Theresa Romain: Season for Temptation

“But I really do like it,” insisted the young lady. “You look quite noble, if that’s the right word for a viscount. I’m well aware that my own appearance is out of sorts, which is another thing I meant to remedy before your arrival.”

She brushed an errant lock of blond hair from her forehead, looking rueful. “I intended to have my hair pinned up properly, but perhaps you know how it is when you are with young children. I’m always having to crawl after something or other, and it is just so much easier not to attempt misguided elegance when one is alone with family. Which I suppose you soon will be, but still, first impressions can be so lasting, and I didn’t want to come across as a complete hoyden despite the possible truth of the matter.”

The cheerful lilt returned to her voice by the end of this speech, and James was again transfixed by the play of her eager expression as she talked, the curve of her mouth, her animated hands.

Her hands. As if time slowed to a crawl, James watched as one of her hands reached for his.

He stared at her hand on his, feeling burned by her cool fingers. It was a whisper of a touch, but his skin prickled under it anyway.

But she was talking to him. What was she saying? He mentally shook himself to pay attention, trying to ignore the fingers holding his.

“Louisa seems to like you very much,” the young woman added, still holding James’s hand in her impulsive grasp. “Since I know she likes me too, I daresay you can tolerate me as well as she does, and we’ll both get to like each other.”

Her innocent words acted on James like a slap across the face.

Louisa .

His mind reeled. How quickly he had forgotten all his nervousness, and even his very surroundings, while talking to this girl. He drew his hand back slowly. “We’ll get to like each other,” he repeated, avoiding his companion’s avid gaze.

He feared that was too true.

He had to remember he was here to arrange a swift marriage with Louisa, not to banter with. . who was this young woman, anyway? She was obviously a member of the family, but she looked nothing like his tall, elegant fiancée.

“I’m sure we will,” he replied at last. His voice came out stiff and formal. The stuffy tone disgusted him, but he needed to place some distance between them.

“Forgive my ignorance,” James began again in his best I-am-a-viscount manner, “but. . who are you?” It was something a viscount probably ought never to have said, but really, sometimes it was so much easier just to cut to the essence of a subject.

“Who am I?” she repeated. “Why, have we really been sitting here these minutes and I never said? Oh, my lord, you must think I’m the rudest person you ever met.”

“Not even close,” he replied. “Remember all the words I know. I’ve been in some very rude company.” Guilt twinged through him as the playful words fell from his lips. He really shouldn’t talk with her like this.

“Rude company. .” She gave a sigh of pure envy. “You’re so lucky. Anyway, I’m Julia, Louisa’s sister.”

“Then you are lucky, too,” he replied automatically. He was still confused, though. How had his dark-haired fiancée wound up with this tiny blond slip of a sister?

Julia seemed to read his confusion on his face, because she added, “I’m not really a blood relative, but I feel as close to Louisa as if we were. I mean, what I imagine I would feel like with a full-blood sister, though neither of us has one. Just half-blood. Though I feel as if they are full relations, too. Anyway, Louisa and I are stepsisters. Do you have any sisters?”

James restrained a smile as her cheerful words bubbled over him. “Yes, one elder sister,” he answered when Julia finally wound down. “Gloria, the dowager Viscountess Roseborough.”

Ah, Gloria. The smile dropped from his face, and he chose his next words carefully. Gloria’s troubles had already been laid out before the entire ton , but they might not yet have made it to the Oliver household in the country.

“My sister is rather a. . well, a serious-minded person, and very conscious of propriety. But then, her life has not been easy of late.”

He berated himself for saying too much and averted the subject. “Still, I can vouch from my own family experience that being related to someone need not make you close, and I’m sure the reverse is true, too.”

Julia beamed at this affirmation, and a jolt of delight shot through James. She’d accepted him; she’d perceived his reply as honest. Perhaps he could have told her more, after all.

Just as Julia opened her mouth to respond, a footman entered the room with a large tea tray. Immediately on his heels marched three girls and a boy of decreasing size.

Julia’s attention was distracted by these new arrivals. “Ah, I thought someone would soon join us in here! We’ve all been wild with curiosity to meet you, you know. Hello, children. I suppose you want some biscuits?”

She motioned to the footman to set down the heavily laden tray on a table next to the sofa, which he did with an audible groan of relief.

Julia turned to James and introduced the lineup of eager young children with great formality and flourish.

“Lord Matheson, may I present Miss Elise, Miss Emilia, Miss Anne, and Master Tom.” As Julia indicated each child, a well-grown and pretty girl of perhaps nine or ten years curtsied properly, a smaller and more saucy-looking version tipped him an equally fine gesture, a chubby fiveyear-old shyly flounced her dress and ducked her head, and a small boy bent into a giant bow, teetering as he hauled himself upright again.

James had long experience with small children, and dutifully matched the solemnity of young Tom’s bow. “Misses Elise, Emilia, and Anne, and Master Tom, I am delighted to make your acquaintance. Would you care for some. .” He trailed off, and peered at the tea tray. “What type of biscuits do we have?”

“Ginger and shortbread,” Julia replied, parceling the treats out onto plates. “And they’ve given us watercress sandwiches, too. I can’t imagine why. No one ever wants to eat them.”

“Actually, I rather like them myself,” James admitted. He pitched his voice casually, mindful of the eight small ears and eyes now regarding him, but disappointment nagged at him. He wanted to continue talking to Julia, to know what she would have said next had they been left alone. He had never felt such an immediate pull toward another person. Did she feel it, too? He wanted to grasp her hands again, to feel the gentle shock of her touch. Given a few more minutes, he might have unburdened himself completely.

Don’t be a fool, James . His burden was his own, his and his family’s, and not to be dumped onto young women he had only just met. He sighed again, but thankfully none of the family members noticed in the bustle over biscuits and cups.

With a great effort, he wrenched his mind away from the present, back to a silent library six weeks before, and a dark-haired young woman named Louisa Oliver who had hidden there to escape a crowded ballroom. The ballroom in which he’d been bidden to find a wife.

But Julia’s voice interrupted his thoughts almost at once. “Children, why don’t you sit on the sofa over there to eat your biscuits? You may fidget to your heart’s content, and Lord Matheson and I will pretend not to notice a thing.”

Amid a chorus of giggles, a bustle of cups, plates, and crumbs, the children scooted off across the room as Julia had indicated.

She laughed softly as she poured out two more cups of fragrant dark tea.

“Heavens, we are coming at you all wrong. I am so sorry, my lord. The only explanation I can think of is that we are out of practice in receiving Louisa’s fiancés.” She smiled at James. “Milk or lemon?”