The Winter Wish by Jillian Eaton Page A

changes
his mind and goes somewhere else.”
    In
a flurry of yellow skirts Lily rose to her feet, but she paused to look back at
Sarah, a troubled frown pulling her lips downwards. “Are you certain? I would
never want to—”
    “Go,”
Sarah said firmly. “If I cannot dance with him, the next best thing is having
you do it for me.”
    Lily’s
entire face lit up. “I will return as soon as it is over to tell you all about
it,” she vowed.
    “I
want to hear every single detail, so do not forget anything. Now go!” As Sarah
watched Lily flounce away, she could not help but smile, and her happiness was
truly genuine. She wished only good things for her friend, and what could be
better than spending even a moment in Devlin’s arms?
    He
approached Lily with a panther like grace, his long legged gait more a prowl
than a saunter, and Sarah nearly tipped out of her chair as she strained
forward in vain to hear what words were being exchanged as he murmured
something to Lily and she smiled in reply.
    Then
they were dancing, and when Devlin curved his arm around the slim hollow of
Lily’s back Sarah felt as though he were holding her . And when Lily
laughed at something amusing he whispered in her ear Sarah felt as though she were laughing too. It was as wonderful as it was gut wrenchingly horrible,
for in that moment Sarah was forced to acknowledge that this was the closest
she would ever come to being wrapped in the arms of the man she so desperately
– and foolishly – loved.
    When
the waltz ended Devlin bowed and Lily curtsied. They parted ways, and Sarah
waited in white knuckled anticipation to hear everything. Unable to sit still,
she met Lily halfway across the ballroom floor, sucking in her belly to squeeze
between dancers and ducking low under a silver tray heavy with refreshments.
    “Not
here,” she said when she finally reached Lily and her friend’s mouth opened.
“Come with me.” Hand in hand the two women darted out a side door and, laughing
like children, ran down the long, candlelit hallway until they reached an empty
room.
    Like
the rest of the Harcourt Estate upon which the ball was being held, the study
they had stumbled upon was immaculately decorated with gilded framed paintings,
matching love seats in deep burgundy, and an impressive mahogany desk that
boasted neatly piled stacks of parchment and a half dozen leather bound books.
    Flames
smoldered in the floor to ceiling fireplace and Sarah jolted the embers awake
with a poker while Lily launched into a lively retelling of every second that
had transpired between her and the Viscount.
    “…and
then,” she said, rather breathless from the excitement of it all, “he touched
my hand. Well, all of my fingers, except for the thumb. And he said…”
    “Yes?”
Sarah gave the fire an extra hard poke. “What did he say?”
    “He
said ‘ You are a lovely dancer ’. Can you believe it?”
    “You are a lovely dancer,” Sarah pointed out reasonably.
    “But
to hear it from him, it truly meant—oh dear, I am sorry.” Her lower lip jutting
out, Lily crossed the room in three quick strides and looped her arm around
Sarah’s shoulders, which were undeniably slumped. “It should have been you,”
she murmured softly. “It should have been you, and here I have been blathering
on about it like a shrew. Forgive me, dearest.”
    Sarah
shrugged. “I wanted to know.”
    Turning
to face the fire, both women held out their hands to warm them as they fell
into reflective silence. Outside the windows the wind howled, a reminder that
beyond the toasty confines of the study Winter was unleashing her wrath. It was
the second week of December, and the Season had just begun.
    For
Sarah it would be her seventh, for Lily her fifth. A decade of failed Seasons
between them, and this one was not looking any more promising than the last. It
did not help that Sarah possessed all the temerity of a field mouse and Lily,
while much more confidant around men, refused to