“Do you deny that he’s called on you here?” Miss Compton asked with building impatience. “And more than once?”

“Cordial visits made during Lady Belwood’s receiving hours,” Effie said dismissively. “There have been many such calls since I arrived in London.”

“Doubtless there have been. And doubtless someone will have told you that Lord Mannering and I have had a secret understanding for nearly a year.”

Effie resisted remarking that it couldn’t be very secret if everyone knew about it. “Indeed, they have not,” she said instead. “And even if they had, it wouldn’t have changed my behavior.”

The color in Miss Compton’s cheeks darkened. “So, you admit it.”

“That I’ve met the gentleman? Yes. It doesn’t follow that I have designs on the poor man.”

“Then where did you go during the musicale? Where did he go?”

“Perhaps he went to play billiards?” Effie suggested. “Or to smoke a cigar? Or perhaps he was availing himself of the necessary?”

Miss Compton flushed scarlet. It was the height of indelicacy to mention anything even remotely related to the privy.

Effie gave her a faint look of sympathy. There was no point in baiting the girl. And no sport in it, either. Miss Compton may have wealth and power, but in this moment, she was wholly at the mercy of her own emotions. It didn’t serve Effie’s aims to prolong her misery.

“I can think of a dozen reasons he might have left the drawing room, and none of them have anything to do with me searching for my hairpin,” Effie said. “Indeed, if I were a betting sort, I’d wager he was in the library with Mr. Royce and Lord Haverford, discussing their charitable endeavors.”

“Mr. Royce?” Miss Compton was incredulous. “That strange man my father invited? The one with the pale dead eyes?”

A twinge of indignation took Effie unaware. She had thought the same about Gabriel’s eyes on first meeting him. His gaze had been so cold, glassy, and distant—almost cruel in its detachment. But she didn’t like to hear anyone else describing him so, particularly this spoiled young lady. Not now that Effie knew him better. And not after what had happened between them on the terrace.

Effie had been up half the night replaying the kiss they’d shared.

And not only the kiss.

She had relived the way he’d rescued her, too, both cursing her helplessness and puzzling over his gentleness. The way he’d braced her with his body on the wisteria. The strength of his arms. The fierce burr of his voice in her ear as he’d returned her safely to solid ground.

She hadn’t seen him after they parted in the garden. He’d never returned to the musicale. He’d simply gone, leaving behind his ominous promise: “I’ll find you again.”