Page 39 of The Fortune Hunter’s Gamble

The snort escaped before she could muffle it. “I am a woman and a widow. What do you think?”

“Mr. Feltham, you rogue,” came a female simper. “How do you know this person?”

The crimson-edged woman who had made a dramatic pause in the sitting room laid her hand on Humphrey’s arm as she came to stand beside him. The acid in her tone matched the coldness of her eyes as she regarded Sophronia.

Ah, yes. This must be Rowden’s mistress, or former mistress, Fanny Glass. The prints had rendered a very close likeness of her heavy bosom, rounded hips, and lush, pouting mouth. She was a woman who cultivated her sensual appeal to the utmost.

“I am no one of consequence,” Sophronia said. “Humphrey was only…” She looked around the parlor. “How did you happen into the women’s side?”

“He is here at my invitation, of course.” Fanny tucked her hand beneath Humphrey’s elbow, staking her claim. It had not taken her long to find a new protector. “Humphrey, dear, you must satisfy my curiosity. You know it is a woman’s chief failing.”

“Among many,” Humphrey said with an edge to his tone. “This is my cousin, Sophronia Hinton.”

Even he felt the indignity of being compelled to introduce his lover to his family. Sophronia could not find it in her to pity him. Fanny Glass seemed a sharp-eyed sort who knew her business, and the flicker of her glance about the room said she was waiting for them to be noticed and remarked upon.

“How on earth did your family become entangled with a banker? I thought your bloodline went back for centuries,” Fanny said.

“It does.” Humphrey spoke through a clenched jaw. “Aunt of mine married beneath her.”

“As women so often do.” Fanny studied Sophronia’s headdress, then the simple circlet of pearls at her throat. Sophronia regretted she had not worn the aigrette, then chastised herself for wanting to compete with a courtesan. To impress whom?

Rowden, when he was not even here?

That prickle moved over her skin once more. It was as if she felt the press of his mouth, his warm breath, but on the back of her neck, not her knuckles. Her middle sloshed.

“But it seems your cousin is attempting to elevate herself,” Fanny remarked. “She is much in the company of the Denford heir. Angling after him, I wonder?”

“I beg your pardon,” Sophronia said, rising to the bait before she could catch herself. “Giles is an infant. He is closer than my cousin to me—practically a brother.”

Fanny pinched her lips together. “I thought as much. It is Rowden you are dangling after.”

“I—” Sophronia swallowed the instant defense. She was acting like a peahen. “No.”

“You are seen always in his company. You are living in his house.”

The mistress did not like this. “And you made the mistake of telling him with whom he might and might not associate, didn’t you?” Sophronia realized. “Did you not understand him well enough to know he would dislike this?”

Fanny drew in a sharp breath, her bosom lifting at the gesture. “You think you know him better?”

Rowden from age eight to eighteen, yes. Sophronia knew that Rowden better than anyone else in the world and understood him in ways no one else had.

But Rowden now, as a man—this was the source of her confusion. There was so much the same about him, his essential character only filled out to its mature form. Yet there was so much else she did not know about him now, important things. His dreams for the future. The longings of his heart.

How he felt about her, Sophronia.

“I have known Rowden since I was a child,” she said, a wistful note in her tone.

Fanny’s breath came out short, angry. A red spot appeared on her high cheekbones. “You love him.”

Sophronia nodded. “Yes. I have loved him my whole life.” She regarded the other woman with a sudden curious compassion. “Do you love him?”

Fanny gave an indifferent shrug, but the way her eyes drifted around the room betrayed her. “That is a risky proposition for a woman in my position, but not yours. I wonder that you did not marry him, if you loved him so truly.”

Sophronia laughed this, and a bitter, rueful sound emerged that she did not wish Fanny, or her cousin, to hear. “Any wise woman knows love must bear little on considerations of marriage.”

Fanny widened her eyes. “I thought women like you marry for love alone. Follow the call of your bleeding hearts, with no other notion in your head but your happiness.” She, too, sounded bitter.

“My aunt certainly married for love,” Humphrey growled. “Would have the glassman and none other, though many courted her name and fortune. My father never could understand the passion she held for him.”