Harland was going to go mad with that women present. She was at the end of the table, but Lord save him if the entire world hadn’t shrunk to her and only her.

It was like he was so desperate to get the masked woman back he’d invent her even in the most impossible of circumstances.

Despite himself, he caught the woman’s profile in a sidelong glance. The line of her nose was straight and strong. That’s one thing he wouldn’t have been able to discern through a mask. The wretched things disguised the upper face too completely.

But that turn of her mouth. It was uncanny. It would have been quite enough to coax him into kindling a smoky wisp of hope. If only it hadn’t been outright impossible, which it was. Her? Here? That woman down the table? No. It couldn’t be. His fancies were toying with him.

The woman didn’t seem in very good spirits. She was pale and withdrawn, as if she carried some great worry on her mind. He’d probably frighten her if he tried speaking to her, which he had no reason or inclination to do. She belonged to the party of older women, the two whose connection to his aunt he’d have to enquire about later—a daughter or a niece perhaps. A Miss… Miss something. Later he’d have to ask his aunt what her name had been, although with little hope of being able to recall again a quarter of an hour later.

Pity she’d never married. Though of an age some might try to dismiss her as a spinster. With a touch of color in her cheeks and the attrition of a pleasantly rounding stone or two, she’d have the sort of face a man would enjoy gazing upon across a dinner table, even if she never made any expression other than sullen.

One thing was for certain. He was going to have to talk to the woman, if only to prove to himself once and for all that she wasn’t the one he sought.

He’d be nothing but a craven good-for-nothing if he did aught else.

* * *

After the meal, Abigail slipped away from the ladies retreating to the drawing room. The men, of course, stayed behind to their spirits and dull masculine talk, whatever that might have been. Someone had boasted on Lady Ingrahme’s behalf that Westmore was home to the finest conservatories in the county.

Seemed the perfect place for a reprieve—to find relief from the unending necessity of trying to shield the outside world from her inner tumult. Not that she’d want anyone to gain any insight into her interior workings, especially not on this matter, not truly, despite fantastical imaginings of throwing a fit at the table, demanding that the marquess acknowledge her as the one with whom he’d spend the last night.

She wouldn’t be missed, not for a short while. It was absurd she’d been made to come at all—as if Fate and Mrs. Gordon were in some sort of collusion to make this Christmas the worst in memory, little more than a cruel and painful farce.

The corridor was dark, but a dim golden glow emanated from the other end. Abigail caught the scent of the room, green and humid, before happening upon it. The conservatory was in the older section of Westmore Hall, designed from a repurposed ballroom when the new wing of the house had been built. The decoration from that former time hadn’t been done away with when the improvements had been undertaken, and the ornately gilded carvings caught the radiance of the candlelight and fires kept burning throughout all hours of the day to keep the temperature high.

She paused in the doorway, wood floor making an ungainly groan beneath her feet.

It was the Mandeville ballroom all over again, only reimagined as if through the lens of a vivid dream—the space smaller, the designs and ornamentations from a different age, condensation obscuring the view through the windows, the people replaced with a stunning array of plants, vines, and flowers. So many roses. No wonder their faint odor lingered so in the main part of the house.

Perhaps he’d appear at any moment to reprise their dance.

Abigail hardened herself. This wasn’t Mandeville house, this wasn’t a dream, and the idea of wishes coming true belonged to the province of fairy stories. Silly fairy stories at that, where nothing followed the proper rules of order.

She, Abigail Sutton, lived here and now, where proper rules of order were observed, and rightfully so. Those who dared flout the principles of behavior that bound good society—those who might steal one night in the hope of fulfilling frivolous fancies—those people would only reap what they deserved.

How far better it would have been to have never tasted what it might have been like to attain a far happier conclusion to the chance she’d taken when she’d slipped on that mask.

Wandering through the clusters of unnamable exotic plants, she came to the bank of windows and, with the side of her hand, wiped away the trailing droplets of water, glass chilled from the other side where the outside air had only winter as its master.

Another clear night had fallen outside, the last hints of twilight long since faded into nothing, revealing a blanket of stars. Among the visible bevy so much more innumerable here than what the lights of London’s night partially obscured, it was impossible to pick out the one she’d wished upon only the night before.

Perhaps she should pick another. Make a new wish.

No. She was done with foolish wishes.

She straightened her shoulders. In the deepest recesses of her heart, there were no true regrets. Nothing over which to feel any self-pity. She’d had one night, one glorious night. It stretched her nerves to their fraying point to be so unbearably near him again so soon and be so locked in silence, but this too would pass, leaving her with the cherished memory of what they’d shared. Even knowing now how the one night with the marquess would end, she’d do everything again, from start to finish, without a single alteration or amendment.

That’s when the low notes of a familiar masculine voice tumbled through her being, eliciting warmth through her veins and a shiver through her spine.

“Miss S, I presume?”

* * *

It was her. In the low light of the conservatory, there was no mistaking the color of that hair. The way her head tilted upward as she studied the night beyond, there was no mistaking the gentle curve of the nape of that neck, either. And when he came up behind her, there was no mistaking that scent.

Harland’s entire being went taut. Of all the absurd unlikelihood—of all the chances—of all the inanely impossible odds, here she was. All he had to do was reach out and he could touch her.

She turned.

“This is the first time I’ve been able to discern the true color of your eyes.” They were a deep shade of brown, the rich darkness of which would have been perfectly obscured by the shadows of the mask.

“My lord.” Her gaze dropped, her color going high.

There were no denials, no claims of being ignorant of that which he spoke. How could there have been? It was as if the recognition seared them both together in an invisible binding threatening to consume them both in hellish fire should they so much as attempt denying everything between them.

“It’s Abigail, isn’t it? Abigail Sutton?” Funny. Once he’d recognized this woman as being the woman, her name had floated up in his mind, emblazoned in flame. No need to ask his aunt to remind him. He’d never forget again.

Abigail. Such a simple name for such unconventional beauty. And yet nothing could have fit more perfectly. Humility hung in the name—an unassuming, unshowy quality that was her through and through.

“Yes, my lord.”

“Sutton.” He shook his head, half mad when at last all the loose threads wove together. “You’re the gamekeeper’s daughter.” And what an insurmountable gulf existed between them. “Now I know why I thought I remembered you. I did. You grew up on the Thurber estate. You spent all your time with old Lord Thurber’s young daughter. What was her name? Sarah?” Harland’s father’s seat—now his—bordered Thurber lands.

“I can’t believe you remember, my lord.”

“Yes, well. I’m not that old. There was that one occasion on which you pushed me into the pond and ran away laughing, didn’t you?”

“I was very young, my lord, and that was a very, very long time ago.”

“You ruined my new silk waistcoat.” He’d been rather puffed up about the thing. It’d been the same flashy color as the green on a male mallard’s throat, and he’d fancied himself so grown up.

“What business did you have wearing it by the pond, my lord?”

That had been his father’s question exactly. Although young Harland had claimed he’d slipped on a mossy rock instead of admitting the truth, not knowing how his father would have reacted to his having been so thoroughly defeated by a girl in one easy swoop.

The passage of time had considerably altered his feelings on what it would mean to be at Abigail Sutton’s mercy.

In some ways, he already was. If she knew the power she held over him…what he would do for one more taste of her lips…

Harland struggled to keep a cool head. “I think we’re a bit beyond that ‘my lord’ business, don’t you think?”

“I think formality exists with good reason and I’d like to observe proper behavior now more than ever.”

Proper behavior. Yes. This from the woman whose cunny he’d tasted not a full twenty-four hours ago. “What are you afraid of?”

“Afraid?” Her gaze met his. There was iron there—real force of will. She didn’t care for being called afraid, that much was plain enough. “I’m not afraid. I just don’t see as there is anything to discuss is all.”

His stare fell upon her lips. “All things considered, discussion wouldn’t make my list of ideal activities, either—”

She went a deep crimson, no doubt understanding his meaning perfectly.

“—however, in this case, I believe discussion would be prudent.”

* * *

Proper behavior, indeed. What a liar she was.

If he suggested she turn around so he could lift her skirts and rut into her from behind, she wouldn’t be able to refuse.

Her blood pounded as if he’d already moved to claim her.

A good hard and furious tup would be far preferable to the idea of being made to talk with the man. All except for the fact that perhaps—and this was a rather significantly large perhaps, depending on the direction of the conversation, which could as easily encourage the devilish delights as quell her yearning for them—discussion might save her from herself and all those wicked things she’d go to her knees to beg him to do to her.

To be this close to him…to look upon him in open recognition as he looked upon her. If she weren’t careful, she’d succumb to a fainting spell for the very first time in her life.

His eyes. Who knew that the human iris could capture such a shade?

“What happened happened. I have no interest in discussing anything, my lord.”

“You can’t possibly want last night to have been our only night. I don’t.”

“I do. You forget, my lord, you are a man and a marquess. I’m a woman with respectable employment—employment I’m eager to keep, I might add.” She drew herself up. There were a hundred solid, advantageous reasons for saying what she was about to say, all of them requiring immediate deprivation for the long-term good. “I won’t be your mistress.”

“What if I want more?”

“The daughter of a gamekeeper and a great lord such as yourself? What more could there be? Nothing. Believe me when I say that I would be tempted if you offered to make me your mistress, my lord.”

He glowered, looking away, jaw hardening. “Then why wouldn’t you?”

“Because one day you’d cast me off. Then where would I be? I have to think about myself—I have to think about my security over the whole span of my life.” When he opened his mouth to respond, she held up a hand. “It’s better this way. We’ll always be each other’s secret. I can’t speak for you, but I can speak for myself, and I want you to know…” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “You’ll always be my very best secret, my lord.”