To Love and to Loathe (The Regency Vows #2)(45)

She had forgotten, of course, that the usual rules of the ton did not apply when one was conversing with a man who had been disinherited by his father and operated a scandalous theater in Piccadilly.

“I just thought you might have had… company.” His eyes were dancing with laughter, and while coming from any other man, the intimation would have offended Diana, she somehow found it entertaining rather than off-putting coming from Belfry. Possibly because she knew that, in truth, he had little regard for the rules of polite society—he was just trying to get a rise out of her.

Unfortunately for him, while he was skilled, he had not yet reached Jeremy’s level of mastery, and she was unfazed.

“My maid is not terribly attentive,” she said, deliberately misunderstanding him.

“Ah,” he murmured, “what a shame. You must have dearly missed… her company.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Emily muttered, setting down her teacup with a clatter. “My lord, surely even you cannot think this is acceptable breakfast-table conversation.”

The instant Emily spoke, Belfry’s gaze sharpened on her with such intense focus that Diana marveled that Emily’s skin was not burning. Instantly, she understood that his entire conversation with her had been designed to nettle not her, but Emily. Now that he had achieved his aim, his attention was so entirely devoted to Emily that Diana was certain she herself could have plunged through a hole in the floor and he would scarcely have noticed.

It was all extremely interesting.

“I apologize,” Belfry said to Emily in tones of such exaggerated courtesy that Diana was instantly suspicious. “Did you wish to resume our previous discussion, then?”

Emily flushed. “I didn’t think we had anything left to discuss.”

Belfry leaned back in his chair. “Interesting. I’d thought we were in the middle of a conversation—one I was rather eager to finish.” His gaze on Emily was unwavering, his blue eyes sharp. He was an exceptionally handsome man, Diana thought—not for the first time or, if he continued to make himself a constant presence in Emily’s life, the last.

“I don’t think you understand what you’re suggesting,” Emily said, so quietly that Diana was forced to abandon all dignity whatsoever and lean sideways in her chair to better hear her friend.

“I rather believe I do,” Belfry said in an undertone. His gaze flicked to Diana, who did not even attempt to feign disinterest. “I’ve told you more than once, I know things about Cartham that could prove most inconvenient if they were brought to light, and—”

Whatever else he had to say was drowned out by the sound of Jeremy’s voice—he had entered the room without Diana noticing and, at the moment, given the conversation he’d just interrupted, she could have cheerfully murdered him.

“Ah, there you are,” he said, although, since he was addressing the table at large, she couldn’t be entirely certain that his gaze had lingered on her for a second longer than was necessary. “We are gathering in the drawing room to begin a game of hide-and-seek—would you care to join in?”

“Really, Jeremy,” drawled Lord Monmouth, one of Jeremy’s university friends seated at the opposite end of the table, “have we reverted to childhood? I don’t think I’ve played hide-and-seek since I was in leading strings.”

“Audley suggested it,” Jeremy said, unbothered. “Though if you ask me, it was more an excuse to hole up with his wife in some cozy corner than anything else.…”

The prospect of finding a lady in a similar private hiding spot was apparently enticing enough to forestall any further complaint, as everyone finished their breakfast in short order and reconvened in the blue drawing room. Belfry had fallen silent upon Jeremy’s interruption, and Emily took the opportunity to engage Diana in a spirited discussion on the virtues of poached eggs, a topic Diana had never heard her friend—or anyone else—discuss with such fervor. Belfry watched her with an amused gleam in his eye that Diana thought did not bode well for Emily’s attempts to forestall their aborted conversation for very long.

Diana herself pondered escaping back to her room for her sketchbook and sequestering herself somewhere for a morning of drawing instead—Jeremy had a lovely gallery with several impressive sculptures in it, she recalled, and it had been quite awhile since she’d last done any drawings of the human form. Emily, however, cast an expectant look at her—was she afraid of being left alone in Belfry’s company? With a mental sigh, Diana followed her along the winding hallways of Elderwild until she reached the drawing room—or, rather, one of them. If she recalled correctly, the house had five.

Audley was standing in the center of the room, looking as excited about the prospect of hiding himself in a linen cupboard as any small boy; his cheeks were flushed, and his usually vaguely distant manner was entirely absent as he explained the rules.

“… gentlemen have drawn straws and Rothsmere is the lucky—or unlucky—man who shall begin the search. He will close his eyes and count to one hundred before beginning, and each person he finds will join him in the quest to hunt down all the others. The last person to be discovered is, of course, the victor.”

He rubbed his hands in anticipation; for a moment, he looked no older than he had done the first time Diana had met him, on some school holiday or another, when he was seventeen or so. It was strangely endearing; she had spent the past several years viewing Audley with vague suspicion, since he and Violet had been estranged and she’d had no knowledge of the nature of the argument that had caused their split. Now that he and Violet were reconciled, it was rather nice to be able to look at him and see only the school friend of her brother, overly interested in mathematics and with no notion of how handsome he was.