Chapter Five #4
Her eyes moved over the benches, taking note of London’s colorful masses, many of whom returned her curious notice.
She rested her gaze on the broad back of a man who did not.
Judging from the way he let his female companion rest her head almost fully against his shoulder, they weren’t the kind of people who Lady Sarah would have pointed out on their last visit.
She turned away and glanced toward the back of the box. The crowd’s attention was a sticky, chilling a sensation almost akin to an unexpected encounter with a collection of spiders’ webs.
She couldn’t gracefully exit now, could she? At least not without making herself even more a part of the show…
The young man seated at her right caught her attention. His eyes moved slowly down her person, lingering long enough on her breasts for her to unconsciously hunch her shoulders.
Confused, she glanced to Willard, who appeared to perceive nothing wrong. She cast a desperate gaze to Lady Eltenham, but the lady had closed her eyes and didn’t appear to have any intention of opening them.
Calm down.
She was in a respected peer’s heir’s company, a well-liked and influential young man. A man with whom she’d willingly danced just last night. Moreover, as absent in mind as his mother appeared to be, she was, in physical form, fully present.
Much as Millie might wish to cry out for help, she was not in obvious peril. And if she cried out for no reason at all, she deserved to be Bedlam-bound for shaming her family.
She gave Lord Willard a stiff nod of thanks and then gracefully took the chair he offered.
Outwardly, she calmly fixed her eyes on the stage. Inwardly, she continued to wonder why she felt as if she’d unwittingly entered a trap.
*
Just after the lights dimmed, Neville thought he heard Mrs. Cartwright hum. As they were sitting very close to the violins, he couldn’t be sure the hum wasn’t just a reverberation.
Neville flinched as she rested her head against his shoulder.
“A gentleman and two ladies have just entered the box,” she whispered. “The gentleman’s shape seems right, but, in this light, I can’t discern the color of his hair.”
The man beside them—who’d earlier grimaced at Neville’s coldness toward Mrs. Cartwright—glanced askance. Then, he harrumphed, prompting a shush from his female companion.
“All the luck,” the man said under his breath.
Neville turned his head, as if pressing his lips to Mrs. Cartwright’s brow. The angle was not right, but he dared not make his turn any more obvious. Since his companion had just been studying Willard’s box, if he looked now, their unusually specific attention might be noted.
There wasn’t any rush. They’d be here for hours yet.
“Thank you,” he whispered back.
No matter what she discovered, she’d brought him close.
So, so close.
Even though she’d already communicated her message, she left her head in the same position, partly on his shoulder, partly against his chest. Neville stiffened, attempting to communicate displeasure, but could do nothing about their positions short of rudely pushing her away.
She did not move. So, they remained as they were, looking like lovers. Tawdry. Overeager. Careless of their public dignity. Everything Neville fought, when in the presence of the lady he truly desired.
But shocking as their positions would have been if he’d been in his usual place in a box up above, he noticed a few others around them taking similar advantage of the dark. The man next to them wrapped his arm around his lady’s waist, trailing his fingers up and down her long glove.
Neville swallowed roughly before averting his gaze.
Why must he closely follow rules the men around him seemed perfectly willing to break?
He heated with a surge of jealousy—not for the woman leaning against him, but for the easy expression of intimacy she displayed, an intimacy he could never allow himself to share with Millicent.
He forced his mind back to the problems at hand, pondering, instead, the identities of the ladies Lord Willard might have brought.
They couldn’t be young ladies, considering the presence of all those bucks. Willard had implied he’d spent the morning’s early hours carousing in brothels with those same men. Surely, even he would not expose a gently bred young lady to them as a group.
His mother, Lady Eltenham, perhaps? With one of her friends?
He sighed in sorrow for the ladies, forced to spend the evening in the company of such men.
The music paused, and the sound of Willard’s distinctive whisper echoed down from above.
“Your seat, my sweet.”
Neville, along with everyone else in the pit around them, turned.
Millicent?
His blood went so cold so fast, he must have made an unintentional noise, and Millicent’s gaze dropped from the stage to him.
He snapped his head back around before she could recognize him.
“That’s the man,” Mrs. Cartwright whispered. “That’s the man who lures pretty merchants’ daughters to their ruin. Several, in fact, including Temperence, the young woman you seek. I’d wager he’s brought his next victim with him tonight.”
Neville turned to look up at Millie. He swallowed roughly in horror.
Over Neville’s dead body.