She shrugged. “All I know is that unmarried ladies are not invited.”
“I see,” he said at length. “A happy coincidence, perhaps? Didn’t I mention my mother is to attend as well? I’m sure she would be happy to serve as your chaperone.”
“Oh?” She exhaled, relieved. His invitation could not besoimproper if his mother were to attend, too!
“I know I’m being unforgivably forward,” he continued. “But rules can be so very tiresome. We are of like mind in that regard, are we not? You’ve such anadmirablyindependent spirit.”
Shyly, she smiled back. “We are indeed.”
“I thought you might be eager for a night away from all your sisters. Was I wrong?”
“No,” she replied carefully. A night out, onenotsurrounded by family? Surely, she need not decline, simply because the way he asked her would not pass the strictest of tests? “Thank you for your kind invitation. I will accept, provided Lady Redver consents.”
His eyes twinkled. “I have full faith in your persuasive abilities.” He bowed again. “And now, I’ll bid you a proper farewell.”
She offered her hand. He grasped her fingers in a grip so strong she couldn’t have freed herself had she wished.
Did she wish?
She watched, fascinated into stillness. He lowered his lips until they met the back of her lifted glove with such warmth, they burned through the kidskin…
“Until tonight,” he said.
He continued walking in the other direction. He was—she tilted her head—whistling. She listened until she recognized an old children’s song. A nursery rhyme? Surely not!
A powerful young gentleman wasn’t likely to be singing such a thing.
If he had been, however…
How sweet.
She looked down at her hand, curious as to why his kiss still burned.
She rubbed at the spot, unsure if she was attempting to catch the warmth of his lips, or trying, instead, to wipe the lingering sensation of them away.
Either way, she must prepare for an unexpected adventure. And she’d have more than a little convincing to do if she wanted Eliza to agree to the scheme. Best not to tell Cassie of theencounter at all, just in case Neville had warned Harbury against Willard.
Just then, Adrian and his curricle rounded the corner.
Ah, yes, Adrian!
There’swhere she would begin her campaign.
Chapter Five
Neville approached TheRoyal Theater, Covent Garden, moving in and out of shadows generated by the light pouring out from the theater’s large rectangular windows and emanating from the lamps resting atop the iron fence posts.
Opened in 1808, the theater’s present incarnation was slightly older than London’s other licensed playhouse, The Royal Theater, Drury Lane. Before the season commenced, Neville’s friend Harris, one of the theater’s managers, had taken Neville and Asquith through the theater’s many chambers, staircases, lounges and corridors while pointing out the nods to Classical structures Architect Robert Smirke had included.
Tonight, however, thrill-seeking theatergoers did not need a private tour to appreciate the more obvious of Smirke’s Classical Orders. Simply passing beneath the soaring portico’s giant columns, a replica of the Grecian temple of Minerva, was enough to give anyone an increased sense of consequence, or at the very least, a feeling of awe.
Neville cast his gaze up over the crowd, admiring the statue of the Goddess of Wisdom, and vaguely wishing she could bestow on him her gift. He was on his way, in disguise, to meet a woman of dubious reputation. He needed all the discernment he could muster. And yet, his mind repeatedly strayed to another lady…one presumably safely at home.
His thoughts, he feared, were no longer rational at all.
At some point in Harbury’s library, he’d had anIdeaabout himself and Millicent Wainwright. HisIdea, though formless substance at first, had thickened with Millicent’s challenge to betorrid, only to be further condensed by Harbury’s not-so-subtle hints.
Now Neville’sIdeasquatted, fat and heavy, in his mind.