Giles would never come back to her. She had shamed him, rightly or wrongly, and he was gone forever.

No more waltzes with Giles. No more squabbles.

That was what she wanted. Except . . .

She couldn’t sleep. In fact, she may never sleep again. Even thinking of him made aching, desperate hunger flood her body, keeping her awake, staring at the ceiling. Lust was overwhelming.

You didn’t have to like someone to desire them, and she desired Giles.

A wave of sadness twisted her stomach. Her rejection of the earl was as good as saying that she, at the age of twenty-five, was giving up . . . all of that. An erotic life. A love life. A family of her own. If she couldn’t imagine the act with Giles, she certainly couldn’t do it with anyone else, even Viscount Templeton. No matter how cuddly he was, she shuddered at the thought.

The Addisons’ drawing room was crowded with gentlewomen. Cleo sprang to her feet and walked to meet her after Yasmin was announced.

“Good morning,” Yasmin said. She dropped into a curtsy—and swayed.

“Darling, what is the matter?” Cleo hissed, catching her arm.

“I haven’t been sleeping.”

“Shall I send my guests home?”

Yasmin managed a faint smile. “Of course not. That would ensure a scandal.”

“Come sit beside me,” Cleo said, towing her across the room. Yasmin sank down on the settee, registering numbly that the worst possible pair—Mrs. Turing and Lady Dunlap—were seated opposite. United in their loathing of Yasmin, they dared not give her the cut direct in front of Cleo. Instead, they nodded frigidly.

For once in her life, Yasmin turned her head away and cut them.

Why should she be endlessly polite to poisonous women who were so eager to hurt her feelings?

“Have a scone and some tea,” Cleo said. “You look exquisite as always, but if you’ll forgive me, darling, you are not yourself. You are too thin.”

“I’d rather not have a scone, thank you. I feel nauseated this morning.”

“The last time I was queasy was when I was carrying my dear son Edwin,” Mrs. Turing muttered to her companion.

Yasmin’s head was spinning with sadness, but she was tired, bone-tired, of nasty whispers. She met the woman’s mean eyes and lost her head. “Are you insinuating that I might have conceived a child with your poetry-writing son, Mrs. Turing?”

“God forbid!”

“I have never encouraged his poetry, nor have I ever found myself alone in a room with him, no matter how much he attempted to inveigle me.”

“Thank goodness,” Mrs. Turing said, her sour smile growing larger.

“You and I both know that I wouldn’t be the bride in that scenario!” Yasmin flashed back.

Too late, she heard indrawn breaths around them.

And: “I knew it!”

Yasmin turned her head slowly and realized for the first time that Lydia was in the room. Not only that, but she had leaped from her chair.

“I told my brother that you could not keep a secret. I told him that you were a liar!”