“Didn’t you just say—”
“Best to wait for a Windermere to come to you,” said Ravensworth, his eye on the stage.
Rory followed the line of his gaze.Ah.“Like you’ve been waiting for a certain Windermere?”
Ravensworth flashed him an irritated glance.
Delilah was certainly a glory both on and off the stage—the sort to be flame to Ravensworth’s moth. The man had an insatiable appetite for art, beauty, and talent, particularly when combined in one female form. And for all her wildness, Lady Delilah Windermere was all those things.
It was none of Rory’s concern, of course, but he wished Ravensworth the best of luck.
He would need it.
A voice sounded behind them. “What is it we’re looking at?”
Rory and Ravensworth turned in unison to find Oliver Quincy. A moment later the man answered himself. “Ah, the beauteous Lady Delilah.”
Ravensworth’s jaw clenched. Rory couldn’t help an amused snort.
“You know,” continued Quincy, impervious to the tension building around him, as ever. “I’m beginning to think she won’t be accepting my standing proposal of marriage.”
Ravensworth pinned the man with an incredulous glare. “Wasn’t that proposal made three years ago?”
“Precisely,” said Quincy, rocking onto his toes, self-satisfied.
Rory supposed he would ask the question that couldn’t remain unasked. “Preciselywhat?”
“After all that kerfuffle and scandal she caused at Eton, I would still have her.”
A dumbfounded beat of time skated past.
Quincy wasn’t finished yet. “It takes some ladies longer than others to know what’s good for them.”
Another beat of silence descended betwixt the three men as it occurred to two of them those might’ve been the first sensible words ever to emerge from Oliver Quincy’s mouth—though perhaps not in the way he intended.
“Right,” said Ravensworth. “I’ll be joining our hosts in the audience.” He directed a parting nod toward Rory and a lifted eyebrow at Quincy.
“Psst,” Rory heard from the curtain on stage left. Delilah was waving wildly, beckoning him forward onto the stage, where James Dalhousie waited, a pugnacious set to his jaw and a mean glint in his eye.
The time had arrived for the wrestling scene.
Best to get on with it.
Rory strode forward, and the lad ran at him full tilt and immediately attached himself to his back. While the audience thought they were watching actors play their roles, Dalhousie clearly felt differently as his arms tightened around Rory’s neck and squeezed.
Rory had expected something like this.
As he allowed Dalhousie to “wrestle” him—males of teen years could be oddly fragile beings, for all their emerging muscles—Rory kept half an eye fixed on Juliet. She and Miss Dalhousie continued their talk. Clearly, the two women had much to get off their chests.
Then from his one good eye that wasn’t presently pinned to the stage boards, he watched Juliet do something unexpected. She handed Miss Dalhousie her wind chimes and took a step.
A step up the center aisle…
His heart kicked up into a sprint.
A step toward him.
“That’ll be enough,” he muttered up to Dalhousie.