The man passed her, head down as he focused on straightening his waistcoat. His foot bumped into a chair and his head popped up. “Pardon me.”
A gust of momentary laughter rushed from him as he realized he’d apologized to a chair, but then his gaze swung sideways and connected with Kit’s. The small, self-deprecating smile fell from his face to be replaced by the thunderous frown that hadn’t aged a bit. “Katherine.”
“Father.” She tilted her head sideways in a gesture that fell somewhere between acknowledgment and respect.
Then there was silence. Long, heavy silence. After all these years, did they have nothing to say to each other? Even in the absence of onlookers? Kit swallowed. Had he cried for the lost years as she had? The midnight book discussions? Their long walks through the parks?
Perhaps he hadn’t. It had been at least five years since Kit had acknowledged feeling any sort of loss. She’d thought herself well and truly done with those thoughts, so the spark of hope that flared in her heart surprised her even as she chided herself for allowing it. No good could come of it, just as the desire to throw herself into his arms was ridiculous and futile. It didn’t matter how badly she simply wanted to breathe, to be held by someone who cared, to be innocent and naïve.
Those things were lost to her, and the hard look on her father’s face proved they weren’t coming back.
That sad truth broke her free from the strange emotional hold that had settled over her feet. She stepped forward, intending to continue on her path from the room and out of the house.
“You’ll not get any more money from me.” His voice smashed the silence with the force of a hammer.
Anger welled within her, an emotion she hadn’t even felt when he’d cast her out all those years ago. She’d understood, made excuses, rationalized it all from his point of view. But now to deny a monetary request she had never made? She wanted to lash out. Make him guilty. If it worked, they could use the money.
“Why not?” She took her sternest pose. The one she used when staring down irresponsible young men, careless young women, and neglectful fathers. “I’ve asked nothing from you in thirteen years. Why shouldn’t you be called on to support me, your own flesh and blood?”
Thirteen years. The same amount of time she forced other men to take care of the children they didn’t want. And yet it had never occurred to her to force her father to do the same.
He huffed. “We made an agreement.”
“And I have kept it,” Kit bit out.
“Yet here you are.”
That was a statement she couldn’t argue with. She had agreed not to return to London. “I had business.”
He scoffed. His tone was ugly. “Business. What business could you have in a society ball?”
“I had to make my way in this world. Did you think my dowry large enough to live on forever? It wasn’t that big, Papa.”
He growled. He actually growled at her. The childhood name she’d used for him must have struck a chord. Tears threatened. Had it really come to this? An ugly estrangement from her father? Suddenly she couldn’t do it anymore. She couldn’t manipulate her father the way she did the unscrupulous cads she forced into supporting their children.
“You should have found some hapless country cit to marry you. You were pretty enough when you were younger. He would have overlooked a scandal then.”
Was he saying she looked old now? She certainly felt it. Still, perhaps she had it in her to manipulate him after all. At least enough to make him sleep a little bit worse tonight.
It took Graham a full five minutes to extricate himself from Oliver, who was intent on teasing Graham about his new imaginary friend. He’d finally made his excuses and simply walked away while Oliver tried to control his laughter to avoid the censure of society’s matrons.
Graham couldn’t care less about society’s matrons at the moment or what they might be whispering behind their fans. He wanted to find the woman in green.
He rubbed his hands together as he stepped out of the ballroom. The white evening gloves pulled against his fingers as the fabric caught itself, and he resisted the urge to tug them off and stuff them in his pocket. One last glance over his shoulder confirmed there was no bold slash of green in the ballroom. So where had she gone?
The house was large, built before Mayfair had become crowded with terraced housing. That meant it had a ballroom large enough to fit the entire party and plenty of unused rooms where someone could hide if they were so inclined.
And since Graham wasn’t quite willing to wander aimlessly around his host’s home, he was left with nothing to do but make his way toward the door and try to convince himself she hadn’t actually been imaginary.
If he’d made her up, wouldn’t he have at least given her a name? What would it say about him if his mind invented a woman who then soundly rejected him?
“Get out.”
The angry voice had Graham stumbling to a halt and looking around to take his bearings. He was near the retiring rooms, just around the corner from a parlor that had been lit and prepared for guests needing a moment of respite.
Or apparently guests needing to have a semi-public confrontation.
“Get out,” the man repeated, “and stay out. Stay out of London. We had an agreement, and I expect you to at least have enough honor left to keep it.”
Graham frowned and leaned around the edge of the open archway. He recognized the man standing near a cluster of chairs. The tension rising from Lord FitzGilbert’s shoulders rolled across the room in waves until Graham even felt the need to adjust his cravat. The baron was blocking Graham’s view of whoever was making him angry, which actually wasn’t that hard to do. The man’s temper was rather notorious. But to make a man agree to leave London?
“And if I don’t?”
Right, then. Not a man. Graham nearly tumbled headfirst through the archway as the feminine voice sank into his brain. It was familiar. He knew the woman.
Graham’s attention snapped to the floor where the lines of a brilliant green skirt were visible.
Lord FitzGilbert growled. “If Hamilton has brought you here to befoul my plans, so help me, I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” She stepped around him and unbundled her cloak. “What could you possibly do to hurt me now?”
The baron sputtered, trying to mention something about Australia, but the mystery woman simply walked away without a second glance, draping her cloak across her shoulders as she went. “You aren’t worth my time,” she said over her shoulder.
Once through the archway, she lifted her eyebrows as her blue gaze connected with Graham’s, but she didn’t pause and didn’t slow down. A moment later, she was disappearing down the stairs.
Graham followed her, trying to see the dark cloak among the clusters of people in the hall below. Servants ran to and fro, fetching cloaks and wraps to keep people warm on the short walk to their waiting carriages. Finally he found her amid a group near the door. She flipped her hood over her head and followed them out into the night.
It took him longer than he’d hoped to wade through the people and convince the servants he really did intend to leave without waiting for his greatcoat. Yes, it would be embarrassing to come back for it later, but if he lost the only thread he had on the enigmatic lady in green, he had a feeling he’d regret it for the rest of his life.
He almost lost it anyway. Shadows stretched across the street outside, providing numerous places for a woman wrapped in dark grey velvet to hide.
But God was of a mood to bless Graham tonight because he saw a flutter of green in the light of one of the carriage lanterns as the lady he was searching for crossed the street.
Graham took off in that direction. She was rather good at slipping away, which sent a spear of worry into the middle of his obsessive fascination. Something new didn’t necessarily mean something better.
He followed her down the street and into a square. He didn’t even know which square, since he hadn’t paid that
much attention to where tonight’s ball had been, simply gave the direction to his coachman.
What did he think he was doing? He knew nothing about this woman—well, nearly nothing. Didn’t know where she was going or even really where they were. What little he did know about her didn’t point to her being someone he could really build a relationship and a life with, so why was he chasing her?
Was he truly so bored that he would tangle his life with that of a woman who could be involved in all sorts of unpleasant endeavors?
“We’ll be having your valuables now. Don’t think to run from us again.”
Graham sighed and looked toward the sky. Perhaps God wasn’t in such a blessing mood this evening, but it was Graham’s own fault. If he’d stayed where he was expected to be, he’d still be mired in idle conversation, not hearing angry men throwing threats around in the shadows. What was it with men being so aggressive tonight?
He’d been robbed by thugs of this ilk before—who in London hadn’t? A flicker of sympathy for tonight’s unfortunate victim warred with a gratefulness that it wasn’t him.
“If we have to catch ye a third time, we’ll not ask so nicely.”
Graham frowned. That sounded a bit more persistent than the average park footpad.
“As you can see, gentlemen, I’ve no baubles to give you. Not even a reticule at my disposal.”
He knew that voice. It had never graced his ears before tonight, but he’d heard it quite a bit over the past hour. And it was a common factor in all the situations with angry men he’d come across. It would seem he really should let the woman run out of his life the way she wanted to.
But not before he made sure she could do so safely. He moved quietly toward the voices, tucked in a small copse of trees at the corner of the park.
“I’m afraid I have nothing for you.” The woman’s voice had grown grim now, dangerous. Gone was the teasing lilt he’d heard behind the trees in the ballroom, gone was the haughty disdain from the parlor. In its place was a voice cold and hard enough to send chills down Graham’s spine. And he wasn’t even the target.
“Oh, I think you do.” One of the thugs laughed in that creepy manner that Graham had never understood. He’d always imagined the villains in gothic romances laughing like that.
“No, I really don’t.”
Graham was close enough to make out the outlines of three people now, and one of them, the one with skirt and cloak billowing about her knees, had just pulled a knife.
About the Author
Kristi Ann Hunter graduated from Georgia Tech with a degree in computer science but always knew she wanted to write. Kristi is an RWA Rita Award–winning author and a finalist for the Christy Award and the Georgia Romance Writers Maggie Award for Excellence. She lives with her husband and three children in Georgia. Find her online at www.kristiannhunter.com.
Books by Kristi Ann Hunter
HAWTHORNE HOUSE
A Lady of Esteem (novella)
A Noble Masquerade
An Elegant Façade
An Uncommon Courtship
An Inconvenient Beauty
HAVEN MANOR
A Search for Refuge*
A Defense of Honor
*e-novella only
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A Search for Refuge Page 13