Page 42 of The Lover's Eye
“I …” Isobel had to break his gaze to speak efficiently.Her neck burned, her head pounded, and she wished she had another dratted pillow to throw.“… Will see you at the dinner table, Lord Trevelyan.”
Without a backward glance, she stole from the room, her fingers still simmering with his imprint.
♦
Isobel watched Trevelyan with keen interest, her eyes an absorptive sponge to detail.He had entered the dining room in measured strides, his large hands folded behind him.His posture was immaculate, the straight line of his back sharp as a knife’s blade, its contours made clear by whatever exquisite tailor stitched that black coat.
Whatever unseen powers had seated them side by side some months earlier now saw fit to seat them across from one another.Isobel blew out a relieved breath.She was not comfortable in his presence, but found it much easier to be at an observer’s distance, rather than a conversational closeness.Never mind that there had been earlier moments when she’d felt at ease with Trevelyan; perhaps more at ease than she’d ever felt with anyone.
Pemberton was in a talkative mood, invigorated by the warm weather and a successful morning at sea.He kept his friend constantly engaged, not so much in conversation as in demanded listening.“I am of the opinion we have gotten too much away from man’s true nature.On a very primal level men need to provide, and not be so petted—”
Isobel ducked her chin, taming down the corners of her lips, and speared another flaky morsel of Pemberton’s halibut.The act of participating in his family’s supper always left his ego fit to bursting.
She was thankful for the distracting rumble of his talking, however.It filled the little gaps of silence with all the pliability of wet plaster; created enough output in the air to distract from the tension pulling at either side of the table, stretching between herself and Trevelyan.
The masculine banter allowed time for Marriane and Isobel to talk quietly amongst themselves.Marriane led the conversation, centering it around Isobel’s presumptive Season.It seemed the first letter of rejection only intensified her nervous fixation on the subject, as if she could speak success into existence.
Isobel strained to listen.She tried to catalogue the rules of etiquette and decorum being rattled off to her, to cement her focus on the Season and the marriage mart and her own match.But some deep call in her breast pulled her attention across the table.
She ached to keep Trevelyan within her gaze, to study the lobelia blue of his eyes and wager what thoughts lay behind them.The silvery strands mixed among his black curls glistened like hoarfrost in the candlelight.Everything about him was classically handsome, down to the vertical line in his chin, its faint depression emphasized by the evening’s shadows.
He shifted in his seat.He had readjusted his silken white cravat twice, now, and began turning his glass methodically between his fingertips.
“Isobel?”
Isobel nearly jumped, but composed herself.Marriane was looking at her with large eyes and a creased forehead.“Yes?”
“You did not hear me at all, did you?”
Isobel took a long sip from her glass.“Yes, of course I heard you.I will not have any garments made up in the shade puce.”
Marriane gave an exasperated sigh.“That was ages ago!I was saying how terribly I wish to hear music again.You cannot understand how lovely it is in London, the talent of the musicians playing at each engagement, and …”
Isobel had been successfully resisting the impulse to look at Trevelyan, but she felt his gaze hovering about her now with all the subtlety of a steaming hot rag.It seemed to stifle the air she breathed and burn her flesh.She looked across the table.
Etched in Trevelyan’s gaze was the same look she had seen that morning.Not the cold appraisal, but the shocking warmth that had presented itself in the first, brief second he had seen her approaching.She knew she should look away, but she couldn’t.
“Time for port!”Pemberton bellowed, breaking the idleness of the table.The intense, unspoken burden between them died along with it.
By the time Marriane and Isobel reached the upstairs drawing room, Isobel felt herself being smothered.The pressure in her head had grown to unbearable intensity, a constrictive band that refused to relent.Facing the close room with its choking damask curtains and high-stoked fire only intensified the breathless sensation.
Isobel put a hand to her forehead, wavering in the doorway.“Dearest, I think I’ll retire early.I’ve got quite a megrim coming over me.”
Marriane sank into her favorite spot, her pallid skin turning orange by the flames leaping from the grate.“Are you concocting a tale?Like you did when you wished to beg off the Sempills?”
I really must stop divulging my every thought, Isobel thought morbidly.“No.I assure you this is in earnest.”
♦
Rather than take their port at the dinner table, Pemberton proposed the men retire to his study.“I am not yet ready to go up to the ladies,” he said with a groan, downing his glass and sitting in one fluid movement.“I shall have to muster the courage.”
Giles mimicked this action, his lips seeking his glass far more hungrily than was his usual habit.“Tell me, why is Miss Ridgeway so adamant to have a come out?That was all they spoke of tonight.”
“God, I am so thoroughly sickened of hearing the subject.”Pemberton massaged the skin around his eyes with one hand.“By the by, it was mywifedoing a considerable bit of that talking.As it always is.”
Pemberton reached for the decanter at his side, speaking as he poured.“In truth, I don’t know what all the devil is afoot with those two.Marriane is determined to give her a Season, but Isobel only has a singular aim: she refuses to marry Sempill.”
Pemberton leant up, offering Giles a fresh pour from the decanter.He accepted, though the brandy’s scent was unpleasant under his nose.A strange feeling of foreboding was gripping him, and he took a large gulp.
