The Secret Mistress by Mary Balogh Page A

that she was the only one he had ever considered marrying, that she was the only one he could contemplate marrying with any confidence of finding peace and companionship and comfort?
    Peace and companionship and comfort?
    From a
marriage
?
    Was there nothing else to be hoped for, then?
    And safety. That word too had leapt to mind just a few minutes ago.
    Safety?
    Yes, a marriage ought to be safe, ought it not?
    His train of thought was suddenly broken as his unseeing eyes focused. Sharply.
    “Oh, I say,” he said.
    “What?” Eunice turned too to look into the ballroom.
    “Of all the gall,” he said. “
Windrow
is dancing with her.”
    “Windrow?” she said. “Dancing with—?”
    And he told her the whole story of the episode on the road to London, with the exception of a few unnecessary details. In this version, for example, Lady Angeline Dudley had merely been standing at the window of the taproom.
    “How typical of you,” Eunice said when he had finished, “to have risked your own safety in order to defend a lady who was behaving so badly from a gentleman who was behaving worse. Especially when you did not even know her. But he did apologize. I daresay there was
some
decency left in him, then, though that does not entirely excuse him from behavior that was not becoming in a gentleman.”
    “And now he is
dancing
with her,” he said. “And
ogling
her. And no one but me knows how outrageous it all is. She does not look happy.”
    Or perhaps he was imagining that. She
was
smiling.
    “Which is very much to her credit,” Eunice agreed. “Lady Palmer is her chaperon. She is a very proper lady. However, without the pertinent information, she would not have known to refuse him the nod of approval when he came to solicit Lady Angeline’s hand for the set.”
    “And Tresham,” he said through his teeth, “is his
friend
. He has a whole army of such ramshackle friends.”
    “But to be fair, Edward,” she said, “he would doubtless not feel very friendly at all to Lord Windrow if he knew the man had accosted and insulted his sister at an inn.”
    Edward’s nostrils flared. But he could
not
, of course, stride into the ballroom to demand that Windrow step away from Lady Angeline Dudley and quit Dudley House without further ado. Or ride in there on a white steed, brandishing a flashing blade in one hand while with the other he scooped the lady up to the saddle before him and bore her off to safety. This was none of his business. And she was doubtless safe from harm tonight, though heaven knew what Windrow was saying to her. He was saying
something
.
    “The set is almost at an end,” he said, “but it is the
supper dance
. He will be leading her in to supper, Eunice.”
    “It is altogether possible,” she said, “that he has apologized abjectly again tonight, now that he knows who she is, and that she has forgiven him, though I certainly would not have done so in her place. Not easily, anyway. He certainly ought to have been made to grovel. Perhaps she is enjoying both the dance and the prospect of sitting beside him at supper.”
    It was indeed possible, Edward conceded. She was no delicate flower, after all. Quite the opposite. She was really quite as ramshackle as her brothers, though perhaps that was a little uncharitable. Perhaps she was delighted to see Windrow again. Though she
had
been outraged when she first set eyes upon him at the ballroom doors, he remembered.
    “And perhaps not,” Eunice said as the music came to an end and the sound of voices from within the ballroom rose and the guests turned almost as one in the direction of the doors and the supper room beyond. “And she ought not to be compelled to go undefended just because she is too polite to make a fuss. Come along, Edward. We will follow them out and secure a place at their table if we are able. He will not dare be impertinent in
your
hearing. Indeed, I expect he will be quite ashamed of himself.”
    Windrow would doubtless shake