Something passed between them—defiance, challenge, or perhaps just resignation. He stepped over, removed his coat, and sat beside her on the bench. “Only one piece,” he said. “Then we return to normalcy.”
Adrian perched on the edge of his seat. “Define ‘normalcy,’” he muttered.
Oscar’s hands hovered above the ivory for a moment, the long fingers poised as if testing the air for currents.
Then, with no warning, the first notes poured out: swift, precise, almost sharp with purpose.
The music was something baroque, but it moved like a living thing—restless, twisting, never quite settling.
Nancy could only stare at his hands as they moved, the muscles of his forearms coiled with control.
She had expected technical proficiency. She hadn’t expected artistry. Or the way the music seemed to echo his personality: fierce, spare, refusing to be sentimental but, in its very restraint, heartbreakingly lovely.
Oscar played for a full minute, then stopped abruptly, lifting his hands from the keys with a finality that rang louder than the notes themselves.
Adrian whistled. “There it is. The coldest man in England and yet he plays like the very devil in love. You never fail to astonish me, Scarfield.”
Oscar said nothing, only flexed his fingers and set them neatly in his lap.
Nancy wanted, absurdly, to touch his hand again. She folded her own in her lap.
Adrian rose, then extended a hand to Nancy. “Come, Your Grace. Let us dance, before your husband’s mood sours entirely.”
Nancy was so startled that she almost refused. “There is no music,” she said, by way of protest.
Adrian lifted a brow. “There is always music. Scarfield, do us the honor.”
Oscar regarded them both, then, without a word, began to play a waltz—light at first, then gradually gathering in force. Adrian bowed, took Nancy’s hand, and swept her into a turn.
She followed, at first uncertain, then letting herself fall into the rhythm of the thing.
Adrian was a graceful partner: sure-footed, but not rigid, leading her easily around the small patch of cleared floor.
She caught Oscar’s eye as they passed the piano, but his gaze was fixed somewhere above her head, as if counting the beats and not the bodies.
“Does your husband always look as if he’s being forced to chew glass at a ball?” Adrian murmured.
Nancy stifled a laugh. “Only when he is actually enjoying himself. He finds it distasteful to admit.”
“Such a shame,” Adrian replied, guiding her through another spin. “You would make a magnificent pair, if only you both relented.”
Nancy felt herself blush, not from the remark, but from the way Adrian held her at the small of her back, firm and steady. It was perfectly proper, but it had been some time since anyone had touched her with such confidence.
“Are you always so forward, Lord Eastmere?” she asked.
He grinned. “Only when I sense a kindred spirit.”
She let herself enjoy it, just a little: the music, the movement, the way her body fit the pattern of the dance as though she’d been born to it.
Adrian made her laugh twice, once with a wicked impression of the Prince Regent, once with a muttered joke about Oscar’s “funeral face.” By the time the waltz neared its final measures, Nancy had nearly forgotten her own self-consciousness.
Until Oscar stopped playing.
The silence was abrupt, jarring. Nancy and Adrian came to a halt in the middle of the floor.
Oscar stood from the bench, expression inscrutable. “It is late,” he announced, his voice colder than the brandy in his glass. “We should call it a night.”
Adrian, still holding Nancy’s hand, looked at her, then back to Oscar. “Already? I was only just beginning to have fun.”
Oscar met his friend’s gaze, then said, “My wife and I wish to retire for the evening.”
There was something in his voice—possessive, almost territorial—that caught Nancy entirely off-guard.
Adrian, unoffended, bowed with mock elegance. “As you wish. Your Grace, it was a pleasure.” He released her hand, then moved to collect his coat.
Nancy felt a pang of guilt on Adrian’s behalf and of embarrassment for herself. She was about to protest, or at least soften the abruptness, but Adrian, as ever, rescued the situation.
He turned on his heel and said, “Thank you for the hospitality, Scarfield. And for the music. I cannot wait to see what you two concoct next.”
Oscar only nodded.
Adrian shot Nancy a final wink, then departed, whistling the waltz they had just danced.
The door closed, and the room seemed to shrink around them.
Nancy drew a slow breath, trying to find her equilibrium. “That was unnecessarily harsh,” she said, not quite facing Oscar. “He was our guest.”
Oscar’s voice was clipped. “He is always our guest, everywhere he goes.”
She stared at him. “That doesn’t explain why you chose tonight, of all nights, to be rude.”
He looked at her, and this time she saw it: the tension at the edge of his mouth, the restless energy in his hands. “You were enjoying yourself,” he said.
“Of course I was. That’s the entire purpose of dinner parties.”
He stepped closer, the muscle in his jaw working. “You enjoyed him.”
She bristled. “Why should that concern you? You said yourself this is a marriage of convenience. If you wish to keep me locked in an attic, say so, and I will pack a bag.”
Oscar made a sound—something between a growl and a laugh. “You are insufferable.”
She set her hands on her hips. “So are you.”
They stood, breathing the same air, the battle lines newly drawn.
Oscar said, softer this time, “He is not what he appears.”
Nancy was tired of riddles. “Neither are you,” she said. “But at least I prefer your brand of mystery.”
He looked at her, then looked away. “You should go to bed. We have an early morning.”
She refused to yield the last word. “You have a talent for ending things before they’re finished.”
Oscar’s lips twisted, as if he was about to say something devastating, but he only nodded. “Good night, Your Grace.”
She marched past him, out of the room, the echo of his disapproval still in her ears.