Courting Magic (Kat, Incorrigible #4)(25)

Even the Marquess winced at that. “Packenham…” he began.

“Enough!” Mr. Packenham seized my closest hand and yanked. “It’s my turn with the lady, Lanham.”

There was only one thing that stopped me from yanking myself free and knocking him back a step for good measure. I was a lady—in public, at least—and what was more, I was under full view of the rest of the diners, at least a third of whom were watching us.

If I ruined my own social début that spectacularly, my family would never, ever let me forget it.

So I let Mr. Packenham pull me to my feet, even as repulsion made my back teeth grind together, and I forced a smile on my face. “Perhaps his lordship could join us until the dancing does begin?” I said. “There are important matters I should pass on to you both.”

“Of course,” said Lord Lanham immediately, and pushed his chair back to rise to his feet.

But I should have known better. “Nonsense,” said Mr. Packenham, and shoved the Marquess back down into his seat with a firm hand. “Find your own dance partner, Lanham. You can’t steal mine.” He started toward the ballroom, moving so quickly I had to nearly run to keep up with him.

The stench of his breath made me fall back again.

“I can’t believe it!” I whispered. “You are actually foxed. On a mission!”

“Oh, Lord. If I never got foxed on a mission, when would I have a chance at all?” He snorted as he strode forward, pulling me along with him. “It’s not as if we’re given many holidays, are we? Oh, no. Born to duty, born to aggravation, that’s life in the Order, ain’t it?”

The brightly lit ballroom was already filling up with clumps of people. So I kept my voice to a low mutter as I replied, “You can’t have been brought up to think that way. If one of your parents is a Guardian—”

“Oh, my parents.” He rolled his eyes as if I’d just proven myself an utter idiot. “As if my father didn’t do enough harm to me, he had to pass on a life’s sentence, too. My older brother gets the barony and the money, and all the others get the fun. Not me. I was a Guardian, so I had to be serious and hard-working, just like Father. I was the only one who could never…” He snapped his jaw shut, suddenly turning a suspicious glare on me. “Now see here, what exactly are you trying to get out of me, Miss Stephenson?”

I groaned. “Nothing. Trust me. Absolutely nothing.” If I’d ever seriously considered consulting Mr. Packenham on the details of our mission, that possibility was long gone.

Worse yet, some second sense made me glance around at that moment. Alexander was standing on the other end of the ballroom, his eyes narrowed and focused with lethal-looking intent on my companion.

I wanted to give him a good glare in return—of all the people in the world, and especially after our conversation in the garden, he should have known better than to think he had to defend my honor against such a fool.

But when his eyes met mine, for the barest fraction of a second, I felt as if I’d been burned. I jerked away, my face heating.

Memories flooded my body. His hands on my back, pressing me as close as a second skin… His mouth against mine… My hands…

When I looked back a moment later, he was gone.

Well. I took a deep breath, fighting to steady myself.

It was probably for the best.

I certainly wasn’t going to let anyone see me yearning after him like a lovesick idiot. Not in public, not in front of the whole ballroom and the odious Mr. Packenham—even if my loutish partner was blatantly signaling another woman across the room even now.

Wait a moment. I blinked hard.

I knew that woman. I’d been keeping a covert eye on her throughout the dessert course, after all, watching her every move for suspicious intent. She’d been laughing and chatting the whole time, but no longer. Now, she was giving my dance partner a fiercely disapproving scowl.

I knew exactly that sort of scowl by heart. I’d seen it from my older sisters more times than I could count. And her hair was very nearly the same shade as Mr. Packenham’s.

Of course, her eyes were a much deeper blue than his…but then, that wasn’t her real eye color, was it? Or, for that matter, her real appearance in general? No, it was an illusion born of witchcraft, carefully created in the ladies’ retiring room earlier that evening. If I imagined what her face might look like without that staggering, magically wrought perfection…with less vivid eyes, slightly redder hair and a less perfect nose…

I dragged my feet to a halt, forcing Mr. Packenham to stop moving. “Mrs. Montrose,” I said. “Is she your sister?”

“Sister?” He barked a laugh and gave Mrs. Montrose a dismissive wave before turning back to me. “Pippa’s my twin, for all the good it does me. You’d think she’d be more friendly to her own twin, wouldn’t you? Montrose keeps her well supplied with jewels, but will she ever just smile and share the loot? No…”

His voice kept going, but I barely heard it. Realization had bloomed inside me.

“You’re twins,” I whispered. With my free hand, I took hold of Mr. Packenham’s coat sleeve and gripped hard.

Angeline and I might be sisters, but—like every set of magical siblings I’d ever met—our signature scents were distinctly different. Of course they were. We’d been born five years apart. George and Philippa had been created in the same moment, though, born in the same hour. Without Philippa’s beautifying illusions to modify her appearance, the two of them would have looked so similar, they could have passed for each other in poor light. They would be nearly identical.