If her mother had her way, she’d coordinate a match between Lettie and Lord Exmoor. It was a future she didn’t look forward to with any real enthusiasm—with no enthusiasm at all. Alas, if she were to be anything more than the spinster aunt reliant upon the generosity of her brother, then she’d do well to be grateful for the marquess’s interest.

Footfalls echoed in the corridor, and Lettie and the duchess looked over just as a young maid entered.

The woman dropped a curtsy. “Lady Eloise has requested your presence for a moment in the receiving room, Your Grace.”

The duchess set down her cup, and Lettie stood to go, but the older woman waved her back down. “No. No. I’ll be along shortly. Please, do not rush off.”

A moment later, Lettie found herself alone in Anthony’s parlor. Setting aside her teacup, she came to her feet and slowly wandered about the pretty parlor, heading over to the window.

She stopped and looked out.

An army of carriages belonging to Eloise’s impressive army of suitors lined either side of the pavement. Lettie’s own conveyance had parked at the far back of one row.

Distractedly, she touched a fingertip to the windowpane where a large bead of rain had pinged. She followed its winding path to the bottom of the sill until it disappeared.

She’d come this morning with the intention of speaking with Anthony’s mother, but with the secret hope of seeing the gentleman again.

Because she needed answers.

Because she had to know just why he’d disappeared from her family’s life.

He’d insisted that he was the one to blame for that absence and the break in his friendship with Rhys, and yet, she could not believe that.

It had to be more.

She intended to find out, and when she did, she also aimed to reunite the two dunderheads, who’d been far closer even than Lettie’s brothers.

And she would do it, too.

She’d been the one to help matchmake her best and once-brokenhearted friend, Alice, with Lettie’s roguish brother Rhys, whose heart had also been broken, she’d learned, though she didn’t know the details of why.

A new echo of footfalls, powerful and deliberate, sounded outside the parlor, and her heart raced. She knew it was Anthony, even before he appeared in the entryway of the room.

“A bloody swarm of guests I’ve never—” He stopped in midsentence as his gaze landed on the tray and teacups.

“Hullo, Anthony,” Lettie called from her place at the window, and his gaze swung over to her. When no return greeting was forthcoming, she added, “It is me.”

“I see that,” he said, his features impassive.

With his eyes sparkling with shock and a muscle ticking at the corner of his right eye, he glanced over his shoulder.

Considering escape.