Page 37 of The Scholar's Key
“I’m sorry,” he said roughly. “Perhaps I should not have done that.”
“Youshouldhave,” she countered. “I wanted it as much as you. I believe I made that obvious.”
“You sound rather disbelieving.”
She stepped back now, her fingers on her lips. “To be honest, I never saw it coming. We have known one another for some time, and yet, as of late… I have seen you in a different light.”
He looked down at himself, some of his initial elation falling.
“Because I am someone else.”
Her eyes flew up to his. “What do you mean?”
“My hair, my face, my clothing, my mannerisms – it is how you would like them. It is not me that you like, it is the man you have made me into, Lady Percy,” he said, his disgust with himself lining his every word. Here he had made the mistake of thinking that such a woman was interested in him when, in truth, it was not him that she enjoyed. It was the idea of what she had created.
“That’s not it at all,” she said, shaking her head as she stepped forward.
“No?” he asked, raising a brow. “How is it, then, that it is only now you have noticed that I am more than just an acquaintance?”
She stopped with some hesitation. “It is only that as we have come to know one another better, I have a new awareness of you. It does not mean that I do not appreciate the man you are.”
His lips quirked upward in a half-smile. “I do not believe you are being honest with me, Percy – or yourself,” he said before he heard footsteps outside the door, and he turned his head toward the sound. “We should be getting back.”
“But—”
“I will tell you when I have managed to get the necklace in my possession.”
“Let me help you.”
“There is no way you can help,” he said, shaking his head. “It is not something that a young lady should be involved in.”
“As opposed to all else that has occurred thus far?” she asked, her hands on her hips now as she challenged him.
“This could be dangerous. I will have to go at night, when I know Mrs. McNall will not be at home.”
“Where does she live?”
“Walcot.”
“Then it cannot be all bad. Tell me when.”
“No.”
“You are sore now, as your feelings have been hurt,” she said, and his eyebrows rose at her forwardness, but then, this was part of what he liked about her. She lifted her arms to the side and then let them fall in obvious exasperation. “To be honest with you, Noah, I do not know why it is that you call to me, but you do. Can you not accept that?”
“Not really,” he said simply. “I like to know why things are the way they are.”
“Well, right now, we do not have time to discover that,” she said, turning from him toward the door. “When I figure it out, you’ll be the first to know. Tell me when you are going after the necklace. I’ll be there.”
With that, she pushed through the door, back toward the drawing room, leaving him scratching his head once more, wondering what had just happened.
He waited a few moments before following her in, finding that Lord Stephen’s eyes were on him as he walked toward the one seat that was open – between Miss Elizabeth and Percy herself on the small settee.
He finally met the man’s gaze, not happy when he saw the gleam within it.
“Tell me, Mr. Rowley,” Lord Stephen drawled out. “Where was it that I last saw you? I cannot quite recall.”
“I believe it was at a social event,” Noah said, wondering just where the man was going with this, for it would be all the worse for both of them if he named himself a patron of the notorious nightclub as well.
