What Price Love? by Stephanie Laurens Page B

sharper; the expression on the girl’s face was one of delighted expectation.
    Pris blinked; Prue only smiled even more, turned, and followed her mother away between the bookcases. Pris caught the final, delighted glance Prue threw her before the shelves cut her off fromsight. “Well!” Eugenia straightened her shawl, then turned to leave, too. “The social avenue sounds a great deal more promising than these books. Such a lucky meeting.”
    Following Eugenia and Adelaide, Pris murmured her agreement, her mind elsewhere. Why had Prudence Cynster looked so expectant?
    Pris had younger sisters, had been at that stage herself not so long ago. She could remember what topics most excited girls of that age.
    Stepping out into the sunshine in Eugenia and Adelaide’s wake, she decided that, while attending Mrs. Cynster’s afternoon tea was the obvious way forward, a degree of caution might be wise.

5
    F our hours later, Pris was reasonably satisfied with her entrance into Newmarket society. She’d adopted a “severe bluestocking” persona; garbed in a simple gown of gray-and-white-striped twill with her hair restrained in a tight chignon, she worked to project a quiet if not studious appearance.
    The Cynster gathering had proved larger than she’d expected; a host of young ladies and a surprising number of eligible gentlemen strolled the lawn beside the house under the watchful eyes of a gaggle of matrons and older ladies, seated comfortably beneath the encircling trees.
    â€œThank you, Lady Kershaw.” Pris bobbed a curtsy. “I’ll look forward to seeing you tomorrow evening.” With a light smile, she parted from the haughty matron.
    Invitations to dinners and parties were an inevitable consequence of attending such an event, but having discovered most here had some connection to the racing industry, she was at one with Eugenia in accepting what ever invitations came their way. Who knew from whom they might learn the crucial fact? Until they found it, they would press forward on every front. She and Eugenia were earls’ daughters, and Adelaide had moved all her life in similar circles; dealing with Newmarket society posed no great challenge.
    Once the introductions had been made they’d gone their separate ways. Adelaide had joined the younger young ladies; charged with seeing if she could discover any word of derelict stables or the like from her peers, she was happily applying herself to the task.
    Eugenia, meanwhile, was pursuing the register with duly eccentric zeal. Unfortunately, it wasn’t possible to talk solely of that; when Pris had last drifted past, Eugenia had been exchanging views on the latest London scandal.
    Pausing by the side of the lawn, Pris scanned the guests. Her task had been to engage the not-quite-so-young ladies as well as the gentlemen, to see what she could learn. She’d steadfastly adhered to her role of bluestocking, responding to the usual sallies her beauty provoked with blank if not openly depressing stares. Her attire hadn’t helped as much as she’d hoped, but her attitude had carried the day. Her reputation was now going before her; the sallies were becoming less common, and more young ladies viewed her with interest rather than incipient jealousy.
    That was rather refreshing; she was enjoying the greater freedom the role allowed her to interact with others on a plane beyond the superficial. She’d always found people interesting, but over the last eight and more years, her beauty had become a wall, prohibiting easy, unstilted discourse.
    Now, however, completing her scan of the gathered multitude and confirming she’d chatted to them all, she felt her real self stir, felt the prick of rising impatience.
    A movement within the drawing room caught her eye. The doors to the lawn stood open; with the bright sunlight streaming down, the interior was full of shadows. As she watched, one moved—with a