Vixen In Velvet. Loretta Chase

gave a little shake of her head, and waved her hand in an adorably imperious manner, signaling him to get out of her way.

      He knew he stood too close—that was to say, as close as one could get without treading on her hem, women taking up a deal of space these days, in the arm and shoulder area as well as below the waist. In her case, he tested the boundary more than usual. Still, he was a man of considerable, and successful, experience with women.

      He obediently moved out of the way to walk alongside.

      “Here’s the thing,” he said as he accompanied her across the conversation room. “We can take a hackney to Astley’s, watch the show for an hour or so, and still get back before this funeral is over. By that time, the crowd’s bound to have thinned out. The girls are all here with chaperons. A good many girls, I promise you, will be dragged home earlier than they like, because there’s a limit, you know, to how much a brother, say, will sacrifice for his sister. Same for Papa and Mama and Great Aunt Philomena.”

      They’d reached the door to the lobby. He opened it.

      She sailed through, in a thrilling swish of silk.

      “I know you’re unlikely to find the sort of clientele you prefer in a place like Astley’s,” he said. “But I thought you might enjoy the women’s costumes.”

      “Not half so much as you will, I daresay,” she said. “Skimpy, are they?”

      “Yes, of course, like a ballerina or nymph or whatever it is Miss Woolford will be playing,” he said. “She’s a treat. But the whole show is wonderful. The performers stand on the horses’ backs, and go round and round the ring. And the horses perform the cleverest tricks. As good as the acrobats.”

      She looked up, her blue gaze searching.

      He bore the scrutiny easily. A boy born beautiful becomes a target for other boys, and the schools he’d attended never ran short of bullies. He’d learned very young to keep his feelings out of sight and out of reach unless he needed to use them.

      You are like a diamond, one of his mistresses had told him. So beautiful, so much light and fire. But when one tries to find the man inside, it’s all reflections and sparkling surfaces.

      Why need anybody see more?

      True, he wasn’t the shattered young man he’d been nearly six years ago, when his father died. The loss had devastated all the members of the tight-knit little family Father had created. That family, comprising not only Lisburne and his mother but her sister—Swanton’s mother—as well as Swanton, had fled England together. Still, it had taken a good while, far away from London and the fashionable world, to recover.

      Few, including the many who’d respected and loved his father, understood the magnitude of the loss. Not that Lisburne wanted their understanding. His feelings were nobody’s business but his own.

      All the same, he knew what true grief was, and mawkish sentiment made him want to punch somebody.

      He couldn’t punch Swanton or his worshippers.

      Much more sensible to set about what promised to be a challenging game: seducing a fascinating redhead.

      “You’ll like it,” he said. “I promise. And I promise to get you back here before the lecture is over.”

      She looked away. “I’ve never seen an equestrian,” she said.

      And his heart leapt, startling him.

      Astley’s was crowded, as always, but the multitude seemed not to trouble Miss Noirot as much as the crowd at Swanton’s lecture had done. Perhaps this was because the space was so much larger and more open. In any event, Lisburne took her to a private box, where she wouldn’t be jostled, and from which she’d have a prime view of both the stage and arena.

      They arrived too late for the play, which was a pity, since it usually featured fine horses and horsemanship and stirring battle scenes. They were in good time for the entertainment in the arena, though. He and Miss Noirot settled into their seats as the crew members were shaking sawdust into the ring.

      It had been an age since he’d entered the premises, and Lisburne had thought it would seem shabby, now that he was older and had lived abroad and watched spectacles on the Continent.

      Perhaps the place awoke the boy in him, who’d somehow survived life’s shocks and lessons and had never entirely grown up or become fully civilized. He must be seeing it through a boy’s eyes because Astley’s seemed as grand as ever. The lights came up round the ring, and the chandeliers seem as dazzling, the orchestra as glamorous as he remembered.

      Or maybe he saw it fresh through her great blue eyes.

      He’d observed the small signs of apprehension when they’d first entered and the way the uneasiness dissolved, once she’d settled into her place and started to take in her surroundings. She sat back, a little stiff, as a clown came out and joked with the audience. She watched expressionlessly when the ringmaster appeared, carrying his long whip. Her gaze gave away nothing as he strode about the ring and engaged in the usual badinage with the clown.

      Then the ringmaster asked for Miss Woolford. The crowd erupted.

      And Miss Noirot leaned forward, grasping the rail.

      The famous equestrienne walked out into the arena, the audience went into ecstasies, and Miss Noirot the Inscrutable drank it all in, as wide-eyed and eager as any child, from the time the ringmaster helped Miss Woolford into the saddle, through every circuit of the ring. When the performer stood on the horse’s back, Miss Noirot gasped.

      “So marvelous!” she said. “I don’t even know how to ride one, and she stands on the creature’s back—while it runs!”

      When, after numerous circuits, Miss Woolford paused to rest herself and her horse, Miss Noirot clapped and clapped, and cried, “Brava! Bravissima!”

      The pause allowed for more play between the clown and ringmaster, but Miss Noirot turned away from the clown’s antics—and caught Lisburne staring at her.

      For a moment she stared back. Then she laughed, a full-throated, easy laugh.

      And his breath caught.

      The sound. The way she looked at this moment, eyes sparkling, countenance aglow.

      “How right you were,” she said. “Much more fun than dismal verse. How clever she is! Can you imagine the hours she’s spent to learn that art? How old do you think she was when she first began? Was she bred to it, the way actors often are—and dressmakers, too, for that matter.”

      The eagerness in her voice. She was so young, so vibrantly alive.

      “I reckon, even if they’re bred to it, they fall on their heads a number of times before they get the hang of it,” he said. “But they must start young, when they’re less breakable.”

      “Not like dressmaking,” she said. “Sooner or later would-be equestrians have to get on the horse. But we mayn’t cut a piece of silk until we’ve been sewing seams for an eternity and made a thousand handkerchiefs and aprons. What a pleasure it is to see a woman who’s mastered such an art! The equestrians are mostly men, aren’t they?”

      “That does account in part for Miss Woolford’s popularity.”

      “But she’s very good—or does my total ignorance of horsemanship show?”

      “She’s immensely talented,” he said. “A ballerina equestrienne.”

      “This is wonderful,” she said. “My sisters are always telling me I need to get away from the shop, but Sunday comes round only once a week, and then I like to spend time with my niece, or outdoors, preferably both. Sometimes we go to the theater, but this is entirely different. It smells different, certainly.”

      “That would be the horses,” he said.

      “Beautiful creatures,” she