He was older—perhaps sixty years or so—and his halting, uneven gait was oddly familiar. She waited for him to turn, so she’d have a better view of his face, and when he did, her blood turned to ice. The thin, drawn lips, the deep crevices in his cheeks—they belonged to the man she’d collided with in the alley. The man who must have her journal.

Terrified that he’d recognize her, she quickly spun, then swayed on her feet. “Sophie,” Mama said, her voice laced with worry. “Are you feeling well?”

“Just a little dizzy. I think I’ll head to the terrace for some fresh air.”

Before her mother could object—or worse, send Mary with her—Sophie made a dash for the French doors at the back of the ballroom. She didn’t think the man had seen her, but she intended to stay as far away from him as possible.

She rushed onto the empty flagstone terrace, leaned her back against a brick pillar, and closed her eyes, inhaling lungfuls of air. It felt as though her carefully constructed plan to save her family from financial ruin was teetering, on the brink of crumbling around her. If her involvement in the Debutante Underground became known, Charles would no longer wish to marry her. He’d demand that Papa repay his loans, and her father would go to debtors’ prison, leaving Mama distraught and all of them destitute.

To make matters worse, her role in the scandal of the season would ensure that they were barred from proper drawing rooms and cast out of polite society. Because if there was one thing the ton loved more than reading The Debutante’s Revenge, it was having the front-row seat at a spectacularly disastrous fall from grace.

Oh God. She snapped open her fan and waved it vigorously, as if her problems were persistent puffs of smoke that could be carried away with a good, stiff breeze.

“Sophie.” The voice, gravelly and deep, stopped her fan midwave. Unless she was now hearing things—which was quite possible given her current state—she knew that voice. She knew that man.

She turned and looked out at the small garden beyond the terrace. “Reese?” she whispered.

He emerged from behind a tall boxwood several yards away. Dressed in a dark evening jacket and buckskin trousers, he stood in the moonlight like a mysterious and powerful god who’d decided to spend an evening in the amusing world of mortals.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

“There’s something you need to know,” he said. “But we can’t discuss it here. Will you come with me?”

She wanted to say that she’d go with him anywhere. Anytime. “I can’t disappear for long,” she said regretfully. “I’ll be missed.”

He nodded, his expression unreadable. “This way.”